I think this was working at one point but now i dont know if i ever tested it. The problem is that it is not sending the value in the text field as a parameter when submit is pressed. so in the submitBid method in the controller params[:bidAmount] = nil no matter what is typed in the field.
<% form_remote_tag(:url => {:action => 'submitBid'}, :condition => "bidCheck()") do%>
<td><%= text_field_tag :bidAmount , "", { :id => 'bidAmount', :size => 4, :onKeyPress => "return numbersonly(this,event)" } %></td>
<td id="btnSubmit"> <%= submit_tag 'Bid' %></td>
<% end %>