Nice job! Shouldn't last long…very fair price for one of the best 80's pins.

Man, if 2200 is a very fair price for Paragon I sold mine for about a grand too cheap last month. GLWS.

$2,200 is a fair price for a restoration of this quality. While most Paragons are not worth $2,200, this one in particular has a terrific cabinet repaint and the playfield looks fantastic.

This game is most likely marketed to the pinball collector that is willing to pay a premium for a top notch restored game. While many may not fall into this category, I speak from experience when I say that they are out there and they buy games just like this one.

Newtoit, good luck with your sale!

Marcus

I don't know if I would consider it a restoration tho. Drop targets are worn. Caps are yellowed, apron is scratched. It's a nice paragon with clearcoated playfield and restored cabinet.

While I do not deny that there are outliers for every pin in terms of condition, the comment that I was referring to appeared to indicate that 2200 was a fair price for paragon in general. That was surprising to me, that's all.

I will concede that point. All you say is true.

However, If the plastics, caps, drop targets & apron were replaced with mint NOS examples, then the price would go from $2,200 to $2,600+ IMHO.

For the quality of this restoration, which was focused on the cabinet & playfield, I still feel that $2,200 is the market for this qualify of restoration.

Hopefully the seller will keep us updated on the sale of this game.

Marcus

That would surprise me as well! This version is the exception, not the rule.

Fully functional Paragons can still be found for $500-$900 across this country.

Marcus

Last paragon I had was pretty nice. Sold for $800. Played 100%. Cabinet wasn't faded, but typical scratches here and there. Playfield wasn't blown out. Little wear around the thousands inserts as usual, with a little spot up by the center target. Backglass was a 8 to 8.5 with a little spot flaked off in dead lower center. but playing 100% with repinned Power board connectors and freshly shopped with new bulbs and rubbers. No broken plastics (typically games of this era don't have broken plastics due to no airballs.

I guess there are different levels of restoration. So it is a restoration in a sense, just not fully balls deep restoration. Great looking cabinet tho.

My comment about the price being fair was for the example in this thread (after looking at the pictures posted). I made no comment about Paragon pricing in general.

This idea that just because someone sold a Paragon for $800, all Paragon's are worth $800 is ludicrous.

They are not all worth $800. But least you know where your average run of the mill game starts. Goes down for lesser condition and up for better.

Maybe you guys are giving him shit because there isn't LED's in it. If he put LED's on it, i'm sure there would be posts stating it's too cheap, and they go for double that price all day long.

Beautiful cabinet, cleared playfield and very nice original glass well worth the 2200. GLWS!

I'm curious to see what price this will bring too. I have a Paragon that's very nice now...will be amazing when restored.

Yep, $800 for average condition sounds right. I paid 2k for a rare HUO example with 0 PF wear and 0 cabinet fade. Worth every penny to me.

Based on the pictures, this example is in above average condition. Don't know who did the PF restore/clear. Cabinet repaint doesn't have the original factory speckles, however looks much fresher than most Paragons I've seen. If it plays well, then the asking price is in the ballpark.

fwiw, I have $1,700 in this NOS PF masterfully restored/cleared by Ron Kruzman (who has done MANY Paragon PF's), so you can understand why I think getting a modest restoration for ~2k is sensible

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i've done a lot of NOS paragon fields for people. Even NOS they still cup like crazy on the inserts. Takes a lot of levels of clear if you want to even those out to a glass like finish.

There is one on eBay at the moment, supposedly at or near collector quality, with an asking price of $6,500. (I actually recalled this being higher, but just double-checked.) Now that's totally ridiculous.

What puzzles me is that over 9,000 were made, so it's not exactly a rare pin, yet they are seldom seen. I was an avid player back when this pin first came out, but I never saw one until quite recently. (But that's true of certain other tables, as well.)

Thanks for pointing out that beauty on eBay. The "Buy It Now" price is silly, but that's common on eBay. I could see it selling for 3-4k. Based on the video, it does appear to be the real deal. Looks similar to mine. My PF actually looks nicer, and mine doesn't have any mylar in front of the slings (this one does).

I think many Paragons were trashed…they got a lot a action back in the arcade days. Unlike Fathom/Centaur, there aren't any repro PF's. So finding a natural beauty is hard, and the guys that own them don't let them go.

