Mr Ponytail is a strange dude eh?
I had an odd run in with him during the nov 2003 auction. That was the 4th one I had been two, so I def knew something was shady about this guy. None the less I was interested in getting my first pinball machine, but was disappointed the first few shows at everything going 1000$+.
I was delighted to find out that the show had alot more pins then usual. This being my first one I wasn't looking for anything prestine. In particular there was 2 T.M.N.T's at this auction. Super because some people may consider them cheesy, so I looked bother over very carefully.
The first 1 had a VERY badly warn playfield. Alot of the paint was missing right down to the wood. As you guys know those playfields are expensive to replace (if you can even find one).
The second 1 looked very nice, but 1/4 of the dot matrix display was out. Now this TMNT uses the first gen DMD, so they are hard to come by. But you could still see the score in between balls.
Pony tail spent 20 minutes trying to talk me into bidding on the first 1... his reasoning was that the "DMD's are very hard to come by". Which is true. But so are playfields. Additionally, while with good care i can guarantee that the nice looking one will never need a playfield, however the 1 with the good display MAY burn out any time, so I may be taking a double hit.
Needless to say, Poor playfield 1 went for 700$+ with the help of ponytails, and I stole mine for 500$
