Pawn Shop Finds

Today (2/13/13) driving home form work the freeway was a parking lot. It took me 15 min to get from my office to the on ramp to get on 45 N. While sitting in the queue of vehicles I saw a pawn shop in a strip mall on my right.

Now I have been driving this route for over 8 years now, and have seen this pawn shop every time, and always say to myself I am going to stop some time and see what they got. Well today was the day.

Typical pawn shop, Pawn Stars it was not. Pawn Dulls, maybe.. That might be to harsh, lets just say that it fits the neighborhood my office is near perfectly. (Greens Point).

Here: http://goo.gl/maps/yBLaZ

For you Canon Shooters.

EF 17-40mm f/4 L USM for $599.99 (Negotiable). Exact words. Make me an offer, I have had it a little while.









Tokina AT-X 80-400 f/4.5-5.6 for $279.99 (Negotiable).
I believe this is a Nikon Mount but I didn't check to closely.

I know nothing of this lens, but found some favorable reviews on the net about it. Found it on Amazon for $778.99.





On both of these lenses the glass was clean with no signs of scratches or other defects. The lens hood on the Canon wide angle zoom showed some rub spots but nothing that would have stopped from buying it if i shot canon.

I am not sure I would have thought about pawn shops for camera gear, but I guess it makes sense. Who else has searched pawn shops for camera gear? Did you find anything unique or any pro gear for entry level prices? If you do go out to one, use this thread to post up your finds, maybe one of us might be looking for what ever it is you found. Or maybe we just absolutely need it and didn't know it until you found it.

Duke I buy alot of used stuff from pawnshops in my area. Never tried the camera thing yet. Stereo equipment and music items mainly. Used to buy more when I was younger but still frequent a couple on a regular basis. Drew

No, but I might start looking for some c-stands or booms.....


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I usually pick up my power tools from those places. Got me a nice Dewalt corded drill for $20.

Found an old gold faced Marantz receiver at Goodwill that works now to get that coveted Pioneer 8-track to go with it.

A Marantz - now that's a cool find.

The 8-track player? Reminds me of my project, in 1980, to record all my remaining 8-tracks over to cassette format. After about 4 cartridges in a row jammed or broke on me, I put my entire collection of 8-track tapes in a garbage bag and left them on the curb. Oh well - half of them were bootlegs anyway. So sadly, I got rid of my Pioneer 8-track player/recorder with a built-in compressor/limiter shortly after that fiasco.

tshelfer said:

A Marantz - now that's a cool find.

The 8-track player? Reminds me of my project, in 1980, to record all my remaining 8-tracks over to cassette format. After about 4 cartridges in a row jammed or broke on me, I put my entire collection of 8-track tapes in a garbage bag and left them on the curb. Oh well - half of them were bootlegs anyway. So sadly, I got rid of my Pioneer 8-track player/recorder with a built-in compressor/limiter shortly after that fiasco.

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I still have my old Marantz PM710 amp and matching speakers,turntable,am/fm radio and clock. I am a stereo guru and love the old stuff. Also have a Kenwood set up that I am using now.

I picked up a near perfect 20 gauge single shot for $65 out the door. Off season. Loving it cause it is so light. Had to come back a second time to get the best price.

Bought a $25 bike that was good enough to get stolen.

A Mitchell 300 reel and useless rod for $1.50. Tossed the rod.

Most of the tags on items at the big pawn stores are above new retail. I wonder the logic.

Best receiver I had was a Kenwood. Played it long, loud, and hard and it eventually wore out. I still have a Sherwood 10w x 2 receiver, circa 1974. The woodgrain cabinet is crumbling, but it has a sweet, warm sound that I love. I like the old stuff; just don't have the means to support everything. I recently sold a set of Realistic Nova 7B speakers from 1975. They sounded wonderful still, but I needed to reduce space, so I'm using high-efficiency Altec bookshelf speakers in place of those big 10" 3-ways. I also donated my old Akai reel-to-reel to LYNYRD, and made a new friend in the process.

