Letters in conn serial numbers

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Elow
Posts: 1924
Joined: Mar 02, 2020

by Elow »

So i came across an elkhart 60H while cleaning rentals, and the letter is different than on my 71H. Do they have any meaning? The letter on the 60H is N and on my 71H is K i’m pretty sure. Also, this horn was made is early 50s and my 71H was 69. I have a 6H that was made in between then yet it doesn’t have that elkhart engraving like the basses do. Is that normal?
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BGuttman
Posts: 7368
Joined: Mar 22, 2018

by BGuttman »

At one point in the 1960s Conn exceeded 999999. Later horns had serial numbers with a letter and 5 numbers. I think the last of these is R, which is around the move to Texas. Note that this means the 60H is later than the 1950s (and later than your K 71H).

Much later Conn adopted a serial number with two letters followed by 6 numbers. This serial can date to year and month of manufacture. I'm not going to go into the details of how that works here -- it's kinda complicated.
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Elow
Posts: 1924
Joined: Mar 02, 2020

by Elow »

That’s interesting. The serial number is N36486, so should be late forties according to some website. I’ll check a different website.

Edit: Nevermind, any serial number with N is 1970. My bad
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Thrawn22
Posts: 1436
Joined: Sep 06, 2018

by Thrawn22 »

How much for 60H?
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Elow
Posts: 1924
Joined: Mar 02, 2020

by Elow »

[quote="Thrawn22"]How much for 60H?[/quote]

I’m not selling it, the store i work at is. The list price is $1800 but i’m sure you could get one of the sales people to lower it. I personally wouldn’t buy it. It looks like it’s been through 8 different wars and then repaired and relacquered. The dents are noticeable and the lacquer job looks to be done with the spray can, i put it in some chemicals and one part started peeling.