Rickenbacker Serial Number Decoder

[guitar-murph]

Like many others, I am waiting for any news from Rickenbacker at the Winter NAMM. While passing the time I happened to go to the official RIC website, where I found that many of the features (forum, recently shipped, etc.) are not available. It does appear that some features such as the 'gallery' and the 'serial number decoder' are working. While experimenting at the serial number decoder, I noticed a curious thing. It would appear that when you enter information to look up the date of manufacture for a guiter, only the first two characters are being referenced. For example, if I enter DJ (for 1964), followed by 001...I get a valid response. However, if I enter DJ with any combination of numbers (so long as they do not exceed 4 digits) then I get the same results..........the month and year of manufacture are displayed. Enter DJ0001 and it says the guitar was built in Oct 64. Enter DJ9999 and I get the same result. I cannot believe that Rickenbacker produced 9,999 instruments in 1964....much less in the month of October. So...again it would appear that only the characters which indicate the year and month are being referenced. Can anyone shed any light on this?

[guitar-murph]

Just to further amplify on my earlier remarks...

In effect, when you run the 'serial number decoder' you are running a database query against certain tables in a database. It was my misguided impression that if you received a valid response, then the numbers entered must correspond to actual numbers which exist in the database. Apparently this is not true. The unfortunate implication of this is that if an unscrupulous person attempted to 'fake' a serial number on the bridge plate (or jack plate) then all they need to be concerned with is the letters which indicate year/month of production.

Oh well........I fear that I have opened a can of worms. Perhaps I should leave this alone.

[Rickygirl]

Sounds like there might be a problem with the server??? Don't think this is normal.

[libratune]

I don't think the RIC serial # decoder is as sophisitcated as you might think. I have used it numerous times and it relies primarily on the first two digits of whatever you enter to provide the year and month of manufacture. This is true up through 1999, when things changed (see below).

I have noticed, however, that if one of the first 2 digits is a letter, I must enter a number after the first 2 digits that is either 3 or 4 digits long. Try 2 or 5 digits and (with some exceptions for 2 digits) you will likely get an 'incorrect entry' response.

Starting in 1999, RIC went to a system where the first two digits of the serial # are the last two digits of the year of production, and those are followed by a 5-digit number. Of that 5 digit number, the first two indicate the week (29 = week 29) and the last 3 indicate the factory production number for that item. So 01-29333 means the plate was stamped in the 29th week of 2001, and the unit was numbered 333.

IMO, I believe the RIC jackplates stamped with serial #s would be very difficult to duplicate, especially the dual-input Ric-o-sound ones. So I don't think there is much worry about that.

DISCLAIMER: I am quite sure that I have not stated correctly several aspects of the RIC serial decoder, so I submit the above observations with full expectation that they will be substantially revised by those who are my betters if not elders.

[guitar-murph]

I don't consider anyone my better, although there is a good chance I am 'elderly' compared to some of the folks on the forum. My concern was that a serial number could be entered, and the result could show it to be a valid number...when in fact it may not be. As someone else suggested, perhaps this is due to problems with the website.

[guitar-murph]

[quote="guitar-murph"]I don't consider anyone my better....

What I meant to say was that I don't consider myself as a better to anyone else. Sorry if this sounded arrogant or condescending. My purpose was entirely the opposite.

[libratune]

I don't consider anyone my better, although there is a good chance I am 'elderly' compared to some of the folks on the forum. My concern was that a serial number could be entered, and the result could show it to be a valid number...when in fact it may not be. As someone else suggested, perhaps this is due to problems with the website.

I think you are basically correct in that the RIC serial decoder does not match the number you enter to a database of numbers of guitars actually produced to determine if your number is valid. Why? Because there is no such database tied into the serial decoder. That is why I said it is not as sophisticated a system as one might think. I believe it has always been that way -- not a knock on RIC, but that's the way it is set up.

As far as "elders/betters", I used that phrase b/c there is a forumite who has that as his signature line and I was reminded of it in this context as I am often looking over my shoulder when trying to address technical matters in this forum. There are others who likely know a lot more about any given technical topic than me (my "betters") and they are only too eager (as they should be) to correct. It appears they are all otherwise occupied this weekend (NAMM, likely) so they have yet to descend!

[dog]

Sorry for the off topic reply, but it is my signature line. This came from a thread on the Ric forum where some young whippersnapper called Chris Squire a "fat, old, has been". Of course this statement ruffled a few (many) feathers. I told the writer that if he couldn't respect his elders, he should learn to respect his betters. Even though he is not much my elder, as a bass player, Chris Squire is my better.

[jwilli]

In '64, once they hit 999, they rolled it over to 001. Possibly true for '65 too. By '66, the "roll-over" went higher.

[gibsonlp]

I wrote our own registry decoder in a similar way to the way Rick had their own (but mine actually works for 1970 instruments)
Rickenbacker's serial decoder is NOT a serial verification system, it simply decodes the serial number to the manufacturing date.
Since the dating comes from the first 2 digit (or the first 4 digits for post 1999 instruments) the rest of the numbers are irrelevant as far as decoding the year counts.

As soon as our registry grows bigger, I might be able to implement some sort of a serial verification system, but it will be hard as some years had circulating serial numbers (early 60s for example, it went from 1-999 or so and then restarted (with the new month code, of course...!) same goes for some years that had the serials going down... Anyways - it is doable, I just need more samples to make it accurate.

[johnallg]

Starting in 1999, RIC went to a system where the first two digits of the serial # are the last two digits of the year of production, and those are followed by a 5-digit number. Of that 5 digit number, the first two indicate the week (29 = week 29) and the last 3 indicate the factory production number for that item. So 01-29333 means the plate was stamped in the 29th week of 2001, and the unit was numbered 333.

Ron, are you saying the 333 is the number of units in a week, or in the year? I have a hard time believing RIC turned out 867 units in the week my bass was made. Can you clarify?

[libratune]

Starting in 1999, RIC went to a system where the first two digits of the serial # are the last two digits of the year of production, and those are followed by a 5-digit number. Of that 5 digit number, the first two indicate the week (29 = week 29) and the last 3 indicate the factory production number for that item. So 01-29333 means the plate was stamped in the 29th week of 2001, and the unit was numbered 333.

Ron, are you saying the 333 is the number of units in a week, or in the year? I have a hard time believing RIC turned out 867 units in the week my bass was made. Can you clarify?

For the example I gave (1999 and thereafter), my understanding is that the 3-digit "units" number after the 2-digit "weeks" number is not tied to the week, but keeps rolling up to 999 (then restarts at 001 if necessary) during a production year. We can assume that no more than 999 units are/were produced in a week, so no two units will have the same serial numbers.

Someone more knowledgeable will correct me if I am wrong, but this is what I have deduced.

[johnallg]

Ahhh, got it, thanks.

[johnhall]

The decoder was never intended to provide verification of the the authenticity of a given number- it would have been called a "verifier" or something, not a "decoder" if it did.

However, there are some basic range checks and general serial validity components to the online decoder, and it does handle a wider range of products (including ampflifiers for instance) than any third party decoder I've seen.

You simply cannot infer anything from the trailing digits of the serial number as this portion has been randomly generated for as long as we have used computers in this company. This is actually a security measure to stop counterfeit serials and for the day that we DO tie the decoder to the database to make a true verifier.

[grazioso]

it is nice feature but i don't know who would go just by serial number for 60's guitars. there are so many distinctive features that one would guess that making fake of all those little details wouldn't prove profitable in small scale operation and big scale operation would be noticed.