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What about vintage / old school molds & chips ? (1 Viewer)

Thomacetti

Thomacetti

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After hunting down chips & sets for over a decade, i'm at a point that not many new sets tickle my fancy.
I have all the paulson & BCC sets I could wish for (bar some small add-ons/filling barrels), the sets I would like to add have reached a value beyond what i'm willing to pay.
I love a bargain hunt and it's time for something else.

Many know how much I love my Key West set...a great example of classy vintage chips.
I wanted to get my feet wet building a vintage set and was able to buy some chips that could be a good start.

I always like the Horseshoe club chips, espec the horseshoe mold (TK Specialty Company)...but the prices were more then I'm willing to pay.
So I will try to build a small cash set (4-5 playes) on the cheap, I have time but could use some feedback.

It started when I was able to snatch my first chips up during one of John's vintage roulette sales. @JWC

These are john ascuaga`s nugget hotel sparks roulettes from the 70's
19 green & 9 brown chips
1610051081142.png


With the help of @Marius L , I was able to find a rack of these, what turned out to be real quarters from The Bank Club Las Vegas (one of the earliest legal gaming operations in the state of Nevada). These are chips from the 50's

1610051270731.png


Downside...these need some work :)
Do hope to save about 80 chips

1610051634682.png


To make this set playable...I needed some spotted red chips.
After talking to Chris from Spinetti's for an affordable priced chip (most horseshoe mold chips are double digits)...he came up with these.

1610051875809.png


Chris is still checking the availability, could be a rack :)

All these chips are on route, so have not seen them IRL...but now the dilemma....
Would it be a crime to mill these (maybe shaped inlays) and use a vintage vegas artwork on Gear labels ?

Need 1 more rack of quarters (solid) and then I have a playable set....so please let me know if you spot any.

100 solid white chips ($1)
100 spotted red ($5)
19 spotted green ($25)
9 spotted brown ($100)

Plenty of bank for a 5 player game...so a great start and some long time building & searching ahead.
Maybe not the most vibrant eye candy but plenty of history...and affordable too

And since I got the vibes of the old school molds...scored these too (another project ?)

1610052691897.png
 
Nice! I think milling depends on what type of chips so if they are plain but only have denoms then i say mill away. As far as Bank Club, then i would probably say no to milling, but hey you own them so up to you.

I do have a few Cali sets on older molds like diamond square and circle square. Those I wouldn't mill.
 
TheBigTater said:
Hopefully these $5's aren't slated for any violence as they are from one of the more historical illegal clubs from Hot Springs, AR. :unsure:

If so, I'm going to turn my head, look away and try not to cry.
Click to expand...
I'll make it quick..they will not suffer
No man, not sure if i'm going to mill or murder any...the history on all of these is great.

Thanks for the insight :tup:
 
If you're interested you can give this documentary a watch. While not specifically about the illegal casino/clubs (Belvedere/Southern Club/Vapors) it does cover a lot about the development of Hot Springs and how it became the hot bed of gangster & gamblers back in the day.

https://www.myarkansaspbs.org/programs/cityofvisitors
 
Nope go aheD and mill away and make a set of chips that will be unique! Your not the only one with the idea, I have purchased 600 old school L mold chips and this spring plan to mill them and get gear labels
 
FordPickup92 said:
Okay. They were offered to me but no idea what I'd use them for or what they're worth
Click to expand...
30 to 50 per racks sounds reasonable to me Brie...but always hard to tell with older chips.
Depends on how much you like or need them...

I got the Bank Club chips & those from John very cheap...but paid 3 each for the rack of redbirds.
Difference is that there are plenty of HHL sets out there but very limited options in horshu mold chips.

Only other spotted red chips I could find were 30 a pop
 
I dont like them or need them at all lol they were offered to me and I think I'm just going to pass. Thanks for the input!
 
I may have the chance to pick up some of these Nevada mold hot stamps, but I can’t find much about them.
At first I dismissed them thinking they were the cheap ‘Las Vegas Nevada’ chips but now after doing some reach I see they are vintage chips.
Do they have any value? Are they good quality? Would it be worth buying them to label and have as a cash set?
The picture is from earlier in this thread to show the mold. These are not the chips I’m considering.
Thanks
 

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Oh, an old post I hadn't noticed before. So this might be out of date, but still:

Thomacetti said:
I wanted to get my feet wet building a vintage set and was able to buy some chips that could be a good start.
Click to expand...
Great idea, and nice work so far!

Thomacetti said:
Would it be a crime to mill these (maybe shaped inlays) and use a vintage vegas artwork on Gear labels ?
[..]
Maybe not the most vibrant eye candy but plenty of history...and affordable too
Click to expand...
Only you can decide that... but I think you've already answered your own question. "Vintage set", "plenty of history"... I think a significant portion of their value to you comes from their history. If you mill them, it'll be harder for you to appreciate that part.
 
MemphisFats said:
I may have the chance to pick up some of these Nevada mold hot stamps, but I can’t find much about them.
At first I dismissed them thinking they were the cheap ‘Las Vegas Nevada’ chips but now after doing some reach I see they are vintage chips.
Do they have any value? Are they good quality? Would it be worth buying them to label and have as a cash set?
The picture is from earlier in this thread to show the mold. These are not the chips I’m considering.
Thanks
Click to expand...
Most of the older chips with edge molds of any sort were made by Burt Co, or ASM if they were made somewhat more recently. They're compression-molded clay, similar to Paulsons, BCC, and TRK. Burt Co eventually became ASM, which became CPC. CPC uses the same equipment, materials, and methods as the original Burt Co did, which means that these older chips are essentially equivalent in quality and feel to the custom chips made by CPC today. They're just older and likely to be worn from use rather than freshly manufactured.

They're not particularly valuable, generally speaking. They're not as visually attractive as the Paulson chips produced for casinos - their spot patterns are usually simple (or absent), the color choices are more muted and dark, and they're usually hotstamped rather than inlaid. Accordingly they command much lower prices than the bright and colorful Paulson THCs that everyone loves so much. Undoubtedly there are some rare chips that are quite valuable on the singles market, but I don't know much about that.

Are they worth buying? That completely depends on how much you like them.
 
CrazyEddie said:
Most of the older chips with edge molds of any sort were made by Burt Co, or ASM if they were made somewhat more recently. They're compression-molded clay, similar to Paulsons, BCC, and TRK. Burt Co eventually became ASM, which became CPC. CPC uses the same equipment, materials, and methods as the original Burt Co did, which means that these older chips are essentially equivalent in quality and feel to the custom chips made by CPC today. They're just older and likely to be worn from use rather than freshly manufactured.

They're not particularly valuable, generally speaking. They're not as visually attractive as the Paulson chips produced for casinos - their spot patterns are usually simple (or absent), the color choices are more muted and dark, and they're usually hotstamped rather than inlaid. Accordingly they command much lower prices than the bright and colorful Paulson THCs that everyone loves so much. Undoubtedly there are some rare chips that are quite valuable on the singles market, but I don't know much about that.

Are they worth buying? That completely depends on how much you like them.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the great reply. It’s amazing the knowledge some of you guys have!
 

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