To what criteria do collectors collect?

[Garvin]

My (very longwinded) point? From one simple practical purchase I rediscovered something I loved from my youth. I find something interesting in each one be it a classic or pot metal toy, all are used regularly and I enjoy every minute whilst I do so.

So maybe the fact that young people can still get their hands on airguns now (and a lot more 'interesting' CO2 ones than were available in my youth) means that in 30 years or so there will still be an urge to recreate that feeling of having a gun in your hands! Except that maybe by then only 'vintage' airguns will be available. But by then this might be pre-1980...

[Blackrider]

Like so many, started with Airsporters cos that's what I used to "drool over" in gunshop windows as a kid in the 1960's.
"Did them" and Webbo's, then took a long rest (fishing interests) and missed the early German hardware. Eventually, the fishing interest wained and I began to buy Weihrauchs and Theobens from a hunting perspective and ended up with four R7's. Sold those upon getting my ticket and acquired three rimfires, then ran the collection right down. Built it back up to over 30 various guns and ran it back down to five or six when the centrefires came along to fund them.

Still do the firearm stuff but I also still like collecting, shooting air rifles and meeting the many great blokes with like minded interest along to way !
The collection of 18 air rifles and three pistols is ebbing a bit of late and it might "ebb a bit more" if I can only decide what to part with next.

Main thing is, I regularly shoot ALL my guns and like them to perform well, I certainly don't have any "pristine" examples wrapped up in boxes !

[PaulR]

Main thing is, I regularly shoot ALL my guns and like them to perform well, I certainly don't have any "pristine" examples wrapped up in boxes !

With you on that.

I had a mint BSA Merlin - I doubt it had ever been used - it had been sold on here a few times. When I got it I fired a couple of shots but felt guilty in case I marked it.
It just sat amongst my collection - knowing I had it gave me no pleasure.
In the end I sold it on to someone who, I believe, just wanted a gun to shoot and didn't even know it was mint.

Sorry if any previous owners of it see this and think WTF but I really believe our guns should be used otherwise what's the point.

[PaulR]

So maybe the fact that young people can still get their hands on airguns now (and a lot more 'interesting' CO2 ones than were available in my youth) means that in 30 years or so there will still be an urge to recreate that feeling of having a gun in your hands! Except that maybe by then only 'vintage' airguns will be available. But by then this might be pre-1980...

In 30 years it will be 2148 - let's round it up to 50 years from now.
What may be interesting is not the well made stuff available today - tomorrows Webleys - but the cheapo CO2 pistols (for example). Most are not built to last - trust me I have quite a few and they all fail if you use them heartedly. So - in 50 years time a mint boxed Umarex Walther PPKS (for example) which costs about £120 now could be worth the latter day equivalent of £600 or even more as all of the others died many years ago.

[harvey_s]

In 30 years it will be 2148 - let's round it up to 50 years from now.
What may be interesting is not the well made stuff available today - tomorrows Webleys - but the cheapo CO2 pistols (for example). Most are not built to last - trust me I have quite a few and they all fail if you use them heartedly. So - in 50 years time a mint boxed Umarex Walther PPKS (for example) which costs about £120 now could be worth the latter day equivalent of £600 or even more as all of the others died many years ago.

I don't thnk it will work like that in the future...

Years ago people did not have the dispoable income they have now and generally people bought what they needed, relatively few were kept in their boxes and were little used which is why such examples can fetch high prices now.

Now people generally have much more disosable income, places to shoot are fewer and fewer, interests are fickle and people also know the value of boxed examples - so I think boxed, mint examples of todays guns will not be so rare as yesterdays guns are today.
That is also ignoring the speculators out who are hoarding them purely as 'investments'.

[Garvin]

One thing this thread has brought out once again, as previous threads like it have also, is the very common view that you have to shoot all the guns in your collection or "what's the point?".

It's expressed so often as almost to imply that this is essential to make you 'authentic' as a collector, whereas anyone who doesn't is an effete hoarder, or worse still, a cold-hearted investor who cares little for the guns, but only what they represent.

I don't think this has to be true, as there are different kinds of collectors - at one end of the spectrum are those who want 'museum-quality' collections with guns as little used as possible, but which could easily be brought up to working order if necessary, while at the other end collectors who are less interested in the gun's pristine finish and more about how it performs today.

