Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

Awesome Paul!

I love those late 50's Combos. Just great looking guitars.

Thanks, Collin.

Noel, the "bedliner" is a texture applied by the factory over the paint finish, probably to address issues with the guitar sliding about while hanging from the saxophone strap while being played.

I re-did a Combo 400 of a later vintage ('57) that had a flocked steel back plate to accomplish the same task.

The stuff on this 400 appears to be horsehair that has been painted under (to adhere it) and over (to clean up the look somewhat).

Take a good look at the closeup photo in this thread.

Dusan, I'll bet your 425 has a Carling switch, too, and Carling is an American company that had an old-fashioned looking logo and case design back then.

Why does everybody call these vibrato-equipped 425s "Boyds"? The Boyd vibrato looks nothing like the Japanese vibrato used on these, and the Boyd was American-made out of bent spring wire. I've never seen any Rickenbacker with a true Boyd.

The only thing I can surmise is that Boyd could have possibly repped these Japanese vibratos to USA manufacturers as an adjunct to their own product line. However, I have no documentation to back up this claim.

jingle_jangle wrote:Noel, the "bedliner" is a texture applied by the factory over the paint finish, probably to address issues with the guitar sliding about while hanging from the saxophone strap while being played.

In all my years of Rickenbacker devotion I've never seen such a thing.

Still, when new, it probably looked better than the snap-on pads which adorn the backs of certain Gretsch models.

longhouse wrote:
Still, when new, it probably looked better than the snap-on pads which adorn the backs of certain Gretsch models.

I wouldn't count on it...

The pads are quirky and a typically Gretsch (stuffy, old-fashioned, obsessive) solution to the issues of stability and buckle rash. But the horsehair texture is even quirkier. The flocking is more elegant. My '56 will be flocked over the new paintwork.

The Gretsch pads look like barstool seats to me.

I can't wait to see the Wilczynski Flocked Tulip!

Naw. Gretsch barstools don't have snaps around the perimeter.

The 400 will be called the Wilczynski Tulip, Flocked (or W T F?)

I was just going to say that!

I adore these threads, Paul. They are very enlightening and entertaining, and are great illustrations of the work involved in a AAA quality restoration. They also keep the anticipation and suspense going for those who have projects up coming.

Any updates?

Yep.

My wife loves the Tulip/combos. Will there be Bondo involved ? Looking forward to the restoration.

The body was redone over a long period...there was no Bondo involved, BTW.

Fretboard was resurfaced, new frets installed and leveled, tuners procured. The 400 was advertised as having "Waverly" tuners, and I was looking forward to adding a set of these to my parts bin, but it arrived with a set of repro butterbean Grovers, of which one had had its backing plate ground down (obviously out of someone's parts bin/off another instrument). So, another set of repro nickel butterbeans is on its way.

I thought long and hard about paint color, as I decided I would live with this for a long time. I went through the usual colors: Jetglo (too many of these around), Brown (not a fan...looks like shoe polish...), even white like the one on the RIC site. Maybe I could make the Turquoise jump, over to a Combo 850 color...but I'd just finished a TURQ V59, so...

...I opted for Coverfield Green, but slightly ambered. It looks just about perfect, and I'm glad I chose it. A new pickguard was just made, and I've got to Alodine it, along with a matching bridge cover. Everything else will be cleaned up or replated. It will have RIC strap buttons; more practical. Out of necessary, I'm going to have to put thin nickel-plated washers under the tuners' hex bushings; a previous owner had hogged out the tuner holes with a rat tail file to fit something else, and the hex bushings don't cover the butchery on the edges. Otherwise still very original looking.

Here it is on my bench a couple of days ago, having the 1mm thick routed aluminum guard fitted prior to etching and alodining:



I haven't told all. There are surprises yet.

I've never seen mold in that shade of green, so it must not be moldy anymore...

Beautiful color! I like that a lot!

Wow. Sparkly. And gorgeous.

I would also say it looks emerald green on my Windows/Dell LCD. I'll have to check on my Powerbook when I get home.

Interestingly, this was edited and color adjusted in Photoshop, on my Apple system at home. Here on my (ugh) Windows system at the U, it looks grass green.

It's not.

Gotta look into that color profile...

Interesting. It would be nice to know how it really looks. Definitely not grass green on my monitor (LCD Flat Screen), more towards the emerald green range, but perhaps a tinge more yellowish.

Whatever it really looks like, I do like the color I'm seeing...