Bentley age

[SallyOKW]

Hi have just acquired an upright Bentley patent number 21430 and wondering its age and if anyone can tell me anything? it's in excellent condition as far as I can tell.

[Bill Kibby]

Sorry, I can't tell anything from the patent number, what is the serial number?

[SallyOKW]

Where will I find the serial number please?

[Bill Kibby]

If you are lucky, you may just open the top and see it. Otherwise, you may need to poke around inside, or even on the back. While you are at it, look at my Datemarks page at pianogen.org because the piano is probably dated under the keys.

[SallyOKW]

Ok there is a pencilled 398 then a squiggle on the last key inside, and a trademark number 571097 inside

[Bill Kibby]

Somehow, I have assumed that this is a modern Bentley, such as sixties / seventies, but that number could indicate 1925, although as far as I am aware, they were not called Bentley then.

It has been a while since I tuned a modern Bentley, but as far as I remember, they had the number written on the (gold) iron frame just under the top edge. It is probably easier to strip it down to the point where you can carefully and genty lift out the keys of the bottom 2 or 3 notes, and you should find a date.

[SallyOKW]

Okay on the gold frame there is a black number 96398 , does that help? Bit wary of removing any keys as really don't thing I will get back properly. Think it may be older than seventies as it was my granny's before we acquired sometime then.

[Bill Kibby]

That should be 1959.

[Colin Nicholson]

I think there is much to be said about including a small photo of the piano, and/or a picture of the serial number - taking all the guess work away. As an example, I part exchanged my car on Monday and bought a Renault..... couple of stone chips here and there; so I started to look for the proper colour name & code for the paintwork. Mmmm! well, the log book just said 'Silver' ! .... then in another manual is said "Platinum" ...... so when I looked on-line for this touch-up paint, the page advised me to check the code matched, which was 632. Anyway, I found the badge just inside the driver's door (next to the courtesy light switch), and there were about 10 numbers!! .... bar codes, sets of numbers on their side reading top to bottom - allsorts.... then magic, I found a picture of the badge in another book, all numbers labelled with arrows & descriptions for each.... and at last, I managed to confirm that the 632 number was in fact genuine.

Regrettably - this is not the same for pianos - no books or manuals for specific types of pianos showing what the numbers mean; all numbers scattered around the piano - some meaningless, except of course that 'all important' serial number!

Personally, I would never just rely 100% on any numbers without a photo or 2, then it can be fully confirmed - assuming the piano makers kept records.

So.... is this piano dated 1925 or 1959? we may never know!

Oh yeh.... I've ordered the paint!