I have two B basses with serial numbers one starting 900 which is melted into the plastic cover on the back of the controls and I assume means it was made in 1990? The other one’s serial starts 020 and is printed onto the the headstock. I’m assuming.
This second one is made in the Cort factory? It has a sharf jointed headstock with the printed serial number which is common practice for this factory, whereas the other B Basses I have do not have this and the headstock is part of the same piece going through the body.
Does anyone know when the 020 might have been made and where?
Sorry for the late reply, I just saw your post now. Can you give us the entire serial number(s)? I can ask the Service Dept. for whatever info they may have, but the serial numbers are the starting point.
Hi Steve, no worries, these are the two numbers I have; 02074000 and 9001653. I also have third bass which is walnut finish with gold hardware. It has a sharf joint on the next and the H on the headstock is a solid looking serif H rather than a glyph type H.
They are somewhat dateable by the headstock logo. I’m having some difficulty following your description of which is which, but I can tell you the solid H is on earlier basses (up to around 1996), the script H is on middle period basses (around 1996 to 2004), and there was a third font from 2004 till they were discontinued around 2009.
They say that both these guitars were built in Korea, 02074000 dates from 1990, 9001653 from 1989. Here the available specs:
body: Californian solid maple; through neck: Californian maple with Indian rosewood fingerboard; 24 nickel silver frets; 2 Select designed by EMG (2x J-style); active tone control on/off; vol/vol/tone: treble/bass; Steinberger DB-bridge with fine tuners; black hardware; graphite nut; red LED; Cosmo black nickel hardware; colours: red, black, grey metallic satin, natural satin, walnut-stain (gold hardware)
Sorry, I thought the picture showed the headstock clearly, I thinks your for your input. There are slight variations on all of them. The red one and the black one I have both have separate battery boxes, and the natural ones have the battery inside the same compartment as the wiring.
The black one (now bare wood) has no sharf joint for the headstock but the other three do.
The jack on the natural satin one is recessed but the others are not (although I wishe they were as it looks so much cleaner).
The natural ones have (or had) white dots on the knobs but the others do not.
The black one also had a brass nut (which I have lost) but I am not sure if that was an addition by the previous owner. I’ve had that one since 1992. I always wanted a natural one but couldn’t afford it, the neck bowed on it so I stripped the paint off it. I have also lost the pre-amp. I am now thinking of having it restored, although it will cost more than it is worth, it will look good in my collection of B Basses.
