Best or craziest Star Wars find at a carboot or charity shop

ive found loads of loose figures at carboots over the years.

managed to put a whole loose run together apart from blue snag and vinyl caped jawa.

mid 90s I picked up a lando general and a romba for 50p each at bricklane market

got a mint complete falcon at a fairly small carboot sale in queens park

I still get between 10-20 loose figures a year at local carboots BUT!

2 years ago I was at a local carboot sale and I wish I'd taken pictures.

he had two tables full of all the the playsets and vehicles and about 50 loose figures with weapons.

I got the figures for £80 but was mega skint at the time so couldn't buy the rest and he wanted it gone that day, oh well!

loving that matchbox with weapons in

I've trailed bot fears in the south for over 10 years and have had a few good finds, though increasingly few and far between. Best ones...

1) A mint complete Amanaman for £1 found amongst a load of Ben 10 etc about 5 years ago.

2) An Ewok village box half full of loose figures & a few mini rigs. No weapons but a few last 17 amongst them. (Think it was £20 the lot.)

3) My favourite though was only last summer. I spotted a Max Rebo with a screw right through his head, holding it in place.The lady wanted £1 or "£5 with the box of weapons" - which I'd somehow missed! It contained around 50 accessories inc Endor, Jawa & Storm blasters + a white Leia cape...instantly completing a load of clean weaponless figures I'd had waiting for this find!

Preston car boot sale was a regular haunt of mine while i was at school. Used to nip out in my lunch for a mooch round. This would have been 1991/92.

Turned up loads - 12 inch chewie, boxed scout walker etc etc. Best thing, there was a dealer with a stall. I just had to ask and he would have it the following week. Got a yak for about £4 which was high end for me back then. Also picked up a moc Leia poncho which I promptly opened to display the figure. Back then I didn't give a crap about a £2.50 moc!

It's certainly not the 90s anymore I remember buying an Amanaman (no staff) for 20p at Chester Rugby club carboot in about '95 that was a nice find.

More recently I've not not too badly. I had a snowspeeder (no harpoon or block) but with 4 x-Wing cannons stuffed in the cockpit for a fiver (some old bag snaffled the Tie Interceptor as I got there!), two boxed Falcons (one complete one missing training ball but had the arm) for £35 and £45, a Jabba on his throne (no stand, or bowl) for £2 (now gloriously complete and all for the princely sum of £14) and, best of all an R5-D4 in a Palitoy-a baggie (tape seal broken but all very nice) for £2 (in the LA thread). That was a totally surreal buy. Also had the odd handful of figures and even left some that were overpriced beaters, but nothing remarkable.

All of the above was in the last 2 years. Both Falcons came from one carboot and all the rest from different sellers at another. Slim but happy pickings

Best find for me was at Pickering car boot sale got a un-painted knee painted dart Boba Fett for £1. At the time was about 11 had no idea about the rare variant just bought it as it was much better condition then mine. Wasn't until about 2 years ago found out it was really rare. At the same Car boot on a different week found a PBP with cape Snowtrooper.

Another good buy was last year bought a few figures from an old lady and she said she had more at home and they were a £1 each one was a near mint Luke Stormtrooper.

Other finds got a few figures from a table top sale for 20 to 30p each and a 12 inch Boba Fett for £1. Once missed a Barada and an Imperial Dig for £3 at a car boot once to a dealer who I hate was well pissed off and at York missed a box of Star Wars figures for £30 was gutted.

Do usually find a few vintage figures or Star Wars related at our local one nothing super rare though rarest one was a Luke Endor gear for £3, Warok for £1.50 from a local second hand shop same shop got a boxed PBP Tri Logo ATAT commander for £70. Got another Warok for £3. Found a Luke Jedi and beater ATAT commander at 2 car boots in Norwich last year for 20p each also found a Falcon for £7 ending up stripping it for parts. ATST for £2. One stall had 3 items for £1 got a vintage Snowspeeder and a book and a small screwdriver box for the weapons.

Did fine a Han Carbonite no block for £4 at a toy fair many years ago.

Not vintage but picked up a Darth Talon last year for 50p

On eBay bought 50 figures for £50 and one was a hollow tube tuskien raider.

