Auction Title: Lobster Tennis Machine TOURNAMENT 401 + Bonus
eBay Item #: 1845250720
Date: 7/29/2002
Purchase Price: Bought: $10.00
Where: Deseret Industries Salvage Yard in Logan, Utah
Starting Bid: $9.99
Selling Price: $530.00
Sold To: An Oncology Doctor in Texas
Description: Lobster Tennis Ball Machine + Bonus Foot Petal Remote w/ Court-length cord. Improve your game with this Tournament Edition, Model #401. Retails for over $800.
Features Include: Holds 15 tennis balls, Sweeps 9 areas on the court, Ball speeds from 15 to 70 mph. Shot interval relay of 3, 6, or 12. Brand new parts: Detent & Channel Ring + All new Snap Rings. Tested and works perfectly.
The Story: One afternoon my brother, Bob aka “Pappy,” was walking around in the Deseret Industries thrift store in Logan, Utah. His Audiology Clinic was right next door so he often strolled over during a break. Bob found this machine in pile of dirty pieces lying on the floor in the outside salvage area with a price tag of $20 on it. He asked the salesperson what it was, but the fellow didn’t know. Bob offered $10 for it as he thought it might be worth putting it all together to figure out what it was. Deal done.
Then Pappy brought all the pieces back to the Clinic and called me to come down and have a look. While I cleaned up all the individual parts, he got the motor going. In the meantime, I started going through the internet with all the clues that we had and found out that it was a tennis ball throwing machine. “LOB-STER” – get it? Better yet, we had the Tournament Edition Model, which was retailing for big bucks.
Pappy is really smart mechanically, he can fix anything! So once we had it all assembled we took it out to the driveway to give it a test run. While it worked just fine, it didn’t have the thrust to throw the balls out at different speeds as advertised by the manufacturer. So, we called the manufacturer and they told us about the likely cause of the problem. We ordered the parts for $62.00 and on arrival, Bob replaced the defective parts and out we went for another test. Wow! It worked like a charm.
I got all the pictures taken and listed the item, starting at $9.99. Then I left for a one week vacation, out of the country, and never saw a computer while I was away. Of course, I was dying to know how our “Lob-Ster” had done, so on arrival home the first question was about the success of the auction. Bob told me that it had sold to an oncology doctor in Texas for $530.00, plus the doctor had paid extra for professional packaging and shipping. We were over the moon thrilled!
The doctor wrote to tell me of the safe arrival and to let us know that it was all set up and his family was having a whole lot of fun.
So was my bank account!
ManorBooks 