I think both views are perfectly respectable and (like Brian's above) can co-exist within the same collection. I have a few pristine examples myself which rarely see the light of day, while others are well-used shooters.

[andrewM]

I have found this thread fascinating and, I suppose, it gets to the essence of what it is that makes a collector and, in this respect, there is no single view that surpasses all others, with everyone collecting to slightly different criteria.

I rather think that some discipline is required as, otherwise, this collecting thing can take on a momentum of its own, as PaulR observes and as many of us know. The event at Kempton on Sunday will require plenty of discipline, I submit!

I think there is also a common appreciation of the engineering behind the makes and models and, as 45flint notes, there is also a personal history behind these, reflective of the makers and designers.

Without collectors, of course, the bottom would fall out of the market and these devices would be consigned to the scrap heap. By contrast, people like us keep the products alive and in a good state of repair, ready for the next generation. To that extent, I suppose, we are curators and caretakers of a heritage and can call upon fellow collectors for advice and guidance - which this site has helped to make possible.

[Geezer]

A lot of us collect things we wanted but could not afford when they were new.

But the pattern of gun collecting (and most collecting) is that collectors - probably the majority - don't.

Which suggests, barring legislative changes, that the pattern will continue.

Example. My dad was 11 when the Airsporter was introduced. He has never had any wish to own one. Nor my mother, even though her great-grandfather worked at BSA when it was set up. I by contrast do own a Mk1 Airsporter. Most of the "vintage" enthusiasts, whether on here or stockpiling different variants of Martini-Henrys, or Brown Bess muskets, are driven by historical interest not personal nostalgia.

[DT Fletcher]

When I first started collecting airguns back in the '80s, there was practically no info available that was specific to collecting air guns and what was available was pretty pathetic. My only real air gun collecting fix came in the form of a couple English air gun mag subscriptions. But I didn't let that stop me. So, instead I picked up some books on the subject of collecting.

One of the things that I learned was that there was a special quality to a collection, any collection, that is the largest in the world of that type. I took this to heart and it heavily influenced me in making collecting choices. One example is my Crosman model 150 collection. I have just about every known model variation, the only reason I don't say all variations is that it's hard to really determine if any more exist. Some 150s, such as the model made in Mexico, are extremely hard to get. I am certain it is the largest in the world.

Sometime I dropped collections since I knew it would be impossible to obtain the largest collection: BB tubes for one. Visited an advance BB tube collector in Iowa and left knowing I would never in several lifetimes equal what this guy had. So the BB tube collection was sold.

Another tip that I took to heart was that the difference between an accumulator and a real collector is that a collector also collects the paperwork associated with their collection. That advice directly influenced me to start collecting air gun paper; which I'm certain is the largest in the world, at least with American paper. I have a large collection of European models, too, but since I'm not familiar with the air gun collectors in Europe there could easily be somebody hiding away with more. I had very little European paper until obtaining the paper portion of the Myron Kasok collection. Myron made many trips to Europe and believed just as strongly as I that the paper was critical to any serious collection. And it is so hard to get European air gun paper over here, I can be somewhat assured that this is the largest European airgun paper collection in the US.

Have I ever mentioned that I have books based on my paper collection? ;-)

What ended up really driving me in the field of Crosman collecting was the wonderful vintage Crosman airgun literature. (The leading character, and I mean character, at Crosman was PY Hahn. PY was an Art graduate from Georgetown University and was very talented. He personally produced all of the early Crosman paperwork up until sometime in the '50s.) Every new piece I found was safely stored in a top load archival folder and placed chronological order in binders. It literally took years to get all of the chronology correct. As this grew, I would find myself just slowly browsing through the binder in awe. Which is why I produced The Literature of Crosman. This book has all of the Crosman paper produced from 1923 to 1952. It doesn't have all of the owner's manuals but it has all of the catalogs, flyers, postcards, etc. It is expensive. I opted for full color, since that is the only way to fully appreciate this collection. I will never produce a B/W version; even though I'll never come close to getting back in book sales what went into producing it. I consider it my most important book on the subject. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Literature-...1687144&sr=1-2