UK bargain pick & place machine (large)

[mikeselectricstuff]

(not my listing!)
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Contact-3S-pick-and-place-machine-/271615679779?ssPageName=ADME:SS:SS:GB:1120

[Araho]

Seriously, just £1,500 for a P&P? Sure, it's an old one, but they say it's in working condition, and it includes the feeders, which I've heard are one of the more expensive parts about them.

Seems like a bargain for a home production/Tony Stark-style lab

[Precipice]

It doesn't seem to be particularly well regarded or have an active user group for when you inevitably get stuck. If your space & time are free, why not? At worst it might make a basis for one of the open PnP projects.
A grumpy PnP machine is worse than no PnP machine at all, though (and I say that as the owner of several - they're nice to have, and let me do bigger runs, but for a home workshop, a good manual machine is far more useful. Spend the time placing components rather than setting up machines, data and feeders)

[EEVblog]

PnP machines here in oz are so rare, and if they do come up, they are in the 10's of $K.
Not something you could afford to just get and have a play with.

[Kjelt]

Problem is not the machine but the machine control system and the spare parts.
This thing is from 1996 so probably a MSDOS/Windows NT 3.5/4.0 OS on it, some essential (exotic) PC cards for controlling it or if you are lucky just the parallel port.
Keeping the PC alone alive and operating is a challenge. If something breaks on the machine where can you still get spare parts etc. etc.
I think it is easier to get parts for a 1950's american car than for a machine like this 

[mikeselectricstuff]

Problem is not the machine but the machine control system and the spare parts.
This thing is from 1996 so probably a MSDOS/Windows NT 3.5/4.0 OS on it, some essential (exotic) PC cards for controlling it or if you are lucky just the parallel port.
Keeping the PC alone alive and operating is a challenge. If something breaks on the machine where can you still get spare parts etc. etc.
I think it is easier to get parts for a 1950's american car than for a machine like this 

By the time stuff like this hits the lowest end of the market, people aren't looking to be running it in the sort of all day every day maximum speed cycles it was designed for, so if you get something that was working when taken out of service (as opposed to taken out due to a failure) , chances are it will have enough life left in it to still be useable. 
I'm sure there are some machines that have some terminal failure modes due to unobtanium critical parts, but remember that machines like this were made in small volumes, so will use standard parts where possible. there certainly won't be any custom chips in there!
Keeping an old PC alive isn't really a huge issue- as long as you have something with ISA cards, chances are you can run whatever vintage of OS is needed. Stuff like custom IO cards are a bit of a risk but electronics in general is reliable and often repairable .
Probably the biggest danger is getting something with no software, or missing calibration data. Even then it could be a decent platform for a DIY project, and will still have the hardest thing to DIY - feeders.

Obviously there is some gambling involved, but if you don't want to gamble, go out and pay $25K++ for a new low-end or refurbed mid-range machine. Nothing comes for free!
 
Before I got mine, I emailed all the UK used equipment dealers I could find asking what they had in the way of "project" machines under £10K, i.e. stuff that needed time rather  than money spent on them. If I'd had the space I could have picked from at least half a dozen.   

A major problem still is that all these old machines pre-date the web, so there is very little info out there, and companies that still support them are very unwilling to share info. The guy I got mine from was very pissed off about the forum I set up.

[Precipice]

The guy I got mine from was very pissed off about the forum I set up.

which is a shame, as it makes the machines far more valuable.
You might think that manufacturers could even justify the effort of running a forum for their orphaned machines...

[Kjelt]

Keeping an old PC alive isn't really a huge issue

I had my share of bad experiences Mike. I do not have to tell you about the many pitfalls you can encounter like obsolete harddisks that have old interfaces (MFM/RLL/SCSI) or BIOS that only support a small harddisks, special OS drivers that can not be found anymore, rare graphical cards, I can go on and on.

If it is working at the time of sale (best case scenario) step 1 would be to backup and document everything and look for the critical parts and start scavaging Ebay for spare parts for the future.
I do agree that it is incredible cheap for such equipment and the real hobbieist would probably reverse engineer the hardware interface and put in their own control hardware/software.
Still the primary question remains do you buy a P&P for the hobby itself and spent most of your time to keep the thing up and running or do you buy a P&P to be more productive. The same for CNC machines, you have hobbyists whose hobby is to build the CNC machine and you have hobbyists that use the machine.

[mikeselectricstuff]

Keeping an old PC alive isn't really a huge issue

I had my share of bad experiences Mike. I do not have to tell you about the many pitfalls you can encounter like obsolete harddisks that have old interfaces (MFM/RLL/SCSI) or BIOS that only support a small harddisks, special OS drivers that can not be found anymore, rare graphical cards, I can go on and on.

True but with old PC  stuff will almost certainly be out there somewhere, and chances are an ebay saves search will turn it up eventually.
Probably the most obscure part on my P&P is a very specific model of vision card - I picked a spare up after a year or so with a saved search.

 
If it is working at the time of sale (best case scenario) step 1 would be to backup and document everything and look for the critical parts and start scavaging Ebay for spare parts for the future.

Absolutely

I do agree that it is incredible cheap for such equipment and the real hobbieist would probably reverse engineer the hardware interface and put in their own control hardware/software.
Still the primary question remains do you buy a P&P for the hobby itself and spent most of your time to keep the thing up and running or do you buy a P&P to be more productive. The same for CNC machines, you have hobbyists whose hobby is to build the CNC machine and you have hobbyists that use the machine.

It all boils down to how much your time, and the use of the equipment is worth.

Old P&P machines never die, they just go downmarket & end up in garages....