"who�s to say the paint he used is resistant to gasoline, water, debris dust etc." It's pretty obvious to me that this mower is for indoor use only. Can't you see the tile floor? ;)
Personally, I think you are being a bit rough on the guy. Refurbished does not equate NOS or "used not even 1 hour in 1969 by my grandma until she ran over grandpa with it." He says in his description he painted decals and the things he did to "refurbish". I would rethink the use of the word "fraud" possibly even "fence" before it comes back to bite you.

lawn mower for indoor use only????? That makes as much sense as a stove for outdoor use only. If you bought a "refurbish" vintage car for a very high price only to find out the paint bubbles and flakes off as soon as the car is exposed to humidity or sulight would you be happy?

I agree with tomplum but also can share your frustrations eric 2007. Since that is the way of ebay, "let the buyer beware" has always been the best bit of advice. Any Lawn Boy expert or collector will know that a NOS or 1 hour use time mower from 1969 probably does not exist anywhere in the world. If he wants to buy a decently "refurbished" 1969 and has that money to spend on...so be it. I have also seen used parts for Duraforce era LBs on ebay for more money than new and the new parts are still available. Frustrating too but I'll always check out if new is available before bidding.

If people weren't willing to give the price, they wouldn't bid it up so high. It's an auction. If you don't like the price, don't bid.

$400.00 for a used lawn mower makes no sense. A 40 year old mower is just that. But if the seller and buyer can agree on what I think is an absurd price then I'm sure they will both be happy. However, tThe bidding may well be nothing more than shills.

It's still not as outrageous as paying 5, 10, 20, 50 times what a car sold for new from that same era. If you do find one for the same as they sold for- there's no motor, trans, glass, or floor! Plus the average Joe can afford a $500 colectable, mow his or her lawn on the 4th of July for old times sake and put it back into storage next to the china cabinet! Anyways Eric- the seller got some free advertising anyways on GW now. WHo knows. Maybe the winning bidder read about it here first...

tomplum, you feel that questioning the honesty of a seller on here is going to create free advertising??? My impression of this forum is for people who have a do it yourself attitude as opposed to paying a mechanic to fix issues with equipment. Therefore why would someone pay $400+ for a lawn mower just because it has painted on decals? Most people would prefer to buy mower locally for $30 or so, clean it, sand it, paint it, repair it etc for a much lower cost and if they desire have their kids or grandkids draw new decals to the ability of this sellers. If someone�s going to take the pride of owning something vintage to the point that they display a lawn mower in their living room next to a china cabinet as you suggest you want to be able to tell friends and relatives "I did it myself" as opposed to I paid someone $400+ for this
Also to roadbike you�re right on the money stating the bidding is nothing but shills. If you look at this auction and all his others previously its 100% private listings so an investigative e bay member has a difficult but not impossible time finding out who�s bidding the price up. The method of operation the seller uses is list the item using a very high reserve price, then over the listing have out of state shill bidder friends nickel and dime the price up to just shy of the reserve to create the illusion the item is in huge demand. Unforcentaly as the only phrase goes there�s a sucker born every minute which is what allows his items to sell for unreal prices
Finally if you are looking for a vintage lawn boy on e bay check out items 370529129991 and 280713659329. although the descriptions are rather generic the bidding pratice seems alot more honest

I forgot to mention another example of this sellers bidding pratices. item 280701226455 is a commerical lawn boy but without the staggard wheel set up, rear bag model missing the bag. a very heavy,low demand and poor transmisson model in the eyes of many. 38 bids from only 3 bidders which again is 1 or 2 of them being his shill buddy trying to nickel and dime the price up however the reserve was not met. $280 plus shipping is far above the value price for this mower espeically it was not internally rebuilt, nor new belt, nor new blade or nor any service whatsoever If i lived just off the interstate in a very busy city trying to sell this mower in my front yard with nonstop drive by traffic for $280 or even $120 my doorbell would never ring. as the old phrase goes buyer beware and never let anyone rip you off

I forgot to mention another example of this sellers bidding pratices. item 280701226455 is a commerical lawn boy but without the staggard wheel set up, rear bag model missing the bag. a very heavy,low demand and poor transmisson model in the eyes of many. 38 bids from only 3 bidders which again is 1 or 2 of them being his shill buddy trying to nickel and dime the price up however the reserve was not met. $280 plus shipping is far above the value price for this mower espeically it was not internally rebuilt, nor new belt, nor new blade or nor any service whatsoever If i lived just off the interstate in a very busy city trying to sell this mower in my front yard with nonstop drive by traffic for $280 or even $120 my doorbell would never ring. as the old phrase goes buyer beware and never let anyone rip you off