It's an awesome looking/playing game…very unique.

If you were within driving distance, Id be on this.. Nice game

For the era, 9k is high but not super high. Also, in the 70s/early 80s, operators often junked pins for ridiculous reasons (to keep the competition from getting them, etc). There was virtually no collector market so no resale value. Many were burned or stripped or sat in unheated warehouses and rotted.

The reason you don't see alot of nice Paragon's is because it came out in 1979 right in the middle of the arcade "Blast" where everyone went and played pinball. It was such a great game they just got played to death. We played the one's in my hometown all the time. As with all of the other classics but Paragon is da BOMB!!!!

I finally got to see / play one at a recent tourney. It definitely commands your attention. However, on that limited exposure, I just couldn't get used to that odd pf layout or the 3-flippers-at bottom arrangement, especially when combined with that "float-y" kind of ball travel, as seen in Bally pins like Centaur. Lots of drain frustration, trying to adapt to that. Embryon, Centaur, and Fathom all had a quick and unquestionable appeal to me -- and I do like widebodies, generally -- but I felt like this one would take quite a lot of play before I finally "got it", if I ever would. And that would likely apply to any others with that flipper design.

No doubt Paragon will punish you. It's a great "leveler" when playing with folks with diverse pinball skills. Brutal to everyone…even top ranked players. Embryon/Centaur/Fathom aren't as hard, but still very challenging. Centaur's multi-ball approach was way ahead of it's time.

It's a great skill building game.

Why are you on the east coast?

Can someone help me understand what I am looking at? Am I seeing before pics or after pics of the playfield? I see clearcoat, and then I see quite a bit of wear around the inserts, and then ball swirls clearcoated over, and then letters bubbling on some of the inserts....

Not being a jerk, it is a serious question. Am I missing pics of the restored playfield?

I keep trying to look at pics, but iOS and that hosting site don't like each other on my device.
Free bump.

Right behind you Snaroff ... Here's my NoS pf, getting ready to send it off to Ron ... Just need to find a box to fit it.

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Congratulations on landing one! Looks gorgeous.

I packed mine in a box designed to move mirrors. IIRC, I had some packing materials from a shipment of PDI glass that I reused to protect the corners. PF arrived without damage, but several inserts fell out from all the movement. Ron said this is typical and he checks all the insert glue anyway.

It will be interesting to see how this plays with a cleared PF…the game is already brutal enough

Well, it's up on ebay. So we can all stop guessing on the price and see what it turns out to be worth.

ebay.com link: 1979 Bally Paragon Pinball Machine No Reserve

I finished clear coating mine almost 3 years ago and it plays smooth, fast, and awesome.

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I presume it sold locally?

pinball shark, that is nice clearcoat. See how smooth those inserts look now. Takes a lot of layers to get that nice of a finish. You can't one and done this playfield.

Must have. Was up to $1250 last time I checked. I would've been very surprised if it went for more than 1400-1500 on fleabay.

Try going to a local Bike Store and getting a box from them. Being that this is a wide body it might fit into an adult bike box. The bike shoppe by me just gives me boxes when I need them so they're free and best of all they're heavy cardboard.

I had a playfield cleared by Ron and it turned out great!

Congrats on the sale!

Are you willing to divulge the sale price?

If so, what was the price?

Marcus

Noted, thanks!

Congrats on the sale. I regret letting mine go.

That ebay example looks sweet…too bad the front is faded pretty badly. The "single owner" should have protected that baby…oh well.

No shipping either....pickup only. If I only lived in Texas. Congrats on sale. You did a nice clearcoating job.

That guy trying to get 65 has dropped to 55, and he's still stark raving mad. The one that was 1200 finished around 3K, but really was one of the best I've seen out there lately.

Steve

Down to $4,950 on the last go-'round, still without takers. Expect he may keep re-listing, perhaps with further price reductions.

It's not unlike a great many other listings you keep seeing on eBay, often going through multiple re-listings with no sale. Even when seriously interested, I would have to tell the seller that I'm just not in the habit of paying thousands over book value on a pin, and if they can actually get that price they should grab it. But that never seems to get me anywhere much closer to a deal.