So I've long since given in to my inner geek and bought a modern receiver with 7.1 audio - sounds great for listening to sound in action movies. It's also pretty darned loud, but it doesn't have the warmth of pre-digital. And the menus in it are more complicated than the space shuttle.

Oh, BTW - You should hear my oldest guitar amp sometime. A 1964 Airline (Montgomery Ward) 5w class A amp with an 8" original Jensen speaker. Got it new as a Christmas present when I was thirteen - $40. Played that sucker in a lot of high school bands. I nailed a board across the open back to make it project better, and set it on top of a stepladder to get the sound out into the room better. Poor folks learn to make do.

tshelfer said:

Best receiver I had was a Kenwood. Played it long, loud, and hard and it eventually wore out. I still have a Sherwood 10w x 2 receiver, circa 1974. The woodgrain cabinet is crumbling, but it has a sweet, warm sound that I love. I like the old stuff; just don't have the means to support everything. I recently sold a set of Realistic Nova 7B speakers from 1975. They sounded wonderful still, but I needed to reduce space, so I'm using high-efficiency Altec bookshelf speakers in place of those big 10" 3-ways. I also donated my old Akai reel-to-reel to LYNYRD, and made a new friend in the process.

So I've long since given in to my inner geek and bought a modern receiver with 7.1 audio - sounds great for listening to sound in action movies. It's also pretty darned loud, but it doesn't have the warmth of pre-digital. And the menus in it are more complicated than the space shuttle.

Oh, BTW - You should hear my oldest guitar amp sometime. A 1964 Airline (Montgomery Ward) 5w class A amp with an 8" original Jensen speaker. Got it new as a Christmas present when I was thirteen - $40. Played that sucker in a lot of high school bands. I nailed a board across the open back to make it project better, and set it on top of a stepladder to get the sound out into the room better. Poor folks learn to make do.

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I have an ruff old VOX guitar amp. You should check out the music thread and post some of your favorite songs on there.

I use a 30 watt Pioneer receiver (1980?) The big Pioneer speakers need to go.

Fiddled around with it last weekend and put the FM dipole antennae back on. Only problem is that I keep getting feedback from the DUAL turntable ground. Someone suggested that it might be the needle but I have not looked for a new one yet.

Those old guitar amps are really gaining in popularity.

Really? Turntable feedback? I've gotten that, but I'll cop to the fact I was running the receiver at garage band volume. Actually, I had a LOT of trouble with that on my first-ever component turntable, but it was a ceramic cartridge. It could actually pick up loud noises and play them through my receiver. Mag cartridges are a little pickier, but they will feed back if you push 'em through enough RMS wattage.

Drew - What kind of Vox? What year? You've got my attention now.

tshelfer said:

Really? Turntable feedback? I've gotten that, but I'll cop to the fact I was running the receiver at garage band volume. Actually, I had a LOT of trouble with that on my first-ever component turntable, but it was a ceramic cartridge. It could actually pick up loud noises and play them through my receiver. Mag cartridges are a little pickier, but they will feed back if you push 'em through enough RMS wattage.

Drew - What kind of Vox? What year? You've got my attention now.

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Not sure the year but I bought it about 20 years ago or so. It is ruff looking due to age. It is on a chrome caddy roll around with a separate head and bottom unit with two speakers and a gray petal that plugs into it. I have a Marshall set also but it is way newer. Has not been used since I opened up for the Rolling Stones at the Lampasas VFW.

I think it's time to resurrect the Guitar Thread. When I have time, I'll post pictures of the Airline. It looks like you'd expect of a 49 y/o amp that has more playing time on it than I could even guess at.

SL350 said:

Most of the tags on items at the big pawn stores are above new retail. I wonder the logic.

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This is due in part to pure Laziness. In the mid to late 90’s (before the internet) you could find a lot of over or under priced merchandise because the only way to find out the price was go to the store and look. With the internet so readily available not knowing the price of your merchandise is just laziness.

