I never quite know for sure exactly which vintage G1 toys I'm going to go after every month. I do keep a list, separated by release year, of which toys I still need, but I try to be very loose and flexible in terms of what I decide to go after. Usually, though, when the stars and planets have aligned, I will happen upon an eBay auction that I know is The One, and that I must make it mine.

So, just for fun I was checking market prices for Greasepit, who I knew was going to be the hardest of the four Battle Stations to find complete. He's got lots of little bits, and most auctions I see for him are missing a piece or two. Well, I stumbled across this auction that described him as "TRANSFROMERS MICROMASTER GREASEPIT" or something like that, with "Transformers" misspelled. Now, this was pretty common back durign the early eBay days.. I used to deliberately do misspelled searches for "Trnasformers" or "TNMT" just to see if I could hit upon auctions not many people would see, and end up snagging something on the cheap. But, now eBay's got computer-assisted seller listings, and they'll take the time to correct you. "We didn't find any listings for TRNASFORMERS. Did you mean TRANSFORMERS?" So, to actually see a weird, misspelled listing in this day and age is strange.

The point is that he was at about $20 with one bid, and I had a feeling he was going to sell for well under market value (even incomplete Greasepits are selling for $70-80 USD). I realized I was only in competition with one other guy for this item, so I stayed up late and waited until the auction was nearly over. With about 12 seconds remaining, I punched in a bid for $44. I could tell he was scrambling to counter my bid, but he didn't have much time to react. I watched as his counter-bids jumped to $26, and then $33, and then $44... and then something happened that I've never seen before. eBay wasn't quite sure who had actually won the auction. I got a page that said, "eBay is calculating the top bidder. Please refresh the page." It was like that for several moments. He must have attempted to counter my $44 bid within a fraction of a second of the auction's close. In the end, I was declared the top bidder, obviously, because I'm here talking about the toy now. To get a complete Greasepit for $44 in today's market is pretty much unheard of, so I'm very pleased.

I have another story to tell about the other Micromaster toys I got from the same seller, but I'm waiting on some parts to complete them, so I'll wait until I've completed those toys to talk about them.

So, Greasepit himself is a redeco of Mudslinger from the Autobot Off-Road Patrol, only he's a bad guy. In vehicle mode, he's a neutral grey with deep blue windows, and he gets something the carded Micromasters never had—consumer-applied stickers. There are two little yellow labels that go on the doors of his monster truck mode that read "4WD," and help to differentiate him a bit from the otherwise undecorated Mudslinger.

He transforms the same, of course, with the front of the truck forming the robot legs, and the robot head flipping up from the rear bumper. In this form, he's got a grey head and legs, a yellow body, and a purple-painted face, and purple trapezoid-shaped windows painted on his chest as well. He can only raise his arms 90 degrees, as they lock and prevent movement if you try to go any higher. I imagine, based solely on his name alone, that he runs a dirty, disgusting gas station with smelly bathrooms, and he probably forgets to put your gas cap back on, too.

The playset he comes with is a mostly blue gas station, about 3.75" wide and 3.75" long, and measuring less than three inches in height. (I can tell the one I bought was on display for a bit. Besides being dusty, the blue is slightly discolored in places from sunlight exposure.) There are two buildings, one a garage with stickers suggesting the presence of spare tires and paint cans and things, and the other a shop with glass windows sporting various sale signs stuck to the glass. I don't think the store is meant for other Transformers to shop in (it would be way too small, even for other Micromasters); I imagine it's a front meant to trick humans.

You complete the gas station by attaching the red "gas station" sign (Easily Lost Piece #1) and the twin yellow gas pumps and the yellow ramp and the advertising sign featuring the "super gasoline Z-1" (Easily Lost Piece #2). Despite the presence of two pumps, there's really only room for one Micromaster to refuel at a time, which is probably how Greasepit likes it. Fewer customers means less work for him.

