Mid 60s off the top of my head.

To confirm, check the Vintage Drum Guide for when that finish came out in the catalog plus the serial number (estimate) guide provided by Gretsch itself.

Also in late 60s you start to see the hex screws and this one has flat head.

I'd say 63-65, most likely '64, based on the tireless serial number dating work that's been done by kcdrumdad over at drumforum.

Has this information been published? I tend to let the instruments speak to me when telling date and originality, but empirical information always is of assistance to the divining process!

Oldschool - Bill's estimate of 1964 +/- 1 year sounds about right. That would be a fairly early satin flame wrap, but not the earliest. Your drum has other characteristics associated with earlier drums.

knavel - Nothing has been published lately. I think the thread that discussed it on dfo is no longer available.

The basic idea is to keep a log of serial number and other information on round badge drums and see what we can learn. The goal is to link the serial number to the age of the drum so that the serial number can be used to predict age. Dfo member gsw started a thread about his serial number log in 2006 and I combined efforts with him later that year. The log now has over 1420 round badge drums and over 2800 drums in all. There are many patterns that have emerged. I am working on writing up the explanation of the information and a dating guide based upon numerous characteristics, including serial number. Perhaps early next year I will have something in good enough shape to share.

Date estimates come with a disclaimer - even with a lot of empirical data, predicting a drum's age is not an exact science, so any estimate (like old school's drum being from 1964 +/- 1 year) should not be taken as gospel truth, just an educated guess. I am of the opinion that Gretsch serial numbers are a useful tool, despite many comments that they are worthless or unhelpful. Gretsch's use of serial numbers is confusing and requires a systematic approach in order to be understood. I don't think anyone had collected enough empirical data to evaluate them properly.

Rick

Nice post KC.

I'm surprised to hear that Gretsch serial numbers of that period are not considered probative as I have found them to be reasonably consistent with what my senses say to me about the year of a drum.

I think your work is excellent from what little I've seen of it and subsequently been able to put into practice. (Every SSB Gretsch I've seen that hits me as 60s but for the SSB has been in that first run range you told me about...there's one on ebay as I write in fact in that range).

Between number of plies, whether there is a label at all, wrap color, flathead or hex screws I think we have some fairly useful dating tools at our disposal. OK so we may never know that something is, e.g., "July 14, 1966" when it comes to Gretsch but at least we can be fairly certain within a year or two and that seems useful enough.

Are you cats finding this guideline at the Gretsch website is holding true for Round Badges?

Quote from site:

"However, here is a reasonably reliable dating-system for RB drums by serial number: four or less digits = early-'60s; five digits = mid-'60s, and six digits = late-'60s. (Late-'60s drums usually have internal hex-head shaped screws rather than the earlier round-head style."

Thanks !

THANKS to all for the input I've received thus far.

I do appreciate it!

KCDrumDad: You mentioned that my drum "has other characteristics associated with earlier drums."

Could you please define what those characteristics might be?

Thanks!

knavel's list is a good start: "Between number of plies, whether there is a label at all, wrap color, flathead or hex screws I think we have some fairly useful dating tools at our disposal."

The bulk of these characteristics point only to defining the drum as 1960s. Here's how I approach it: Six ply, silver painted, round badge drums are widely regarded as from the mid 50s (paint started and plies grew to 6) through about 1971 (badge changed). This can be refined a little as follows: post 1961 if it has a label (started in about 1962) and pre about 1968 if it has round head screws instead of hex heads (started about 1968). Add to this that the Progressive Jazz 4x14 snares are believed to have been more popular earlier rather than later in the 1960's. The satin flame wrap first appeared in the 1966 catalog, but seems to have available and somewhat plentiful for at least a few years before that. White got less popular as time went on and bolder colors took over.

Without the serial number, that's all we have, but at least we can place it in that range because it possesses all of those characteristics and none of the characteristics vary from what would expect to see. We can point to 1962-1968 and nothing points outside that range.

The above may appear to be educated guesswork based purely upon physical characteristics. It is. But, John Sheridan suggested his Rule of Thumb that Gretsch posted on its site and kevins quotes in this thread. I have found that Sheridan's Rule of Thumb holds true for round badge drums. It does not work for other eras however, because of Gretsch's reuse of serial numbers. Between the physical characteristics and Sheridan's Rule of Thumb, we can get to a slightly tighter range of possible years. For this particular drum, Sheridan's Rule gets us from 1962-1968 to the mid 1960s.

That seems to be the state of the art right now. That is what started me collecting information a few years ago to see if we could do better. When I can get time to complete my full explanation of the log, I think we can get our estimates a little more precise. At this point, I can say that serial number 26975 (if I read it right in your picture) seems to fit in the 1964 +/- time frame.

Rick