Wow all this time and energy spent to "Save the Ebay Community" because of little old me Eric? Why don't you tell these forum members why it is that you have such a vested interested in my sales? Some of you folks in here might know this guy by the Ebay username direct567. If it sounds familiar you will recall he used to sell a lot of Lawn-Boys on there until his mission became to first start sending me emails under another Ebay users accounts talking the same talk is here last year. I now see it has moved on to public forums. Could it be Eric you have such an interested because the guys on there like myself that actually sell something appealing raised the bar for third rate junk dealers like yourself? If you want to talk about comical we are talking about a seller who claims UPS wouldn't ship mowers with brand new blades due to UPS safety standards. Funny I never had an issue with that. I could go on and on. Selling mowers with busted up decks. Selling mowers that he claimed were test run but clearly by photos had not had a fresh blade of hit the underside in years. This guy is the biggest reason I started running my auctions private. As far as you caring on about shill bidding and such I don't understand as all of my auction have reserves. You make it sound like I am going to peoples houses and forcing them to bid. People can shill bid all they want but in the end the guy who bids the most and last amount is the one that needs to own his decision. People bid what they bid and I am sorry if my stuff sells and that makes you angry. You really shouldn't attempt to put people out there that you don't even know. After all Eric you are the one that looks like the fool now that these guys know who you are. Yes I replicate that is part of restoration. Yes I take pictures of my mowers on the tile floor in the back area porch kitchen of my house. What is the deal? Who cares besides you? The funniest part of all about all this is I recall the emails from you asking me how I did this and what kind of paint I used..etc. etc. When I didn't give you the answers you wanted you got angry and trust me other forum members this has been an on going thing with this guy for a couple years now. Thanks to a forum member I got a tip off that this was posted in here. I joined up and got to come in here and have a good laugh. Eric you can't even be honest about who you are as you came in here I see on another post claiming you were looking for a brick top mower and because of my auctions it was impossible for you to buy one. Posing as some poor Ebay victim. So there you have it guys. If I had anything to hide I wouldn't be here. I put a lot of work into my mowers. And I can respect the people who say they would not pay what people pay for them. But I do a lot more than run a garden hose over the mower and take a pic of it. You get what you put into something and it shows. Eric maybe you should spend less time posting crap like this and more time working on your mowers and maybe you might get somewhere. To everyone else in here you can believe what you would like but I have said my peace. Special thanks to the forum member that pointed this trash out to me and let me have a chance to say my piece. I won't respond to anything else in this thread though. I have said all I have to say.

Sincerely

omcjunke197709

I missed the fact that the original poster actually listed specific Ebay sales by number before proceeding to trash them. It turns out that Eric also sells lawn mowers on Ebay and is doing nothing more that denigrate the competition in the hope that his auctions will look better. I'm apalled that Garden Web allows members like Eric to use their forums to beat down the competition with unsupported allegations.

Does Eric turn the mirror around before shaving in the morning?

"tomplum, you feel that questioning the honesty of a seller on here is going to create free advertising???" Yes, actually. I don't Ebay a lot, but when I see a member quality / quantity rating such as this seller plus a thorough description- I don't really question if the guy is going to purposely rip me off. I don't know either one of you two and I am not here to pass judgement. I do think that there is probably enough room on Ebay for the both of you if you wished to sell there and several more to sell these old lawnboys. Heck, I'm the dumb one. I've scrapped many of these. I could be thousandair by now...