The gas station transforms into what is described in the instructions as an "assault tower station." After propping the entire gas station on its backside, the garage unfolds and doubles in height to 6.75" and reveals a positionable missile launcher at the base, and a flip-out row of two red search lights at the top. (The missile has a groove on one side that corresponds to a thin strip of protruding plastic on the launcher, so you just plug it into place. You can mount it so that it's armed and ready, or partially deployed if you like.) The gas station sign post mounts to the top of the base now, near the search lights. The store front also pops open to reveal a battery of three yellow laser cannons, with the store front glass now upside-down.

The section to which the gas pumps are attached also opens up, to reveal a cockpit for Greasepit to man, as well as a quadruple-barreled laser turret for him to operate (it reminds me of the missile launcher PAC/RAT from G.I. Joe). He can't fit in the cockpit facing the quad-laser, though, because of the big, fat monster truck wheels on his legs. One supposes he's got controls in the cockpit to operate all the weapons remotely. He can also man the control tower to operate the search lights directly, shining them on any targets he needs to see clearly in order to more effectively destroy. There's sculpted detail on the inside tower that includes ladders for him to climb, just in case you were wondering how he gets up there.

The instructions specifically note that you can swap the four-phase laser and the missile launcher, which is true, but the playset won't transform back with them in the "wrong" spots. You don't technically need to remove the ramp, but due to the new base configuration, it hangs loosely from the middle of the tower and cannot be accessed or used in this state. But, it's an incredibly well-armed battle station, with more firepower than a lot of conventionally-sized Transformers. Greasepit guards his fuel fiercely, and he'll be damned if he's going to let any enemy Autobots, or any especially greedy Decepticon comrades, come anywhere near it without a fight.

The updated version of this playset that came out for Earthrise in 2020 was a halfway decent effort at reproducing the look of the Greasepit playset, even if it didn't quite have all the functionality of the G1 version.

So, you can get an incomplete Greasepit for around $35, but every piece you're missing will run you $15 a pop, so it adds up quick. Also, the gas station sign post and the little super gasoline billboard are basically never available on their own, so it would be super difficult to complete a playset that way. (Even if I choose to replace the main playset piece at some point down the road, it won't set me back much.) I knew that Greasepit was going to be very hard to find complete, so the fact that I snagged one without breaking the bank was a small miracle. I even had enough cash budgeted to get a couple of other toys this month! So, to say I'm pleased would be an understatement.

Zob (time to break out the Q-tips now, though, 'coz he's a little dusty)

On Friday, May 5, 2023 at 6:15:18 PM UTC-7, Zobovor wrote:
> So, to actually see a weird, misspelled listing in this day and age is strange.

I was watching this seller because they started out their TF stuff with hundreds of incredible sealed and minty boxed G1s. To be fair, they did like 480 auctions with 'Formers' spelled right and only 22 with the 'Fromers'. I'd have figured with so many eyeballs on the boxed and sealed stuff that collectors would have been looking at their other auctions regardless of the misspellings.

> The point is that he was at about $20 with one bid, and I had a feeling he was going to sell for well under market value (even incomplete Greasepits are selling for $70-80 USD).

Oh boy I imagine you were like that meme picture of the guy waiting behind the tree licking his lips.

> I realized I was only in competition with one other guy for this item, so I stayed up late and waited until the auction was nearly over.

Ah that explains why it went so low. The auction ended on a Monday night at 9 pm west coast time. Everyone on the east coast is asleep so that eliminates the geographic majority of Transformers collectors (and also a good chunk of kiddies who waste everyone's time with high fake bids). You'd figure the seller would have learned a long time ago to always end auctions on a Sunday night (and to spell Transformers right).

> With about 12 seconds remaining, I punched in a bid for $44.

OMG 12 seconds is an eternity. I too am a scummy degenerate ebay sniper but I wait for the last 5 seconds to pull the trigger. That cuts it razor close but only once has my bid not made it in in time and I'm sure that was due to a bad wifi connection. Those incremental bidding bots are useless against bids that process in the last two seconds or so.

> and then something happened that I've never seen before. eBay wasn't quite sure who had actually won the auction. I got a page that said, "eBay is calculating the top bidder. Please refresh the page." It was like that for several moments.

Trust me, when you wait until the last five seconds this happens a LOT.