I ran a pawn shop for over 5 years (before the internet) and spent most of my free time pricing things at stores and other pawn shops. I had binders full of sales brochures from the Sunday paper. My Store was ranked #1 out of 500 because I new what to loan on merchandise based on what I could sell it for.

Some of my best Finds:

A freedom arms Cassull 22 missing the cylinder pen $20. Bought cylinder pin for $3.50 plus the gun holset belt buckle for $20 from Freedom arms.

A savage over and under 410/22 $35

A colt mustang $280

Remington 870 Wing master $200

A bench top Fluke multi Meter $1

Freon leak detector $1

Hurricane custom surfboard $50

Rossi 38 Special revolver $50

I was a day late once on a pair of Swarovski Binoculars. The code on the tag told me they loaned $10 on them and they were priced $700. I asked her if she was willing to deal and she said if I would have come in yesterday before her manager had seen and priced them that I could have bought them for $18. She said they sat on the shelf for $18 for 3 days before her manager came in and chewed her a new one.

At one time or another most everything I owned came from a pawn shop. Actually still have stuff all over used from them. I picked up some killer Polk Audio speakers a few years ago for a song as well as many other things. When the internet came into play my buying at pawn shops faded out. I still go every few months looking for a bargain but not as often as before.

I have bought some good items, for great prices at pawn shops. The problem I find today, is so many are selling new junk from china.

I really find much better deals at yard or garage sales. Sometimes people don't know what they have.

I remember the good old days when pawn shop owners didn't necessarily know what they had. Before the vintage guitar explosion, I can remember Woody's Pawn Shop in Arlington having an entire table covered with old Gibson Les Paul Jrs, Melody Makers, and SG Jrs. Basically, any single-pickup Gibson solidbody for $100. If I knew then what I knew now -- well, if I'd known, they would have known first.

Here is the Marantz Tim. Notice the price. Do I get some cheapy points?

Now some awful pics of the Vox. Sorry dust and motorcycles blocking the way so just two views neither very good.

$10 for a Marantz.

All of my film camera equipment except for my initial Olympus OM-10 body, 50mm lens and Olympus flash (that I got for a photography class in my jr. year of high school) came from pawn shops. A Vivitar 25mm wide angle for $25.00, a Sigma 70-210mm zoom for 75.00, a 2x extender for 5.00 and an OM-2 body with power winder for 125.00. The only place I found some of that cheaper was when TG&Y was closing and the OM equipment sold out the day before I got paid, so the pawn shop stuff came after that.

I used to get some stereo equipment at pawn shops but anymore that is hard to find with store prices much more reasonsle on new equipment. If they have any high end stuff, they know what they have. I had a bunch of Yamaha equipment that came from pawn shops, still have Yamaha cassette deck from a pawn shop and a Sanyo turntable that came from a garage sale.

I wish I still had this. When I was a sophomore in college (fall of '71), I was desperate for a guitar amp with a little bit of power, but I was a broke college kid. My dad, knowing very little about musical instruments, gave me $25 and told me to go buy something really good. Right, Dad.

Well, I hit every pawn shop in El Paso and eventually, I found this mid-sixties Silvertone 1482. Twelve killer watts, tremelo, and a really crappy sounding speaker (Airlines had much better speakers). But it was loud, and I got it for $25! I played that amp for about 4 years. Eventually, I sold it for $50 - actually made a profit - and put the money into a 1965 Fender Princeton.

Today, I think those Silvertones go for $200-400, depending on condition.

I bought my 8-track recording deck at a pawn shop.

Also bought a Marlin .44 rifle that I re-finished and sold for a small profit. Wish I'd kept that.

Killeen is the pawn shop capitol of the world. At one time or another I was making the rounds every week picking up used cheap stuff. Even made extra money buying cassettes and reselling them for profit. Now with the internet most things are priced higher than in the past. I remember the guide books they use to have. AHHHH those were the days.