I think this seller seems to do a good reburb job.
180697420595

Omcjunkie it�s nice to hear the point of view from the horse's mouth himself. However I have not sold mowers on e bay nor anything else for that matter. I do have account which I use time to time to buy rare hard to find gifts for relatives. The whole interest in busting shill bidding goes back when a year or so ago when my son was doing a restore on a vintage car to impress the girls at his high school. It was a group project between him, friends and friend�s fathers which was a productive way from them falling for negative peer pressure. To put the icing on the cake I wanted to find NOS hub caps and found a set on here however after the action ended I studied the bidding pattern and his other items and found a shill buddy with 95% buying history from him in too many categories. I printed off all the documentation and submitted it to him and e bay headquarters via certified mail. Within a few days I got a phone call from him begging me to accept a full refund including roundtrip shipping via certified check if I told ebay I cleared the issue. Now I search e bay for shill activity and report it to e bay and forums as needed. Sure it may seem like an odd thing to play volunteer snitch but I do not feel the need for people to be ripped off in this economy or any other for that matter. Your statement of "People can shill bid all they want but in the end the guy who bids the most and last amount is the one that needs to own his decision" implies you have a "don�t ask don�t tell" policy regarding shill bidding which mean I was right on track posting this. If I was something on e bay and my Uncle Louie and best friend from high school were bidding on my item id cancel their bids and tell them not to, where as others feel you can bid as long as you stay under my reserve price. Very poor morals in my mind perhaps like saying just because I found a lost credit card in the Publix parking lot gives me the right to use it at the Chevron station before its reported missing.

Also to tom plum I have had a full beard for 30 something years now so only shaving I do is clean up neck line from time to time which I do not face away from the mirror, however nor do I get "aroused" looking in the mirror. The 2 mowers I mentioned have nothing to do with me but just feel a cast side discharge model from early 80's and 60's model with hinged hood are very rare models with no reserve price. Also I looked at the history as possible for direct567 and nothing looks unseal from what I can see although he does not appear to sell very many items at a time.

Regarding the item 180697420595 which is a sweet Plymouth road runner with hemi engine that�s an amazing restore. Impressive if it honestly only has less then 10,000 miles. You can tell they did a full restore showing pictures from every point of view possible. Showing the seller himself in the picture with the car and listing a phone number. I doubt I would ever spend over 100 K to restore a car but you truly get what you pay for in a case like that.

Actually I made the reference to turning the mirror before shaving and I think you know very well what was meant by the message. Just to be clear it's a reference to dishonesty and seeing oneself as one really is.

I think you should stop responding to this thread for more than one reason.

I read this thread because I had a bag of popcorn to eat, so I had a spare ten minutes. It turned out to be about as interesting as what Casey Anthony might have (or might not have) had for breakfast this morning. Bye-bye.

So, was anything learned here? Maybe a touch of live and let live and don't assume everything on an internet forum is indicative of anything (fillintheblankhere) Is Casey Anthony on Wheaties box or something?

"Is Casey Anthony on Wheaties box or something?"

Hopefully, her picture will be on milk cartons soon.

Wow ... I would Think Buyer Beware would Prevail !

Agree ewalk. Listen eric 2007,It's a free market economy. Someone can sell a Lawn-Boy for $15,000 if they want to try. If you don't think something is worth the money then don't bid on it. Geeze....What a waste of time this post is. Hey guys, check out the ebay link and sort highest prices first if you want to see something high priced. But then again to a billionare a $100,000 purse may be just the thing.........

Here is a link that might be useful: ebay purse

I happened to hear about this link recently and thought that I would add a follow up regaeding the posted dialogue.I've read the post by Eric aka direct 567 and can attest to the assumption by a few that he is trying to trash and denigrate the competition on ebay to further his own agenda.He states he has never sold mowers or anything else for that matter on ebay.This is a bald face lie and eric/direct567 you are a bearded LIAR! I have sold many Lawn Boy mowers on ebay the past few years and I'am an avid restorer of such just like a few other sellers are.Eric/direct567 has also contacted me and accused me of shill bidding and helping others in the same.I have a long email I received in the early spring of this year accusing me of these practices,I saved it for future reference and included the response I sent back to him.I'd be happy to provide it to anyone who would care to read it,it is very telling as to who MR.eric/direct567 really is.The bottom line is that a few of us selling Lawn Boy mowers spend many hours and sometimes days to bring these icons from when our great country manufactured great products back to life and there are people who love to collect these machines and are willing to pay us a higher price to receive a higher quality/standard item.
eric/direct567 hasn't the talent to do what we do he instead choses to pressure wash his trash pile finds and list them still dripping wet as is.You can't polish a turd! You can't expect to make money without the investment of some effort and talent.Never the less eric/direct567 is just plain jealous of those of us who produce nice things and can only react by trying to denigrate and marginalize us.
I'm happy that there is such a place as this to air this out with you eric/direct567 as the cat is out of the bag and you are the one who got scratched.Like I told you eric/direct 567 back in the spring just leave people alone and mind your own scrap pile!!!
By the way my ebay username is gasoilmix for any interested.I haven't listed too many units this season but have some nice oldies in the works for next season.