> He must have attempted to counter my $44 bid within a fraction of a second of the auction's close.

Yeah he probably got a buzzer beater bid in and ebay took it but needed to process it. So I guess he was up late, too but didn't want it bad enough or had a slow proxy bidding bot with too small increments. I can't believe a real person would play games like that up to the last second only doing 3 buck increases each time. You guys are both lucky that someone more representative of the average market price didn't come in and take it away for 60 bucks.

> he gets something the carded Micromasters never had—consumer-applied stickers. There are two little yellow labels that go on the doors of his monster truck mode that read "4WD," and help to differentiate him a bit from the otherwise undecorated Mudslinger.

Interesting about the stickers. I remember having a blue B-1 bomber looking micromaster combiner with stickers on it. I wondered why some micros came with stickers and others didn't.

> I imagine, based solely on his name alone, that he runs a dirty, disgusting gas station with smelly bathrooms, and he probably forgets to put your gas cap back on, too.

He probably scratches off the lottery tickets without paying for them and lets flies get on the hot dogs..

> The playset he comes with is a mostly blue gas station, about 3.75" wide and 3.75" long, and measuring less than three inches in height. (I can tell the one I bought was on display for a bit. Besides being dusty, the blue is slightly discolored in places from sunlight exposure.)

I am kind of surprised this wasn't a deal breaker for you given that you want the most minty specimens.

> There are two buildings, one a garage with stickers suggesting the presence of spare tires and paint cans and things, and the other a shop with glass windows sporting various sale signs stuck to the glass. I don't think the store is meant for other Transformers to shop in (it would be way too small, even for other Micromasters); I imagine it's a front meant to trick humans.

Okay I get that they were copying Micro Machines so gas stations are a no-brainer, but this was s huge missed opportunity to connect with the kids that were buying the toys. Some of these micro stations could have turned into toy stores or video game arcades. It would have been neat to see some officially licensed micro stations that turned into a K-Mart or Zayre or Toys R Us or Kay Bee toys or something.

> I knew that Greasepit was going to be very hard to find complete, so the fact that I snagged one without breaking the bank was a small miracle. I even had enough cash budgeted to get a couple of other toys this month! So, to say I'm pleased would be an understatement.

Yeah definitely a victory worth celebrating in this day and age. The other thread talks about starting a collection late in the game but you're kinda doing the same thing with G1. I do like reading about your adventures collecting latter year G1 at a time when prices seem to be at their most astronomical.

On Saturday, May 6, 2023 at 8:58:24 PM UTC-6, Evil King Macrocranios wrote:

> OMG 12 seconds is an eternity. I too am a scummy degenerate ebay sniper but I wait for the last 5 seconds to pull the trigger.

So, back before smart phones were a thing and I could only bid on auctions from my desktop computer, I used to get so frustrated when an auction ended during the middle of the day when I was still at work. Then I discovered the auction sniping sites that would place proxy bids for you, which eliminated most of the frustration, but not all of it. That still left an opportunity for somebody to outbid me if they were quick enough. There's nothing that grinds my gears more than bidding $50 for something and watching somebody else get it for $50.25. I mean, obviously if I'm willing to spend fifty bucks on an item, I'd be willing to fork over the extra quarter. It's a soft limit. Never once have I gone, "Nope, this toy is only worth $100 to me and not a penny more!" But, of course, that's how they get you.

eBay psychology is so interesting to me. Sometimes people get into these intense bidding wars and end up paying far above market value for something, just because they were trying so hard to beat the other guy. Sometimes perfectly worthwhile items fail to sell at all, just because the seller uploaded a blurry picture. I try not to allow myself to fall into psychological traps like that, but I'll admit that I am more likely to buy from a seller who has a) uploaded 12 photos instead of just one, and b) transforms the toy correctly. I actually saw an auction the other day where somebody had propped up some toy—maybe it was G1 Wreck-Gar?—on all fours like it was a quadruped. Absurd.

> Interesting about the stickers. I remember having a blue B-1 bomber looking micromaster combiner with stickers on it. I wondered why some micros came with stickers and others didn't.

