Author
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Topic: [Regency-Superior] Space Auction (June 2014)
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Jared_5714 Member Posts: 10 From: St. Louis, MO, United States Registered: Nov 2013
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posted 04-11-2014 02:17 PM
Regency-Superior proudly presents its June 2014 Space & Collectibles Public Auction! This auction will be held live online beginning at 11am (Central Time) on Wednesday June 4, 2014 at our St. Louis galleries. All viewing for Space and Collectibles will take place in St. Louis. This auction will have both live floor bidding and live online bidding, as well as bids executed by telephone, agent and mail. With over 450 interesting lots of Space & Aviation alone, this promises to be a truly astronomical sale. If you're a collector that likes their space collectibles to be rare and colossal, you may wish to bid on Lot 188, 1960s Apollo Command Module Block 1 Mock-Up, only about three dozen of these mock-up and boilerplate spacecraft survived and are primarily located in museums, schools and other public locations. Only few remain in private hands. Estimated $400,000-$600,000 However, if flashy is more your taste you have the opportunity to obtain one of the most important Shuttle Program Robbins Medallions in existence. An STS-107 2003 Original Silver Robbins Medallion #235 (Lot 251, $4,000) Lot 468 is an amazing, attractive and RARE artifact of the Soviet half of the race to the Moon.The 1960s Original Vintage Model of Russian N1-L5 Rocket, measuring just over 6 feet in height, bears some great detail and design. Estimated $20,000-$25,000 Lot 672 (estimate $50,000) is a very intriguing item. Never used, large 28-cylinder supercharged air cooled four-row radial piston aircraft engine (about 96.25" long, 55" diameter) designed and built during WWII. It was last of Pratt & Whitney Wasp family, and culmination of its maker's piston engine technology If you have any questions or would like more information, please contact Alan Lipkin at alipkin@regencysuperior.com. |
noroxine Member Posts: 116 From: Registered: Mar 2009
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posted 04-25-2014 08:58 AM
It look like that the Lot #296: 1990 Flown Pair Of Soviet Eva Space Gloves was more gloves from a NAZ Kit emergency water suit than EVA...Title is more: "Flown" Pair Of Soviet Emergency Suit Gloves From Naz Package For more details and photos please look here. |
cosmos-walter Member Posts: 691 From: Salzburg, Austria Registered: Jun 2003
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posted 05-19-2014 02:58 PM
Two covers are offered as twice flown into space by SpaceShipOne. Are they actually flown? If so: How many were flown? |
cosmos-walter Member Posts: 691 From: Salzburg, Austria Registered: Jun 2003
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posted 05-20-2014 03:04 PM
What is you opinion on this atypical Neil Armstrong signature? |
rgarner Member Posts: 1193 From: Shepperton, United Kingdom Registered: Mar 2012
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posted 05-20-2014 03:17 PM
I noticed this cover right from the off. I am quite fond of the more unusual covers. The cover itself has a nice, clean Armstrong signature, the First Man on the Moon stamp has obviously been added to promote the relevance of said signature (I wouldn't have done that myself, but that is just me). Overall an unusual piece that someone like me finds very attractive. |
NAAmodel#240 Member Posts: 312 From: Boston, Mass. Registered: Jun 2005
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posted 05-23-2014 08:01 PM
Great price on Apollo 15 covers flown to the Moon. Average opening bid per cover is $2.50. These previously unknown envelopes (Lot 0170) do have a problem, however. The astronauts left in July and the FDCs are postmarked at KSC in August before they returned. |
Ken Havekotte Member Posts: 2915 From: Merritt Island, Florida, Brevard Registered: Mar 2001
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posted 05-23-2014 09:13 PM
Of course, none of these RCA-cachet Apollo 15 first day covers went to the moon. I know of the letter referred to, and simply put, they DID NOT fly to the moon in any capacity. |
NAAmodel#240 Member Posts: 312 From: Boston, Mass. Registered: Jun 2005
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posted 05-23-2014 09:29 PM
Collectors rely on auction houses to properly describe material. This catalog has several problems (like opening bids in excess of expected realized prices) which make confidence problematic. Ken is obviously right about Lot 0170. RS should correct or retract the lot. |
SpaceSteve Member Posts: 428 From: San Antonio TX, USA Registered: Apr 2004
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posted 05-23-2014 10:09 PM
Regarding the postmarks on lot 170...I believe the USPS has a rule that as long as they get the envelopes within 30 days or so after the "first day of issue" of the applicable stamp, they will apply the postmarks to the envelopes. So, someone would've had until Sept. 1st or so to get the envelopes to the USPS. Was that the rule back in 1971, and if so, could these envelopes have been aboard Apollo 15, and then have been given to the USPS for postmarking upon return and release from quarantine? |
cosmos-walter Member Posts: 691 From: Salzburg, Austria Registered: Jun 2003
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posted 05-26-2014 12:16 PM
There was a big investigation on covers flown with Apollo 15. You can find the full story here.As Ken explained, the offered covers definitively are unflown. |
jonspace Member Posts: 169 From: Registered: Jan 2014
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posted 06-04-2014 03:29 PM
Is anyone here participating in this auction? They are having IT issues and bids aren't getting recorded. Desirable Neil Armstrong autographs are selling for $500-600, with estimates set at $2000-3000. While this is frustrating as a bidder (I lost 4 auctions only because it didn't register my bid) other folks are getting insane deals. |
SpaceSteve Member Posts: 428 From: San Antonio TX, USA Registered: Apr 2004
