In the mid-March chill of an early Chicago morning, construction equipment of varied sizes and shapes, lined neatly in rows, sputtered to life.

By 7 a.m. the gates opened and prospective buyers crunched through the damp gravel lot, sitting in the trucks, working the buckets of wheel loaders and lifting the excavators' arms. Diesel fuel trucks worked down the line filling the tanks and jump starting the machines. The smells from a catering company grilling chicken breasts, hamburgers and hotdogs fought for dominance over those of diesel exhaust.

It's March 21, in Morris, Ill., an hour drive from Chicago, and Ritchie Bros. Auctioneers is having the grand opening of its newest auction house-a 25,000-sq-ft, 1,000-person theater. The Morris site is one of 25 international auction sites the company operates, and is patterned after its other newly built sites.

The heated, tiered auction theater is sandwiched by administrative offices and a vending area where transportation, financing and other related firms man booths, and where caterers provide food and drinks throughout the day.

In addition to the live auction that day, it also was carried over the Internet (www.rbauction.com) where viewers could bid on and buy equipment.

Before the start of the auction, the vehicles are lined up single file leading to the staging area in a smallest-to-largest order. On the lot, an equipment dealer from Wisconsin inspected a A35 Volvo articulated dump truck; it is one of two of its kind up for sale.

At 8:10 a.m., with the ceremonial ribbon cut, photos taken and hands shaken, the line starts moving. Five men in Ritchie Bros. jackets, known as bidcatchers or ringmen, standon podiums in front of each section of seats. Throughout the day they encourage bidding and indicate to the auctioneer when a bid has been made. The seats are less than half full at the start. By lunch, the crowd more than doubles. Ritchie Bros. said 1,043 bidders attended the auction.

One of the first items offered is a 1998 Ford Crown Victoria. It has 88,000 miles, but looks great, the driver said. Bidding started at $3,000; it sold for $9,000. Light- and heavy-construction and mining equipment (the bulk of what is sold) were offered in the middle of the auction. Tools such as water pumps, air compressors and sandblast pots are sold last.

The auctioneer melodically jabbered into the microphone, pausing only briefly when a different set of three or four vehicles was moved onto the staging area. After an hour the auctioneer was replaced by a fresh voice and the bidding went on.

The typical bidder came armed with a cell phone, a pen and the pocket-sized listings catalog (1,037 items listed). Some bidders are loners, others traveled in groups of as many as six. As morning becomes afternoon, their coffee and doughnuts were replaced with pop and hamburgers.

Bidding for the Volvo A35 started at $30,000. It sold for $75,000; moments later, its twin sold for $55,000. A pair of Terex articulated dump trucks sell for considerably less; the 2366 fetched $23,000, while the 3204 brought in $20,000.

One buyer bought all three Cat 621B motor scrapers for $90,000 a piece. A 1998 John Deere 862B motor scraper went for $210,500, and a 762B went for $130,000.

Several wheel loaders also went on the auction block. A Cat 980C sold for $40,000, while another 980C went for $51,000. A 1998 John Deere 744H sold for $167,500, and a same year 644H sold for $135,000. A 1992 Deere 744E sold for only $47,000. On the low end, a Michigan 175B loader sold for $14,500.

A Mack R686ST water truck with a 4,000 gallon water system sold for $30,000. A 2,500-gallon GMC 6000 water truck brought only $3,500. Other support vehicles, such as a 1991 International 9400 fuel and lube truck sold for $26,000. And, a 1993 Ford F450 mechanics truck sold for $5,000, while a Ford F-150 utility truck sold for $1,500.

When all is said and done During that third full week of March, the company hosted five auctions, four in the United States (including the one in Morris) and one in The Netherlands. That week more than 1,000 customers sold more than 8,200 pieces of equipment. There were more than 6,400 bidders combined at the auctions.

In Morris, 373 of the 1,043 bidders turned out to be buyers. The 1,051 pieces of equipment brought in a gross sale for the day of $14.3 million.

The Chicagoland auction was also aired over the Internet. Online bidders are treated as absentee bidders. These bidders submit a maximum bid. They can, however, buy a piece for less than their maximum bid based on how high the on-site bidding goes.

Ritchie Bros. reported that 1,100 people tuned in to view that auction. There were eight online bids, three were successful in buying equipment worth $34,000.

IronPlanet.com, Inc. said its first used heavy equipment online auction closed with sales in excess of $1.5 million. Whereas Ritchie Bros. offers both live and online auctions, the IronPlanet (www.ironplanet.com) auction is online only.

The auction, which ran from April 3-5, facilitated transactions both within the United States and Latin America. This auction included a Caterpillar excavator which sold for more than $130,000. Equipment from Caterpillar, Ingersoll-Rand and Dynapac sold through IronPlanet's online marketplace included backhoe loaders, compactors, dozers, excavators, motor graders, crawl loaders and rubber-tired loaders.

IronPlanet, Palo Alto, Calif., was founded in 1999 to provide a full-service, online marketplace for buyers and sellers of used heavy construction equipment. IronPlanet provides standardized comprehensive, independent equipment inspection reports and fully insures all transactions. The company also offers financing, insurance, transportation and equipment repair.

IronPlanet provides real-time access to detailed information for each piece of equipment, including separate ratings on key parts and systems, a minimum of 27 photographs of critical parts and oil analysis results. The same information is also available by phone or fax to bidders who are not connected to the Internet. The information is gathered during independent, third-party inspections performed by DynCorp as the equipment is consigned for sale.

IronPlanet also guarantees that equipment will arrive to the buyer in the same condition as described by DynCorp. If not, the buyer is refunded the full purchase price plus transportation costs.