I think it comes down to how they were packaged, honestly. All the boxed Micromasters had stickers, but none of the carded toys did. It sort of mirrors how a lot of carded toys like Mini Autobots or Throttlebots didn't have consumer-applied labels. They did the exact same thing with the Action Masters. I'm sure some Hasbro bean-counter couldn't justify the cost of producing sticker sheets for toys that were only retailing for a few dollars.

>> I can tell the one I bought was on display for a bit. Besides being dusty, the blue is slightly discolored in places from sunlight exposure.
>
> I am kind of surprised this wasn't a deal breaker for you given that you want the most minty specimens.

True, but honestly when you're buying a loose, complete G1 toy, you're paying for the accessories. You can get Headmasters with no heads, or Targetmasters with no guns, for only a few bucks. So, as long as I got the all-important gas station sign and super gasoline sign, that's what was really important. If I have to spend a few more dollars to get another incomplete gas station playset, I can always sell off the slightly discolored one and make back a little bit of money. (At least, that's what I tell myself.)

> Okay I get that they were copying Micro Machines so gas stations are a no-brainer, but this was s huge missed opportunity to connect with the kids that were buying the toys. Some of these micro stations could have turned into toy stores or video game arcades. It would have been neat to see some officially licensed micro stations that turned into a K-Mart or Zayre or Toys R Us or Kay Bee toys or something.

Now, that would have honestly been a stroke of genius. But, I wonder if they were filtering it through the premise of the Autobot-Decepticon war, and what types of stations would make sense. Like, a gas station is pretty sensible, because all Transformers need to refuel. It would be hard to justify the existence of a toy store within the fictional Transformers universe. It would be a disguise, of course, but I wonder if Hasbro would have gone for it.

Of course, I've always wondered why we've never gotten a Transformers toy that turns into a schoolbus, either. It's such an iconic vehicle that millions of kids would be familiar with, so it seems like a huge missed opportunity.

> The other thread talks about starting a collection late in the game but you're kinda doing the same thing with G1. I do like reading about your adventures collecting latter year G1 at a time when prices seem to be at their most astronomical.

I am quite late to the party, admittedly. I would have been doing this 20 years ago, but I just wasn't in a place where I could do it financially. I mean, maybe I could have done it if I wasn't buying any Beast Wars or Star Wars toys, but I don't think I would have been happy collecting *only* vintage G1 and nothing else. Now, I can keep up on current stuff and still get some vintage G1 on the side, so it's the best of both worlds. Just took me a while to get to a place where I could finally make it happen.

We also didn't know what the reissue market was going to end up looking like. I was pretty content to buy the Hasbro reissues when they were coming out around 2003, and then the Takara reissues to finish off whatever Hasbro hadn't imported domestically... and then the Zhong Jin unlicensed "reissues" to catch toys like Mirage and Sunstreaker and the Dinobots that neither official company did. But, when there were no reissues left to buy, official or unofficial, vintage G1 was the next logical step for me. But, of course, two decades ago there was no way of knowing when they'd stop. If Takara had kept churning them out and doing reissue versions of Chromedome and Landfill and Skyhopper, I'd have gobbled up all of 'em.

In some ways, I'm saving some of the most expensive G1 toys for last (Roadbuster, Monstructor, Targetmaster Scourge, etc.) which may not be the best strategy. Prices are only going to continue to go up. But, I think it will be easier for me to justify paying $200+ for Roadbuster if he's literally the last toy I need to get to complete an American G1 collection. Hopefully the wife will see it the same way, too...

Zob (honestly, she is super supportive of my hobby, and I love her all the more for it)

On Saturday, May 6, 2023 at 8:44:57 PM UTC-7, Zobovor wrote:
> There's nothing that grinds my gears more than bidding $50 for something and watching somebody else get it for $50.25. I mean, obviously if I'm willing to spend fifty bucks on an item, I'd be willing to fork over the extra quarter. It's a soft limit.

But the thing is you don't know how much over that quarter their bid was set. You can't assume that was their max. The guy probably bid $250 and all he needed was a quarter. So my philosophy is bid high, bid fast, bid last. So that if they do win, you at least made them pay.