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posted 06-04-2014 04:05 PM
I won two lots earlier (the Mercury 7 signed photo of them in their spacesuits, and the ISS-1 signed launch cover). I was also affected by the IT issues. I clicked twice to bid on the Alan Shepard signed MR-1 launch cover, and neither one registered, so it ended at the opening bid. |
jonspace Member Posts: 169 From: Registered: Jan 2014
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posted 06-04-2014 04:12 PM
While there are some folks getting really good deals, I truly feel bad for the consigners affected. Since my last post, I missed out on 2 more listings that would likely have gone significantly higher. I'm upset because on the first two items I lost because of this, I clicked and it wouldn't register. I then called in to bid but then the person on the phone said it already closed even though on my screen it still showed as open. |
Mercurypgm Member Posts: 292 From: Houston, Tx Registered: Aug 2002
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posted 06-04-2014 07:28 PM
Steve, I notice that you bought the Mercury 6/7 in silver suits. FYI, that came from my collection and all signatures were obtained in person by me here in Houston or Florida. I am sure you will be pleased. Thanks for bidding. — Richard |
SpaceSteve Member Posts: 428 From: San Antonio TX, USA Registered: Apr 2004
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posted 06-04-2014 08:02 PM
Thank you for that info Richard.What really struck me about this photo is that all the signatures go the same direction and are in the same locations (top left, top right, and on the front four's chests). And even though they're not all in the same color ink, they're still "symmetrical". You and the astronauts did a great job with it! |
Mercurypgm Member Posts: 292 From: Houston, Tx Registered: Aug 2002
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posted 06-05-2014 09:28 AM
I just spoke to someone at Regency Superior and to those who had trouble placing bids apparently it was related to the browser you were using. Some were no longer supported (in the past I have accessed via AOL) and needless to say it caused numerous problems for bidders as well as consignors. Being a computer dummy and having just upgraded to Windows 8.1 (totally confused, thanks to Microsoft) I will not try to explain the problem, but hopefully a full explanation will be provided here as to that happened. Fortunately I was only interested in two somewhat large $$ items so I arranged to be called on the first one as I was doing errands all day (I bought the Leonov painting of Titov as my wife is from Star City, Russia) but found out I could not bid on the other item of interest once I returned home... No matter, as you win some and you lose some, but for others I feel your pain (bidders who missed out and the consignors who got less than they might have). As a consignor I was pleased with my sales so I really can't complain. |
jonspace Member Posts: 169 From: Registered: Jan 2014
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posted 06-05-2014 11:12 AM
IT guy here. It was not a browser problem. They weren't prepared to deal with the bandwidth. If you tried to access any part of their website (like the catalog) it would take minutes to load a single page. At the end of the day they admitted to me on the phone that they still didn't know what happened and they thought it was an issue with a router (which they were resetting/replacing during the momentary pauses according to the people on the phone). The problem was with their hosting provider for their website and for their live auction application. Their host could not handle the traffic on their servers. In short, they are using a provider that is behind the times. Modern day hosting services (Amazon Web Services, Azure, etc.) allow server utilization to scale based on traffic. This is to prevent exactly what happened yesterday. While some browsers are faster than others, I experienced the crawling/lagging service from their servers on different browsers and on different platforms. |
Mercurypgm Member Posts: 292 From: Houston, Tx Registered: Aug 2002
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posted 06-05-2014 01:09 PM
As I said, I am a dummy with computers so I merely related what I was told this morning. I am laughing (thanks I needed that) as reading your comment is like when my wife speaks Russian with her daughter and I just think to myself (what are they saying). Thank God there are folks with the skills you have as I have no idea what you wrote. LOL (I am two or more generations too late to comprehend your message). My background was in finance but having consigned nearly 100 lots I do wonder how much revenue I potentially lost. Lets just hope they get the situation corrected. UGH! |
jonspace Member Posts: 169 From: Registered: Jan 2014
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posted 06-05-2014 01:27 PM
Agreed! Maybe it was for the better of my wallet that my bids didn't go through (lol). The short version of my IT rant above is: they should have been better prepared to handle a spike of traffic. The technology is readily available (and cheap!) for this. |
spkjb Member Posts: 144 From: Merritt Island, Florida USA Registered: May 2011
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posted 06-05-2014 07:08 PM
Likewise, saved some $.Would have bid some items higher if the IT had worked!
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gliderpilotuk Member Posts: 3398 From: London, UK Registered: Feb 2002
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posted 06-06-2014 04:51 AM
I consigned a few items too and was surprised to see items "hanging" as if waiting for bids. The problem seemed to be worse later in the auction. Fortunately I'd placed reserves on most of my items but I'm still expecting a reduction in the consignor's fees to reflect the restricted bidding and sub-optimal results. |
jonspace Member Posts: 169 From: Registered: Jan 2014
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posted 06-06-2014 11:05 AM
I woke up this morning to an invoice containing items I didn't even bid on. (update: I called and they removed the ghost items from my invoice) |