Fair price for a Vandercook number 14 proof press ?

I think $1200 would be a fair price, if the press is in good shape. I can’t see why someone would pay over $1500, tops, for this model.
I can’t see paying much more for this model because it is so bare bones. There are no grippers on the older style model, and there are no rollers, so it would need to be hand inked, which would make its use fairly labor intensive, and also possibly less accurate and consistent from print to print.
Registration would be an issue because of the lack of grippers.
The prices of Vandercooks have skyrocketed in the last few years, quite unreasonably, i think. But the pricier presses you see have the appropriate bells and whistles to do really concise, proffessional work, but i think that would be a real challenge on the #14.
I own a pretty versatile Vandercook, and have run several others over the years, and they are fairly slow and steady as is, even with good registration systems, and rollers systems and all that.
Minus the bells and whistles, and they are really just suited for basic woodcuts and whatnot, but not controlled, involved letterpress work.
My humble opinion.
I wouldn’t hesitate to try asking on the Vanderblog at:
http://vandercookpress.info/

there may be some insights there.
:)

I second Natron’s opinion and agree with it’s many points, but would like to add that this press may not be sought after for work with lead type in our usual way- but it’s perfectly great for printing things like linoleum cuts and wood engravings which work best with hard packing/hand inking, so that is probably the best market to target with it.

I suggest listing it on Inkteraction or some site that printmakers frequent, as you may draw a better crowd for it’s purpose. People on Briar seem to be more oriented towards type and plates that are type-carrying, though it couldn’t hurt to list it both places.