> I actually saw an auction the other day where somebody had propped up some toy—maybe it was G1 Wreck-Gar?—on all fours like it was a quadruped. Absurd.

Was it this one? It stuck out to me, too.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/394538097157

A long time ago after mistransforming Apeface and Snapdragon so that they too resembled long necked quadrupeds, I came up with a theory that all Transformers have an undocumented llama mode.

> If I have to spend a few more dollars to get another incomplete gas station playset, I can always sell off the slightly discolored one and make back a little bit of money. (At least, that's what I tell myself.)

Well as long as the total cost of your duplicates comes in under the current market price you're good. Or I guess you could always just be happy with what you have.

> But, I wonder if they were filtering it through the premise of the Autobot-Decepticon war, and what types of stations would make sense. Like, a gas station is pretty sensible, because all Transformers need to refuel.

If only they tried a little harder to mine the intellectual property already being created for the line. They could have done a micromaster Car Wash of Doom. Maybe one day there will be reprolabel sets to turn these gas station micro playsets into car washes and toy stores of doom.

> It would be hard to justify the existence of a toy store within the fictional Transformers universe. It would be a disguise, of course, but I wonder if Hasbro would have gone for it.

I do remember a scene in the cartoon where Vortex is causing a windstorm and among the debris going airborne is a big sign that says "TOY" or "TOYS" like a toy store had gotten demolished by the hurricane force wind.

I do like the idea of an evil Decepticon toy store. Maybe it could be run by micromaster Swindle.

> Of course, I've always wondered why we've never gotten a Transformers toy that turns into a schoolbus, either. It's such an iconic vehicle that millions of kids would be familiar with, so it seems like a huge missed opportunity.

I guess all these toy/cartoon fantasies were meant to be escapes from normal childhood worries and situations. Bringing a school bus into it might make things too real and uncool to kids. Plus there is no scenario I can see where a school bus fits into a war without the implication that non combatant children are being used as human shields. Is the bus a good guy or a bad guy? Either way whoever is riding in it runs the risk of dying in a space robot battle. Definite redeco potential as a prison/jail transport though.

> In some ways, I'm saving some of the most expensive G1 toys for last (Roadbuster, Monstructor, Targetmaster Scourge, etc.) which may not be the best strategy. Prices are only going to continue to go up.

Well remember if you outlive enough people the bubble will burst and there will eventually be more supply than demand.

> > Of course, I've always wondered why we've never gotten a Transformers toy that turns into a schoolbus, either. It's such an iconic vehicle that millions of kids would be familiar with, so it seems like a huge missed opportunity.

The school bus idea has so much potential. It's a creative use of the "robots in disguise" concept. The rubsigns, normally so superfluous, could once again become relevant. Is this a heroic Autobot determined to protect innocent children? Or an evil Decepticon poised to take hostages?

Or thirdly, is it The Magic School Bus? (Hasbro Collaborative, you can have that idea for free).

On Saturday, May 6, 2023 at 11:25:14 PM UTC-6, Evil King Macrocranios wrote:

> But the thing is you don't know how much over that quarter their bid was set. You can't assume that was their max. The guy probably bid $250 and all he needed was a quarter. So my philosophy is bid high, bid fast, bid last. So that if they do win, you at least made them pay.

Good points. There have been times when I placed an absurdly high bid, and immediately said a silent prayer to the auction gods hoping that somebody would outbid me. When they do, I feel a sense of relief. These days, there are an abundance of Buy It Now listings that bypass the whole auction format, and quite frankly I love it. Either I'm willing to pay their asking price, or I'm not. (Sometimes I will use the Make An Offer function and try to haggle a bit. Obviously if I'm looking at a $150 toy, it's not as if I can't afford it unless they drop the price to $142.36. But, it's the point of the thing.)

> Was it this one? It stuck out to me, too.

Yeah, that's the one. It demonstrates a complete lack of seller product knowledge. I assume people are going to be somewhat knowledgeable about what they're selling, unless they have disclaimers in the auction listing like "estale sale find" or "I am not a collector" or somesuch. But, if this person legitimately thinks Wreck-Gar is a dog, then obviously I can't ask them legitimate questions about the toy's condition or completeness. Because they think Wreck-Gar is a dog.

