On 10 auction - opens at $5,700:
http://cgi.ebay.ca/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=308&item=7317493274&rd=1
The chanter looks like KT’s work.
Anyone know the seller - Harvard, Illinois?
What has happened to the chanter keys?
Looks like Brendan McKinney playing them. They look like a solid set of pipes.
Sometimes pipers lose their chanter keys in the mayhem. After playing a tune women can get very agressive and a rapid escape is quite often the best solution to a sticky situation.
Patrick “Less is More” D’Arcy.
Since I play a Thompson chanter, and have never experienced such a scene, I conclude that this must only happen when one plays a K&Q set. 
My guess would be Sandy Winters. I didn’t know he played pipes.
From the text in the listing one might infer he is serving as an ebay “broker” for the current owner of the set.
Warning: I am not saying that it applies to this auction, BUT the number 1 mark of a fraudulent sell is that the seller will only accept cash or money order. If I were purchasing this set I would use an escrow service that is recommended by Ebay. They are relatively inexpensive and both the buyer and seller are protected. If you were going to pick up the set personally or you know this person, it would be a different story. There have certainly been many prominent examples lately of hijacked auctions of pipes. It’s more money than I would blindly risk. Again, I am not saying that this applies to this auction, but beware.
Escrow services are relatively useless as the exchange is a parcel for a MO. No escrow service can authenticate items like the pipes.
But CAVEAT EMPTOR is the phrase of the day and every day on eBAY. I would verify any large transaction before completing it.
This transaction looks pretty straightforward. PayPal takes a good amount for processing a money transaction and that is always worth avoiding if you are the Seller. If someone was committing such a large amount, phone contact, etc would help the transaction happen. Picking them up in person would be a safe bet, too.
This pipes are apparently from Illinois, and Pat Broeder, so someone in the Chicago Pipers Club must have some feedback on these??
Escrow services are relatively useless as the exchange is a parcel for a MO.
I’m sorry, but I don’t understand “MO”, unless it stands for money order.
I used a escrow service when I bought my pipes. I found it quite useful. The escrow service didn’t try authenticate the pipes, that was up to me. The escrow service provided the following:
- I sent money to the escrow service.
- When the escrow service had my money in hand they informed the seller that he could ship the pipes using a service with package tracking available.
- When I received the pipes, I had a time period (time period agreed to by buyer and seller) to inspect the pipes.
- If pipes were as agreed, I authorize the release of the funds to the seller. If the pipes were not as agreed, I was responsible to ship the pipes back to the seller via a service with package tracking.
- If pipes were shipped back, the escrow company would not release my funds back to me until the seller had received the pipes back and authorized the release.
The cost for this was $70.00 USD for a $2100.00 USD set of pipes from Germany to the US. I thought that was quite reasonable for some security in the transaction. This is the only avenue that I have found, other than a face to face, that provides a measure of security for the buyer and the seller.
Paypal maxes out at about 3% for transactions in the US. I haven’t used it a lot, but paypal has always transferred money to my account in less than 5 business days.
Happy Hunting,
John