What Sweany said
Ultimately, you'd be best off to email Sid and ask him directly. That's what I ended up doing on a couple. Sid pointed things out to me that I didn't even know what to look for.
Another thing John, is you should purchase the Little Giant rebuild book. It's well written, and gives you a complete rund-down on rebuild. It helps greatly in knowing what should be where, why, and how. Even if you don't end up buying a LG, I think it would help you with the basic mechanics of any older mechanical hammer.
That LG's only got a 1 hp, 110V motor. The 50 lb. is supposed to have a 1725 rpm 2hp... 220 preferred. It's currently set up with a little bitty single belt, and should have 2 heavy belts.
The motor has a top mount, which most folks don't care for. I can't say it's necessarily a BAD thing, but it is unusual.
But those are pretty minimal in the grand scheme of things. I think the lack of bidding is, like Sweany said, the pretty high starting bid.
I've seen some machines that were absolutely horrid sell for $2,000-$3,000, but they started off low.
I'd have a hard time buying one without being able to go look at it. Even at that, the 50 I bought had some small things that had been repaired. I just didn't know enough about them at the time to know better.
I think the very best thing in that whole auction is the one question from a potential bidder... where ends it, "Possibly Sincerely"
It's nice to know that he may or may NOT be sincere