> Well as long as the total cost of your duplicates comes in under the current market price you're good. Or I guess you could always just be happy with what you have.

Most of the G1 toys I still have from my childhood are well-loved and unsuitable for display. I got a lot of enjoyment out of them, which was the whole point, of course. But, as an adult I have different standards, and toys with chrome wear and peeling stickers and chipped paint cannot go on my display shelf. I want toys that are complete and in reasonably good condition. I'll make allowances for small defects, because these are toys that are three or four decades old, and it's unrealistic to expect them to be pristine. But, at the same time, I want a collection I can be proud of. It's a balancing act.

In this journey to complete my G1 collection, I've already acquired a number of extras, which I envision I'll be selling off once I'm done buying everything I need. By that time, the toys will probably be closer to 50 years old instead of 30 or 40, so maybe even my rejects will be worth more than they are now. Who knows?

> If only they tried a little harder to mine the intellectual property already being created for the line. They could have done a micromaster Car Wash of Doom.

Wait, that reminds me of something I saw on Twitter. Here we go:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Ev0FAOJUUAEgWeU?format=jpg&name=large

> I do like the idea of an evil Decepticon toy store. Maybe it could be run by micromaster Swindle.

> I guess all these toy/cartoon fantasies were meant to be escapes from normal childhood worries and situations. Bringing a school bus into it might make things too real and uncool to kids.

Well, I think the best toy line ideas are the hard limitations that force the developers to get creative. For example, the only reason that He-Man rides around on a gigantic tiger was because they had run out of money for tooling, so they couldn't make him a dedicated vehicle, but there was an earlier toy line called Big Jim that was designed at a much larger scale. It was a normal-sized tiger in the Big Jim world, but it became a gigantic horse-sized tiger for He-Man. And honestly it's such a bizarre, unexpected concept that it's one of the things that made Masters of the Universe a success. Or, the idea that a rat taught four tortoises how to fight with ninjitsu weapons so they can fight a naked android with a brain in his stomach. There's nothing about that that's intuitive or makes sense.

My point is, had there been a Diaclone toy that turned into a schoolbus and Hasbro felt obligated to use it in the toy line somehow, I'm sure they would have found a role for him. Maybe he could have been the troop transport for the Autobots, and he carried them in and out of battle. In the show, he would have room for every single Autobot, even though the actual Diaclone-era toy would have been tiny and would have only held like two Mini Autobots. And then decades later, they'd develop a great, big Titan-class schoolbus retailing for $200 that was actually big enough to seat like twenty of your favorite modern-era Deluxe-class toys.

> Well remember if you outlive enough people the bubble will burst and there will eventually be more supply than demand.

That's really hard to predict. I think of all the TikTokers who are collecting vinyl records or VHS tapes or sealed 8-bit NES games, even though they were born long after those media formats went obsolete. It's possible the next generation is going to place value on G1 toys, not because they're nostalgic about a cartoon they grew up on as kids, but as these antique curiosities from a bygone era. One day the last original G1 fan will pass away, and there won't be anybody left alive who actually remembers when the toys were in shops or the cartoon was on the air. But, I can't imagine for a second that the later generations will just dismiss all the existing G1 toys as worthless junk. If that was the case, then by the same reasoning, we should be able to get old World War II memorabilia for pennies on the dollar, and that hasn't happened.

My suspicion is that when Transformers are a century old, they'll sell for thousands of dollars instead of merely hundreds. Nobody will have a complete G1 collection, but serious collectors might own entire dozens of existing samples. And there will be archivists who will do their best to document the brand to the best of their ability, based entirely on research they've done here on the Internet, taking quotations from people like us who remembered the origins of the brand when we were still alive. (Which means we really need to get it right, because there won't be anybody around to correct us later. That's why bugs me so much when people say things like, "Groundbreaker can't even see when riding his own vehicle" because it's just patently untrue.)

Zob (armchair historian-at-large)