Well, it's takes more than a few cleanings to wear down a stamp to the point to where its almost invisible but in my younger days when I was obsessed with cymbal cleaning I had a Paper Thin Crash where I nearly completely rubbed the stamp almost off. It was your run of the mill amonnia based cleaner such as the Zildjian cymbal cleaner.

Thank you. Interesting. I didn't think that so much metal could be removed by hand rubbing and cymbal cleaner. Lots of effort.

I hope you have recovered from your cleaning obsession. :cool:

[img]http://photos.imageevent.com/drumaholic/constantinople/4_1.jpg[/img]

[img]http://photos.imageevent.com/drumaholic/constantinople/3.jpg[/img]

[img]http://photos.imageevent.com/drumaholic/constantinople/websize/5.jpg[/img]

Thank you Drumaholic!! I will get out my cymbal and compare next to your photos. And also my cymbal with the same stamp. This will be interesting!

That is an old A probably. Not a K at all. Look at as many pictures of old K's as you can find. None of them look like that type bell, and most of the A's have that type of bell, higher, rounder bell. Still tough to say because of the artificial wear on it (scraping and scratching) but other factors such as weight and degree of wobble wouldn't hurt to lessen the mystery of the equation. I actually have an un-stamped 20" A that I posted here or on cymbalholic that it was determined is probably transition-A era ('49-early 50s).. But old k's have more distinct and random hammering, usually a flatter bell and another thing that may be an indicator is the diameter of the (unkeyholed) hole, and the diameter of the cymbal itself. So while we're mulling over the pics we can have some other measurements to consider. Looks like another sad brillo pad victum to me though.

Still think it could be a Zilco.

I'm new here as I was pointed in this direction because I mentioned I loved my ride cymbal as I was interested in getting others like it -- and the members of that forum said to look at this one.

Anyway, my ride looks a little like the one Drumaholic posted above but with a different stamp. Meaning, it's a big cymbal but there is no ink labels on it or anything like that as in the original cymbal posted on this thread. The stamp, as you will notice does say "Zildjian and Co." but it doesn't say made in the USA. (My eyes are bad) Even so, it may look old but I love to play it because it can make anyone sound like a good drummer. :)

(Sorry I had to edit this to show pics).

And I apologize in advance about the quality of the pics. The certainly don't do the cymbal justice. Its much nicer looking in person.

With that said, if its too difficult to view properky I can have my wife take additional photos (with a camera as opposed to an older model smart phone) as she has much steadier hands and better eyes than I do.

It doesn't say USA or Avedis because that is a K Zildjian made in Istanbul, Turkey. Called a "New Stamp" by Drumaholic. He distinguishes between "Older New Stamp" (1967-1972) and "Newer New Stamp" (1972-1977). Perhaps Bill can tell us if he judges that to be an Older or a Newer. Or that I have it completely wrong.

ref: The Gretsch Drum Book, by Rob Cook with John Sheridan, pp 250-251 (this is a special 2 page section by Bill Hartrick aka Drumaholic)

Thank you very much for the information, Zenstat. I would love to pick up that book because I'm a Gretsch man myself. Do you know what the differences are between the "Older New Stamp" and the "Newer New Stamp" and if so, which one mine is? Not that matters too much, because the bottom line is the cymbal sounds like a dream. Curious though ... would it be hard to find more like this one? I would love to get another but in 18". Once again, thanks for the info!!!