Thread: Old fuel Bowsers worth a fortune

A mate complained recently of buying a 20 litre drum of kerosene for a parts washer he found at a garage sale and it cost almost $100. $2.49 a litre is cheap.

No one around my locality even has a bulk tank of kero anymore, let alone a pump. Hardware stores are about the only outlets.

I was at the clearing out sale of a freehold servo not long ago. I bought a pallet jack and an obsolete tune up machine in good order. However the big surprise to me was the old 6 gallon manual bowser out behind the workshop. "As is, where is" it fetched $1750.

i love those old bowsers and thats the downside of a parts washer even though kero will last and clean forever it cost so much

I wonder how much these old Caltex pumps would go for....


[nomedia="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbq6tDE6gnw"]YouTube- Sabrina - Caltex Commercial Australia[/nomedia]

[QUOTE=Brian Hjelm;1276475]A mate complained recently of buying a 20 litre drum of kerosene for a parts washer he found at a garage sale and it cost almost $100. $2.49 a litre is cheap.

In Ipswich last week I bought 20 lites in drum for $48. My pump supplier had run out but he was selling it for $1.70 a litre. Big difference in prices.

My Mum sold a 2 gallon old shell can and stand on ebay today for $127.
I also have a friend in Perth that has his own museum and buys and sells this type of thing. He employees one guy full time to restore this type of thing and basically keeps about a third of projects and use the funds to maintain the museum. Fully restored bowser, done properly sell for up to $4k, unrestored $1k to $3k depending on type.

At the previously mentioned sale, the cast lids over the fill points for the underground tanks had cast into them "The John F Bowser Company Fort Wayne Indiana". These sold for $50 each

hi - I use kero for heating - can anyone tell me the contact details for the garage that still pumps kero? i cannot imagine it will be doing so for the long term, it's just not a fuel that's commonly used in australia..

Thx

I've emailed you to the address you supplied in your PM. The stuff they sell is clear and incredibly strong smelling. It's nothing like the prepackaged kero.

I have a fairly big 25,000 BTU Toyostove to heat my shed so for the use it gets, it's pretty economical.