3 cheers to people with no mechanical skills!
 

Scored a 2012 cub cadet tractor with 155 hours today for $400.00. There is a trailer park down the road from my shop. One of the guys who does maintenance for them will stop down to shoot the breeze once in a while.
He pulled in this morning on a brand new john deer, and I made a joke that no green, only the yellow ones are allowed in my garage. He told me that they bought a brand new cub cadet last summer, and for some reason, it kept tossing the deck belt. It went in for warranty work 3 or 4 times, and no love, 3 guys who work for the park tried to fix it, and finally , they just gave up and bought a new one. He said the park manager told him to sell it.
I drug it home, pulled the deck off, straightened some sheet metal, re bent the tensioner, whipped it all back together, and just mowed for 2 hours straight , without tossing the belt. 2 hours time, and $0.00 invested to repair.

Hooray! They keep me in business!

Amen to that. I bought a 1999 Boxster that the young owner had given up on, he had just spent $1800 at a local Porsche "expert" shop and the problem was not fixed. After a test drive I was pretty sure I knew the cause of the high RPM misfire and CEL, so I took a gamble and bought it. Sure enough the code was a misfire on cylinder bank 3, moving the coil gave me a misfire on bank 4. $30 later for a new coil and I had a really nice little Boxster for not much money.

I scored a 2000 F250 a couple of weeks ago, it sat for 7 years with a bad fuel pump. 200 bucks and a roll of paper towels and I have a great running dump runner.

My brother saw his neighbor cussing at some year old riding mower. The neighbor said he was going to sell it and get a new one. He had hauled it to the dealer twice to get it to run and no luck.

My brother offered him 200 bucks. He pushed it home and took out a screw driver and tightened up the carburetor. It fired right up and runs great. 15 seconds with a screw driver and it was fixed.

I would have just fixed it for the neighbor.

Same here. :(

I don't hold much respect for people with no real mechanical/electrical skills, I know its a character flaw....sad thing is many of them make more money than me.........anyway if you every ended up on a deserted island with any one of them, the only useful thing they would be good for is food.

Lack of mechanical skills and society's " toss it away" mentality, leads to some pretty good scores out there.

LOL. Great.

I bought a 67 MGB for a song. Sat for 2 years for a strange power loss problem as soon as the car would warm up. Seller told me to expect a cracked head. Turned out to be the ignition coil. It was hooked up backwards +/-. The car had been converted to Neg. ground which may have confused previous "mechanics". A coil is not build symmetric, so it will overheat and drop output after a few minutes if it is installed backwards ...

G

He was going to but the owner did not want that "POS" anymore. He had made up his mind it was a lemon.

I always get the opposite, wherein the brand new machine I just bought needs me to modify some part because of shi**y design. Gas blower? Check. Pressure washer? Check. Get out the tools.

I got my '47 Dodge for cheap because the seller thought it needed a head gasket/had a cracked head + a bad generator. He just had the battery in backwards and was using cheap points with tungsten only on one side. I reversed the battery & re-polarized the generator, tuned it up with good parts, and drove it for 5 years before a rod bearing went out.

Nice score, Fred.

I got my '90 Miata cause I thought the "Loctite Repair" would work on the short nosed crank problem. There's a lot of fun in those little cars.

I just wore out the 13 hp ride on I got for $200 a bunch of years back. The tech couldn't get it to settle down to an idle. Owner was disgusted with it and offered it to me cheap. Throttle plate screws hadn't been set and the plate would move on its own. Took me an hour to figure out.

Some folks just don't think in a logical manner.
I don't mind when I benefit.

Best
Les

I bought a Honda Civic on the cheap years ago because it was being sold with a knackered engine. I spoke to the girl owner who said lots of smoke comes out the back. I asked her when it last had an oil change and she explained to me that she puts in a litre a week so by the end of the month it's had a complete oil change. I bought the car, changed the oil, drove it around the block a few times, changed the oil and added two or three cans of STP then enjoyed a smoke free car for the next four or five years.

ECHO chainsaw at a yard sale, didn't work $20. Fouled plug.

Your DR is better than my DD.

You really write off people with no mech/electrical skills? There are so much more important qualities.

I picked up a like new troybuilt chipper that would handle 3" branches at a garage sale for $60 Owner said it didn't run, but it looked like it was brand new. He only used it twice and now it would not start. Put in a new diaphragm in the carb to pump the fuel, which cost under $3. It fired right up and ran great. Used it for a few years on my one property until we sold it. Then sold it for $100 to a friend with the provision that I can barrow it at anytime.