Webley Spares Prices.

[Sam99]

I was just looking at a certain Auction Website.
My usual searches :
Webley
BSA
Pellets tins and stuff.

No names etc , but someone is selling four Webley spares , which together total £250.00 , if they sell.
Im just a bit stunned to learn that four spares cost more than a complete rifle.

It's a shame really to break guns.


Sam

[Garvin]

I was just looking at a certain Auction Website.
My usual searches :
Webley
BSA
Pellets tins and stuff.

No names etc , but someone is selling four Webley spares , which together total £250.00 , if they sell.
Im just a bit stunned to learn that four spares cost more than a complete rifle.

It's a shame really to break guns.


Sam

I think this is sad as it translates to higher prices generally and unrealistic expectations among future sellers.

[thisisdonald]

If it's on that auction site. I would make a realistic offer based on something less than chambers or knibbs.
It might be someone breaking a fubard gun or , I hope not, someone breaking guns for profit... you'll fund out when you make an offer 🤷♂️

[Geezer]

I think this is sad as it translates to higher prices generally and unrealistic expectations among future sellers.

I agree. It may also reflect the fact that certain spares that used to be commonplace and cheap not so long ago are now hard to find.

I also think that in the internet/Amazon age, people have become impatient. It used to be that people would trawl through gunshops, spares dealers, auctions, fairs and so on in person in search of the elusive missing bit.

Increasingly, people want instant gratification.

In what feels like the distant past, but wasn’t actually very long ago, I used to enjoy physically hunting down or discovering out-of-print books. These days, a couple of searches, and there’s a “buy it now” or “add to cart” button. It is more convenient, but I think we’ve lost something special.

[Garvin]

In what feels like the distant the past, but wasn’t actually very long ago, I used to enjoy physically hunting down or discovering out-of-print books. These days, a couple of searches, and there’s a “buy it now” or “add to cart” button. It is more convenient, but I think we’ve lost something special.

This is very true. In my youth I would go each year to the Beaulieu autojumble in Hampshire to hunt NOS car parts I was looking for. We had fantastic afternoons meeting stallholders from all over Britain and Europe, ferreting through boxes of bits hoping for that elusive part. Happy days!

Nowadays you would probably try to find it ASAP on the auction site...

[Geezer]

Nowadays you would probably try to find it ASAP on the auction site...

And if you had to wait 48-72hrs to find it, you’d be happy to pay 2x or 3x what you’d expected.

We all need to learn to slow down a bit.

When I was a kid, all the shops were shut on Sunday and Wednesday. Even food shops. The only thing available on those days, during licensed hours, was the off-licence hatch on the side of the local pub, which was fine if you wanted alcohol, fags, nuts, crisps, or those little purple sweets called MoJos that I think were three for a penny. Despite the inability to buy a microwave curry at 2259hrs, we didn’t starve.

[Jerry Cornelius]

.

In what feels like the distant past, but wasn’t actually very long ago, I used to enjoy physically hunting down or discovering out-of-print books. These days, a couple of searches, and there’s a “buy it now” or “add to cart” button. It is more convenient, but I think we’ve lost something special.

I used to like finding the second hand bookshop in any new town I was visiting. Nowadays it’s rare to find one, other than charity shops they are almost always rubbish. (Incidentally it was Oxfam not the Internet that killed second hand bookshops. Free stock and no taxes.)

On the other hand I just ordered a book via abe books from the states for £15 including delivery, so, swings, roundabouts I guess. It’s not the same as browsing in a real shop though.

[look no hands]

I know how you all feel and agree with you, when I went to John Knibbs for the first time a few weeks ago I was in my element, lots of lovely old secondhand rifle's (just not the ones I'm after) but it was a pleasure to find somewhere that had a decent amount unlike the gun shop that used to be near to me when I lived near Southampton, which had a load of new Chinese/foreign made guns or very small selection of over priced secondhand stuff, but there's nothing like finding a shop full of what you're after for what ever interests you have.

I'm still hoping to find a gun shop with the rifles I want for my collection but in general the price for spares and whole rifles has gone stupid, I said the other day about the £645 Airsporter Stutzen I found in a shop, I have the money to buy it but I won't because I feel it's way over priced, I may never find another one for sale or because of the next time I find one for sale again they may all be that sort of money or even more.

Pete

[Binners]

A talented Engineer at our fair makes spares, here are a few.

[Garvin]

I know how you all feel and agree with you, when I went to John Knibbs for the first time a few weeks ago I was in my element, lots of lovely old secondhand rifle's (just not the ones I'm after) but it was a pleasure to find somewhere that had a decent amount unlike the gun shop that used to be near to me when I lived near Southampton, which had a load of new Chinese/foreign made guns or very small selection of over priced secondhand stuff, but there's nothing like finding a shop full of what you're after for what ever interests you have.

I'm still hoping to find a gun shop with the rifles I want for my collection but in general the price for spares and whole rifles has gone stupid, I said the other day about the £645 Airsporter Stutzen I found in a shop, I have the money to buy it but I won't because I feel it's way over priced, I may never find another one for sale or because of the next time I find one for sale again they may all be that sort of money or even more.

Pete

Pete your description of the Knibbs shop visit reminded me that I started on the long and happy road as an airgun collector after a visit to my local gunshop, which had the owner's fabulous collection of vintage air rifles in cabinets scattered around the place. I first saw a Webley Service Mk2 there at the age of 16 and thought it was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen. A year or so later I had one of my own (located via Exchange & Mart) and still have it, 40 years later.

i visited the shop recently and there were only modern guns on display. Depressingly, the shopkeeper told me his main cashflow came from selling Chinese-made cheapies, which had a big price markup.

[Jerry Cornelius]

A talented Engineer at our fair makes spares, here are a few.

Oh my. Those are so nice it’s almost worth buying them even if you don’t need them !

[Garvin]

Did the Service peeps come in two lengths or is this just a distortion of perspective (I suspect the latter)?

Beautiful work!

[Troubledshooter]

Did the Service peeps come in two lengths or is this just a distortion of perspective (I suspect the latter)?

Beautiful work!

Different height adjustments on the same sight type.

Paul is indeed a talented engineer.