Saw that, Wow! Wasn’t me. It looked like a good candidate for a ground up refurbishment. There is a gentlemen in here who has a ready to go, full cab 1450 for sale @ $15k.
I'm not sure what machine you're talking about....
MBSieg, recently sold a 1982 1450, but it was a two-door cab. Bear Gap is selling his for that price, which includes a trailer, no less, but it is also a two-door machine.
My opinion only, but in terms of value, Bear Gap's machine is "a steal". Yeah, it needed work when he bought it, but he put in a lot of hours and did a top quality job. Fifteen K for the machine alone seems low to me, and with a nice tandem axle deckover trailer included?
I see new forum members show up... and complain about the prices of machines. I try and preach it's not the price that's most important, it's the value, and BG's package has "value" in capital letters written all over it.
Paying almost $17K for a 1450 that needs a fair bit of work?
Here's an example: look at the 13th photo. I have a 1984 1450 and the front idler wheels are solid urethane bonded to the aluminum wheel casting. If you look at Bear Gap's machine - they are solid urethane as well. (Same with MBSieg's 1450.) The ones on the ODOT auction machine look like they may be pneumatic tires. The solid urethane won't go flat. But a pneumatic tire in that position that goes flat could result in the tracks coming off. If that happens out in the backcountry? Not fun...in the least. Even if they are pneumatic tires that have been solid filled, they are not nearly as rigid as the solid urethane idler wheels.
I'll admit to being "pickier" than most, but if you read the questions and answers in the listing, the fellow at ODOT, Nick Thomas, said "There is quite a bit of rust spread out through the machine I didn't notice any major spots. There are a couple of small spots that have penetrated through".
Having grown up in Northern New England, which at the time was the road salt capital of the universe, rust is a four letter word. It's like the proverbial iceberg. When you see a rust hole you might think "no big deal I'll just weld in a small patch". Yeah, except when you weld something, you have to have something to weld to. The steel surrounding the rust hole is very likely paper thin and as soon as your mig wire hits it, you'll blow a hole right through it. Now that "small patch" has become a small project....
Earlier this season (meaning the 2020-2021 snowcat year) there were several Super Imps in Arizona that were sold at government auctions. As I recall, they were in better shape than this one, and they went for considerably less money...
www.govdeals.com
