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I overhauled one of those mid '50's Seeburg amps for someone and it was a royal PITA. Someone had already re-capped it at some point with those horrible '50's red "tiny chief" plastic paper caps. Of course, they were all leaky by now and these leaky caps caused the output transformer to burn out. A friend has already clued me in that the Seeburg mechanism is much more complex in comparison to other brands.
About 1.5 years ago, I actually saw a later Seeburg 45 box for sale at a church rummage sale. It was an upright model and the title strip panel was V shaped. They said that someone had been working on it, without success, and that I could make them an offer on it. My gut told me to leave it alone.
There's another '80's box at an antique store. I don't know the brand; but, it's one of those "plain jane" models without much character. I think she wanted around $400 for it; which, I don't see happening.
One of the church thrift stores had two '40's 78 boxes that were trashed and missing parts; but, he still wanted something like $500 each for them.
Back in the early '90's, a friend had a circa '55 Rock-Ola 45 box and a '40's Wurlitzer 78box (the round top model with all the lights that everyone goes crazy for). They looked good; but, needed work to the mechanics and the amp. I tried to buy one, or both, from him and he wouldn't hear of it. One day, I went to his house and noticed the boxes were gone. I asked about them and he said that two guys were roaming the neighborhood looking for antiques to buy. They offered him $300 each for the boxes and he let them go. Needless to say, I was sick when I heard this. I would have happily bought those boxes at those prices.
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