Lbforever,
I have no idea why you keep refering to me as direct567 in your reply. I do once in a while buy hard to find items on e bay however do not sell items due to issues such as high commission for e bay, hastle of shipping items only to have buyer complain and perfer to sell items I may have at the annual neighborhood rummage sale. I noticed in your reply your demeanor comes across best described as, angry, paranoid, and defensive. With you be a seller of items as you indicated that would be a extreme concern for any customer raising red flags from here to the moon. Another concern reguarding your reply is your feeling about e bay members trying to compete to sell items, however if your a seller of older lawn boy mowers just as omcjunkie wouldn't that make you 2 compete with eachother and not act like your brothers or best friends the way you stand up for him, especially considering the 2 members apears to live hundreds of miles apart???? As for myself I worked in the field of insurance fraud investigation for years and far prior to use of gps devices or hidden cameras and honestly quite disapointing what i have come across incuding people making false claims of cars damaged by a huricane until I found out their credit card was used out of state durring the time proving they were on vacation with the vehicle in question and claim is canceled in no time. My point is people who try to come across as defensive for no reason, or paranoid or despratly trying to change the focus of the subject often indicate the inside of the book does not match the cover. I also have looked at the profile for direct567 and his feedback seems typical for the time hes has the account and apears honest dispite not seeing alot of items for sale recently. The profile for omcjunkie does raise a red flag being within the past few months hes feedbacks gone up like wildfire and nearly all private. As I mentioned before private on e bay creates a honesty concern for all since buyers feel the seller has issues to hide. Also I noticed omcjunkie has another lawn boy for sale however this one he mentioned has a green shroud repainted yellow with painted decals. I give him credit for cleaning up his act a little in the honesty department however I wonder how he could paint the inside of the tank and make is resistant to fuel? My overall intent of starting this message was concern of bidding prices and procedures. If someone wants to pay $500 for a lawn boy with repainted cover and not recomended to be used for intended purpose thats fine. I have absolutly no problem with direct567 or many other e bay members who do a general clean up, paint touch up and mechanicly service of a mower then sell also which seems to be more typcial on ebay or local ads. Honestly id rather spend $250 with shipping for a mower thats fully functional and serviced then spend $500 with shipping for one that looks great but paint bubbles and flakes when put into service. Again i understand everyone has their own point of views on everything in life and respect that. I personaly only drive american cars all my life going back to the AMC days, my son in law eat lives and breaths toyotas, while my neighbor uses his motorcycle as much as possible. 3 differnt point of views but none of us argue or insult who is better then who. As lbforever indicated there is competion in any item or service you may be intrested in so pays to shop around and if the seller comes across as less then friendly then look elsewhere. Best example is when I had the roof on my rental property replaced last year I had 4 estimates and timed them all the same evening half hour apart for each apointment that way when one contractor was finishing the estimate the next guy was pulling in my driveway. It crated alot of evil stares but trust me I got a steal of a deal for being informed and aggressive consumer.

So what is your EBay name? I guess it really doesn't matter.

As I mentioned before reguarding selling pratices of this member I'd like to futher expose the truth and genuine reason for private listings. Omcjunkie and other shill bidder fans appear to be unaware that the mobil ebay website accessable though phones and portable devices allows you to sneak past the "privacy fence" by going to the item and selecting bid history you can see the highest bid for each of the bidders of the item with the censored ids instead of the bidding saying "private auction" for example 280732905947 has 9 bids from 4 bidders since listed a day ago. the bidding history shows the highest bid for each of the bidders. As of 6:30 pm eastern time on september 1st highest is id "n**M" (671) with bid up to $112.50, next is id "i**i" (481) and very loyal 2nd place bidding customer bidding $110.00 next is id "l**i" feedback of 0 bid up to 105.55 and also repeat customer. finally bidder "n**e" feedback of 0 bid up to 21.00. This trend in his bidding history of members 0 feedback or "i**i" 481 is very typical as even though the bidding history can not be accessed after auction ended it can still be saved on the micro sd card and accessed as a printable file.

As for why do I care so much? It has nothing to do with competing or outdo anyone but honestly after seeing victims of these scam artists ripped off and nearly falling it for myself with vintage coins a couple years ago I choose to involve myself. I have seen this activity in many categories and report it in forums for those categories which created and outrage from bidders.

As I stated over and over before I have no problems with sellers who sell whatever they desire but when they mislead buyers in the form of describing the item, apperance or bidding pratices I can not help but become involved after enjoying a career of fraud investigation