Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

I am lucky enough to own a number of Rics in Mapleglo with Black Trim - one of my favourite combinations, which improves with age as the maple matures into that wonderful honey gold colour. Out of curiosity, does anyone on the Forum know when Rickenbacker stopped offering Black Trim as an option?

Somewhere around 2000-2002.

I believe they stopped the BT option in 2002. I have a Jan. 1 2001 price sheet that provides the BT option. The next sheet I have is Apr. 1 2005, and the BT option is not listed. Anyone have price sheets for years in between?

Thanks for those helpful responses. Here's a pic by way of appreciation - and for all lovers of Black Trim.

Nice!


Love the black trim!

MG and BT is a perfect combination. Great guitars!

bassduke49 wrote:I believe they stopped the BT option in 2002. I have a Jan. 1 2001 price sheet that provides the BT option. The next sheet I have is Apr. 1 2005, and the BT option is not listed. Anyone have price sheets for years in between?

I don't. There may not have been one if there were no price increases. I do have a 2002 catalog and BT/BH is not shown.

Love the BT / ambered MG combination. Looks particularly nice on that 610

For that matter, do we know roughly when they started the black trim option? I recall seeing a custom one in the early 70s. As far as production ones, I feel that my March '74 4001 in white/bt would be considered an early one.

Very nice looking trio!!

fran4001 wrote:For that matter, do we know roughly when they started the black trim option? I recall seeing a custom one in the early 70s. As far as production ones, I feel that my March '74 4001 in white/bt would be considered an early one.

Well, for that you may have to define "black trim." The earliest price sheet that I have that shows "Custom trim charge (CTC)-binding, pickguard, or nameplate color reversal" ($25 charge) is dated 6-15-1976. There may be price sheets earlier with this, but my next oldest one is 3-1-1975 and it does not mention color reversal of trim as an option. The upcharge went to $50 in the 1985 price sheet.

The full suite BT option that included black powder-coated hardware (tuners, pickup surrounds, tailpiece, strap pins) appears to have come in on the 5-19-1986 price sheet. The wording changes to: "Custom charge for reversal of hardware, binding, nameplate and pickguard color" (my italics) and retains the $50 upcharge (reversal goes up to $65 on the 6-1989 sheet, and to $75 on the 12-15-1996 sheet). It is also on the 5-19-1986 price sheet that it is clearly stated that the black trim was STANDARD on Midnight Blue, Silver, Red, White, and (gasp!) Mapleglo - MG went back to white/chrome trim as STANDARD on the March 1993 price sheet. White/chrome trim was STANDARD on Fireglo, Jetglo, and Ruby. Obviously, we've seen a few examples where the reversal option was chosen (Jetglo with black, Red with white, Ruby with black, White with white, etc.) from this time period.

I don't have price sheets between 1-1-1998 (when MID, WHT, and RED are still described as STANDARD with black trim) and the price sheet "effective January 1, 1999, updated January 2000" where WHT and RED are gone, and all the remaining colors (Jetglo, Fireglo, Mapleglo, Midnight Blue, and Turquoise) come STANDARD with chrome hardware, white binding, nameplate, and pickguard. The BT option is still available though ($75). My 1-1-2001 sheet still shows the BT option, but the next sheet I have, 4/1/2005 does not show the BT option.

I welcome additional information that can fill the holes in the data on color/trim availability. I'd like to include all this in my book, so the more info the better!

There are two late '73 White BT 4001 basses in the registry. This is as early as I can find...

As with many Rickenbacker features, there are going to be examples made before and after the "official" availability time frame as indicated in price sheets or catalogues. This is especially true at the end of a time frame due to the delay between order and delivery. Instruments made for special customers, factory experiments, and one-offs all figure as timeline anomalies. And we know that the only absolute about Rickenbacker instruments is that there are no absolutes.

antipodean wrote:There are two late '73 White BT 4001 basses in the registry. This is as early as I can find...

White instruments had black guards & TRCs from the beginning, no?

sloop_john_b wrote:

antipodean wrote:There are two late '73 White BT 4001 basses in the registry. This is as early as I can find...

White instruments had black guards & TRCs from the beginning, no?

Probably, but we may not be able to figure when the "beginning" was exactly. I may not have complete price sheet for 1973 as colors aren't even mentioned. I have only single-page price sheets for 1974 and '75, so the earliest listing I have that mentions White is 1976. Interestingly, White is considered a "custom color" (and so is Mapleglo in 1976!) and has a $25 upcharge. Starting in 1981, a line was added to the "Colors" section of the price sheet that states: "White color is not covered under warranty."