My belief is from `72 to `75 they didn`t have serial numbers...Am I right gents?

Cheers

You don't date a drum or a kit solely based on serial numbers. There are several different serial number lists. There's also fit and finish and hardware and shells. All this goes into dating a drum or a kit.

I think that it is generally recognized that the serial number date guide for the 1970s Ludwigs is incomplete at best. There are not very many reports of drums with serial numbers and dates upon which to base a guide. I would suggest that the drums from 1973 through 1975 and 1977 all had serial numbers, but that when the date guide was developed for inclusion in Rob Cook's Ludwig Book (the source of the vintagedrumguide information you cite) there were no reports of drums from those years.

I have been gathering information from serialized Ludwig drums from the 60s and 70s and hope to be able to present a date guide that will be based upon many more drums than those currently available. I have collected information from almost 700 drums so far, from 1963 through 1972. I believe at this point in my research that the practice of date stamping the interiors of shells was eliminated or severely curtailed. There are still some reports of drums for which there are reliable reports of the original year of purchase after 1972 which can be of some guidance. For a brief period in 1971-72, paper labels were used, often with date stamps, but often with a date code, the logic of which I have not yet decifered.

Rick

Thought I would throw this out there. I just got a Ludwig Acro and it has a pointy badge, and date stamped inside the shell. Serial number, 837094. Hope this helps out with the research.

JC