Everything has two prices:
The price the vendor wants to sell the item for and the price the buyer wants to pay for it. These are usually different and buyer needs to asked themselves, how badly do I want the item, be it a manual or the actual vehicle. I am sure that we have all paid two much for both in the past.
The issue of buying manuals is complicated by some collecting the manual as part of the restoration of a vehicle as well as some that collect just manuals, so we get two differnet motivations for buying the item.
Generally I will pay more for a manual that goes with my vehicles but having said that I have a growing collection of manuals, collected over many years, as part of my MV book collection, that have cost me more that I set out to pay especially when currency conversion from the UK Pound or US Dollar into our NZ Dollar plus shipping. I have also found that a complete set of the manuals for a vehicle provides the restorer with a complete understanding of the vehicle. There is however a growing number of the public think that just becuase its old and has something to do with the military that means its worth as much as a new set of gold teeth.
On the issue of copies be they be CD or Paper based I think they have an important role to play in our hobby as I would rather go and print a page or two from a CD Copy for working with / under an MV than destory a original manual, as I am sure all of us would, howver CD copies are not always available so the backup is a Paper copy. Therefore I am thankfull for the vendors like Alex above that provide these Copies as well as those that sell the original Manuals.
In Summary if the cost is more than you can afford don't hit the confirm button, or sit on your hands, you never know when another may come up for sale.
All the Best
Remember to keep the rubber (or tracks) between you and the tarmac
Kev
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