1921 F4's and their FON's and Serial Numbers

[Gary Hedrick]

I have in my hot little hands two F4's.

One is serial number 67236 with a FON = 11495...cremona brown...aluminum bridge top and no truss rod

Second is serial number 66587 with a FON = 11495 red finish...aluminum bridge top and no truss rod.

Both are in really really good condition.

So why the wide variance in serial numbers with the same FON......Perhaps instruments sat around for a while? ...large batches?? lots of elves making lots of instruments at the same time? Beyond my little pea brain....

I started another thread on this rather than jump on one of the other threads of serial numbers on Loars or the couple of F4 ones going on now.

[JFDilmando]

I'll defer to the experts here, but in short, I believe the FON #'s relate to build batch, while the serial #'s relate to shipment/sale date.

[pfox14]

Hopefully Joe Spann will chime in here, but the serial #s could have shipped 6 months or so apart, which is not that unusual for 1920s mandos. They just didn't sell as well as they did in the teens.

[houseworker]

Pictures would be nice

[danb]

I have in my hot little hands two F4's.

One is serial number 67236 with a FON = 11495...cremona brown...aluminum bridge top and no truss rod

Second is serial number 66587 with a FON = 11495 red finish...aluminum bridge top and no truss rod.

(...)

So why the wide variance in serial numbers with the same FON

As JFD said..

FON/Stamp = a batch of N instruments of same type ordered internally in Gibson
Serial = an instrument shipped to a customer & warranty information entered in the book

So why are they different finishes with the same FON? Well, that's a more interesting question. No immediate answer here

[Rick Albertson]

My late 21 F4 (aluminum saddle, no truss rod, red finish) is S/N 68046, FON 11575.

[Joe Spann]

So why the wide variance in serial numbers with the same FON......Perhaps instruments sat around for a while? ...large batches??

Hello Gary,

Said simply, because Gibson made up large batches of instruments under a FON, but did not apply the serial numbers until the instrument shipped. Both of your F-4's were constructed in the last part of 1921, probably in December. However, they shipped at different times. The first one (#66587) shipped in January 1922, probably in the first week. The second one (#67236) didn't make out of the factory until February, probably even the last week or so.

So why do instruments from the same batch have different finishes? I would postulate that the mandolin with the lower serial number (#66587) represents what the majority of the batch looked like....a red sunburst finish. I think the manoldin with the higher serial number (#67236) may have been returned to the finishing department before it ever left the factory, possibly because of a defect in the original finish, and thus delaying it's departure from the factory for a few weeks. Perhaps the boys in the finishing department were set up to do Cremona Sunburst instead of Red Sunburst when the mandolin came back...or maybe the guy that did Red Sunburst wasn't there that day....or maybe the mandolin was returned at some point prior to 1925 and got a refinish.

Differences in trim between members of the same batch can also be explained in a similar way.

In January of 1920, Gibson ran an article in their Sounding Board Salesman magazine which indicated that the nut, bridge, tuners and tailpieces were not installed until just prior to shipping. This only makes sense....strings would die quickly in the factory environment.

Oh...say hello to brother Dave for me.

Joe

[Gary Hedrick]

Thanks for the info everyone. It just seems a little strange that Gibson would have so many instruments within a FON number....my manufacturing experience makes that seem odd because it takes a fairly long time to make one of these...

So let's say they have 50 craftsmen.......5 doing basic wood prep....cutting stuff from big pieces to neck blanks...tops,, sides and backs.....there are guitars, mandolin, mandolas etc etc. so lots of pieces of difference sizes all being sorted into bins. 10 guys doing necks, 5 guys doing guitar pieces....5 doing mandolin family pieces.....say 15 high skills fellows doing the final graduations and fit up etc......3 or 4 doing finishes......3 or 4 doing final pieces...key, pickguards etc. and a couple of check out QC and shipping etc. .....what purpose does the FON serves as a batch number when the process is long period of time and is so varied....I suppose just some way of keeping track of the materials and flows... 700 to 800 hundred in a batch that's several months worth of work....just curious to try and do lot control and cost control with such wide numbers etc...

I am assuming that Henry Ford's methods would be up front and on "business" folks minds....he is in Detroit and using production line processes to push out consistent product very efficiently ...so I am assuming that Gibson would use some of those methods of division of labor.. perhaps this has all been covered before on the Cafe (everything seems to have been covered at one time or another)

and thanks Joe for your info.... You certainly should be proud of your efforts on the book. The book has now become the SOURCE of info on these instruments and is cited in a lot of ads. No small thing to transcend the everyday and become part of the fabric of this Gibson flow....

[Joe Spann]

It just seems a little strange that Gibson would have so many instruments within a FON number....what purpose does the FON serves as a batch number when the process is long period of time and is so varied....I suppose just some way of keeping track of the materials and flows... 700 to 800 hundred in a batch that's several months worth of work.....

Gary,

Since I published the book I've learned that Gibson produced instruments in multiples of 5. The observed data seems to indicated that within any one batch the minimum number of instruments was 5. However, usually it was a larger multiple of 5 like 40, 80 or even 120. Pre-war photographs of the rolling racks used in the Gibson factory reveal that they would hold exactly 40 acoustic guitars. The Mandolin racks appear to have held 60 instruments. Unlike a Ford Motor Company assembly-line approach, Gibson's craftsmen moved the rolling racks from one work station to the next, performing a specific operation on every instrument in the rack and then sending it onward, around the perimeter of the factory. From the White Wood Shop on the first floor to the stringing and shipping department on the third floor, the rolling racks slowly progressed along from point to point. For their banjos, the only thing that moved along in racks were the resonators, necks and rims. After receiving their finish, these three components were then returned to a room on the second floor which was used as a final assembly point for all banjos. According to pre-war employee Wilbur Marker it took about 4-6 weeks to complete a single batch of instruments.

The Factory Order Numbers (FON) were used to track all costs. When the rough lumber was drawn from the stacks the amount used was reported back to the Accounting Department, and charged off to that FON. Everything from labor hours to quarts of lacquer, was charged back to the FON and reported back to the Accounting Department. This information was also then used by the Procurement/Purchasing Department to buy more of everything needed to build more instruments.

Joe