50's A's with the BIG hollow letter ZILDJIAN stamped into the metal already had 3 dots by then,so,your's could be older or late 70's,when they took the dots out again.
The hollow logo you're speaking of is 50's, as is the one that this gentlemen has. I have both types of logos on two different cymbals, as well as a 70's thin stamp,
This cymbal is definitely 50's, my only question is did the hollow block stamp come out before or after this stamp.
Classic late 50's stamp. Block letter stamp and other variations of 50's large stamp were earlier, around mid 50's. Some trans stamps carried over from 40's to early 50's
That trademark is without a doubt the late 1950's type. You can figure roughly 57,58,59, and maybe as late as 1960. There should be at least some hand hammering on that cymbal probably only on the top side, but I've seen a very few rare pieces that look for all the world like they were hand hammered both front and back. I have one of them from the late 1950's It's the darkest A I've ever had. Same thing for the block letter large stamps. I also have one of those that are hand hammered; there's not even one machine hammer mark on that thing that I can see. It's a dead ringer for a later transitional, and it sounds unbelievable good. So this has caused me to revise some of my thinking as far as hammering is concerned during this period from the mid 1950's until the late 1950's.
Maybe a little later I show you examples of those 2 cymbals that I mentioned.
I have heard that rivet cymbals became popular in the late 50's,so maybe by then,they took the 3 dots out......Bill?
Yes that's right. Originally at the very beginning the Zildjian trademark didn't have the 3 dots. In later years, as the story goes, the die maker put those 3 dots in there when he shouldn't have for some reason, but Avedis didn't mind. So they started using that new version. In the 1950's the only trademarks that had 3 the dots was 2 of the 3 large stamps, and the 1954 version. Then in the late 1950's they took them out again. From the early 60's on they then started using them once again, leaving them out only once more during the early 70's. Then they came back again after that and it has been this way ever since.
I know that it's kind of a complicated story, but it certainly helps in dating these cymbals. Those differences that coincide with various eras, are very helpful for this, along with some other things.
