Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

Hi All, I'm the proud owner of a Tom Petty Limited Edition 12 string bought secondhand a few months ago. It's a Jetglo #188 serial number e47854. It's great, I love the sound, but I have one question -

It's about the Rickenbacker logo part that covers the truss rod end piece just above the nut. Every Rickenbacker I've seen has a solid plastic logo/truss rod cover about 2mm thick - It's a solid piece of plastic.

Mine has what appears to be a piece of gold paper with the word 'Rickenbacker' on it in a clear plastic cover(?). It's the thickness of a sheet of paper - and it's wrinkled at the top where the screw has been attached slightly out of position.

Is this the original part? It just looks so odd that I'm not sure. Other than this the guitar's great - low action, Pyramid strings, all the right papers, silver case and so on.

I've been emailing the Ric Corporation but just keep getting told to talk to their dealer in Australia ..

Regards, Lee Kear
Brisbane Australia

The gold nameplates are made from a sheet of clear plexiglass .

After the shape is cut out , the logo is silkscreened onto the back side .

The gold is sprayed over that .Sometimes , that gold looks wrinkled and lumpy . This is due to the fact that the gold is a powder suspended in clear ... that particular nameplate may not have had a good mixture , and as such the painter was forced to spray it heavier than normal , to get coverage.
When it dries and shrinks , this can get a different look .
The white covers are a more even spray as they are pigmented clear .... this is a more 'even' product .

Gibson and any company that uses a metallic powder for a color also have this problem ... it is extremely common .

I doubt you have a piece of paper stuck to the back of plexiglass . If you do , then some one tried to fix a broken original . or at least replicate the original .

The wrinkling of plexiglass is not uncommon , given that users torque the #3 screws down . The holes are NOT drilled using anything but a hand drill and their eye . so the angle could in fact not be at a 90 degree pitch to the face of the plate .This would cause this to wrinkle .

Thanks Mark,
I'm beginning to think that there's something amiss with the nameplate. It's possible that the original plate was removed and a poor quality copy put on in it's place. I've checked the screws and they're in perfectly straight - the wrinkle is a result of the 'plate' being scrunched up slightly before screwing down.

Let me just check a couple of points with you: A genuine nameplate: -
1. Should be made of the same material as the scratchplates (plexiglass).
- Mine isn't.

2. Should be the same color (gold) as the scratchplates.
- Mine isn't even close -it's more green than gold.

3. Should be at least 1 to 2 mm thick, about the thickness of a CD or more.
- Mine isn't. It's the thickness of a sheet of paper. It's thinner than a playing card.

4. Should have the flexibility of plexiglass eg: can bend a little but will break, or snap, or crack if folded flat.
- Mine isn't - it could be rolled up, or folded flat several times without cracking or snapping. You could do origami with it.

I'll post a couple of pictures later when I get my digital camera setup. Thanks again for your help. Regards, LK