Flea market in berlin 3 years ago,I had stopped collecting and had abandoned most of my collection to my mums loft. I found at the bottom of a box of electrical items, only figure in the box, a nice condition a-wing pilot At first I thought the guy said €50, but turned out he was asking for $1.00. Best deal I have had for 10 years.

You'll never find anything at carboots here anymore, iv'e done carboots lots of times over the years and iv'e always enjoyed doing them with family since a little kid. But all of a sudden in the past 4 or 5 years they've gotten terrible with zombies climbing into your car and clawing at your boxes/bags before you even have the door open to see if you have vintage valuables or gold, this literally happened to me last year turned up half asleep at 7am in the dark to set up and I turned around after I opened the boot and there was about 30 people crowded around me all asking if I have this n that and sticking their heads into the boot to look inside boxes etc and fighting over each other to find that hidden gem that you're not aware you have, so they can buy it for pennies and resell on ebay.

So if you turn up as a normal buyer and don't go as one of the vultures picking everything in the first 2 mins of that boot opening then unfortunately you don't stand a chance now, this has got much worse since the 08 recession hit and iv'e been twice now and last year was the last, never again!, they've spoiled it for genuine buyers/collectors too it's such a shame.

subzero said:

You'll never find anything at carboots here anymore, iv'e done carboots lots of times over the years and iv'e always enjoyed doing them with family since a little kid. But all of a sudden in the past 4 or 5 years they've gotten terrible with zombies climbing into your car and clawing at your boxes/bags before you even have the door open to see if you have vintage valuables or gold, this literally happened to me last year turned up half asleep at 7am in the dark to set up and I turned around after I opened the boot and there was about 30 people crowded around me all asking if I have this n that and sticking their heads into the boot to look inside boxes etc and fighting over each other to find that hidden gem that you're not aware you have, so they can buy it for pennies and resell on ebay.

So if you turn up as a normal buyer and don't go as one of the vultures picking everything in the first 2 mins of that boot opening then unfortunately you don't stand a chance now, this has got much worse since the 08 recession hit and iv'e been twice now and last year was the last, never again!, they've spoiled it for genuine buyers/collectors too it's such a shame.

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Not sure about that... it can be bleak at times, but I found vintage two weeks ago myself and this current thread seems to indicate there's still bit ms to pick up:
http://www.starwarsforum.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=32593&start=90

I used to frequent carboots in the early 90's. Me and my sister used to sell too once or twice in the summer months. Once there I'd soon sneak off to search for Star Wars goodies. Once I found a guy selling a load of vintage Action Man but he also had a boxed 12" Boba Fett which I held and offered to buy - think he only wanted £10? Unfortunately my sister held all the cash so I dashed back for funds as you do. Guess what, on my return another guy had snapped up the lot including Boba. I even offered to buy Boba from him as he was into Action Man but he said he'd rather find out its worth 1st. I was gutted and always class that as 'the one that got away!"

Maybe it can depend on the area you're in with how bad it is with the vultures, but the last two iv'e sold at were awful experiences and i'm never going to one ever again lol.

Well done though to the guys who still actually find stuff, i'm amazed it still happens haha!

The climbing into carboots is nothing new, IMO. I remember going to carboots in Chester in the early 90s and people were being forceably removed from the boots by the sellers then! I remember one guy having a stand up with a particular buyer who he refused to sell him something the buyer had removed from the seller's boot. Told him to do one and that he'd be selling it to someone else. So funny.

Record dealers and computer games resellers seem to be my pet hates at the moment. They're both particularly pushy and underhand in their dealings. Saw one smartly dressed middle aged record dealer haggling for a dozen records. The old lady had been asking £24 and he wanted them for £20 and it wasn't just a "if you don't ask" kind of offer, he really didn't want to give in: he had an armful of Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin. Probably upwards of £150 worth. Just no need at all. We all love a bargain but if I see a Yak Face for a quid I'm not about to offer 50p.

Struck out at the weekend. 3 car boots and not one purchase. The only vintage I saw was the barrel of a tripod laser cannon.

I'm going to my local one this sunday, hoping to find a few loose figures but its getting a lot harder.

I do quite often seen the odd beaten up or parts missing mini rig

worth rummaging through boxes of toys and you do get the odd chief chirpa or ree yees turn up