I’m going to start by telling you that the 460 is hands-down my favorite Rickenbacker model. No question.
I have a hard time putting “why” into words, though.
There are certainly some tangible things I—and anybody—could like about the 460. They’re small and lightweight, have a Telecaster-ish low deck height (click to learn more) that makes fingerpicking comfortable, and while you still get the Rickenbacker chime from the toaster pickups, the solid body gives it a bit more sustain.
The same thing can be said of the 450 though. So why is the 460 my favorite?
Because it’s kind of stupid. Let me explain.
Let me put it this way: who here is old enough to remember the Cadillac Cimarron?
Introduced in 1982 and positioned as an entry level luxury car, the Cimarron is widely regarded as one of the worst cars GM has ever built. Not because it was poorly built or unreliable—well, it actually kind of was, but no worse than other domestic cars of the day—but because of what it actually was.
And what it actually was was a Chevrolet Cavalier—Chevrolet’s entry-level four-door small sedan—with a Cadillac badge, a different grille, and leather seats. MSRP on the Chevy? Around $7,000 (about $23,500 today). And the Cimarron? $12,500—or $42,000 today. For a tarted-up Cavalier.
I mean obviously there was a bit more to it than that, but if you park the two side by side and squint…it’s basically the same car. The automotive press was not kind, and most consumers were unimpressed.
So why bring this up? Well, if the Rickenbacker 450 was a Chevy Cavalier…
…the 460 was a Cadillac Cimarron.
But as much as the automotive press savaged the Cimarron, there were still a handful of people who looked at it and said, “Yeah, that’s the car for me. I WANT a fancy Cavalier.”
I guess I would have been one of them.
Okay, okay, as we’ll see that’s not an entirely fair comparison. But there are a lot of similarities. I mean, the 450 was a neck-through (click here to learn more) solidbody with two pickups, a floating intonated bridge, no binding, dot inlays, and pickguard-mounted mono output. At an MSRP of $224.50 (about $2,300 today) it was the cheapest full-scale two-pickup guitar Rickenbacker offered. It was the “entry-level” Rickenbacker.
The 460 took the standard 450 and tarted it up, adding triangle inlays, neck and top binding, and the fifth/blend knob (click here to learn more) missing on the 450. These additional features raised the MSRP to $284.50 (about $2,900 today), making it the “deluxe, entry-level” Rickenbacker.
Now to be fair, this still only made it the second cheapest Rickenbacker two-pickup model. So it wasn’t nearly as egregious as the Cimarron—which was pricier than Chevy’s most expensive sedan. Still, a “deluxe entry-level” guitar sounds more than a little contradictory, doesn’t it?
That’s what I really love about the 460. Yes, it’s comfortable and it sounds great. But more than that, it’s just kind of…unnecessary. Yet it exists.
Just as most drivers didn’t see the point of the Cimarron, most guitarists didn’t seem to see the point of the 460 either—despite remaining in the line for 20 years, it’s one of Rickenbacker’s rarer models. Let’s see if I can share the 460 love with you.
First of all, yes, you’ve likely seen me walk through the following sequence before. But it’s absolutely worth repeating, so bear with me as we speedrun our way through the 400 series lineage.
The tulip-shaped Combo 400 (click to learn more), Roger Rossmeisl’s (click to learn more) first original Rickenbacker design, debuted in 1956.
In early 1957, the two-pickup Combo 450 (click to learn more) joined the line.
Later that same year, Rossmeisl reshaped the 450’s lower cutaway to improve upper fret access.
And for the 1958 model year, Rossmeisl scooped out the inside of the 450’s upper tulip-shaped cutaway to create the cresting wave (click to learn more) body shape that lives on in today’s 620 (click to learn more) and 660.
See? Fast.
Let’s look at the 1959 price list to understand where the 450 fit into the product line.
Let’s begin by saying that while the Combo 600, 650, 800, and 850 were still technically on the price list, they weren’t actually being produced anymore. So let’s just ignore those.
Once we ignore those, we’re left with three basic categories of guitars:
Student/entry-level solidbody guitars, in short and full scale. Standard features (click to learn more) only.
Premium semi-hollowbody guitars in short and full scale, available with both standard and deluxe features.
Premium full-bodied, full-scale semi-hollowbody jazz guitars, in both standard and deluxe forms.
Guess which category the 450 fit in?
Now explain to me how the 460 fits into that hierarchy.
1961—1962
The 450 saw two significant changes in 1961. First, the pickguard changed from gold anodized aluminum to white plastic. But the larger change was to the slab body—the thickness shrank from 1 5/8 inches to 1 1/4 inches, and the edges gained front and back contouring in the wear areas for greater player comfort.
This revised body served as the platform for the new 460.
Production on the 460 began late in the year. Most features carried over from the 450: a maple through-neck (click to learn more) with walnut headstock wings, maple body wings, nickel-plated Kluson Deluxe tuners, a gold back-painted Plexiglas truss rod cover, white pickguard, two toaster pickups, and a bridgeplate-mounted standard Rickenbacker six-saddle bridge hidden beneath a chrome clip-in ashtray cover.
From there it got fancy.
While the 460 had the 450’s new thinner body, it lost the contoured top in favor of single-ply white binding around the edges. Mostly.
I’m not honestly sure whether this detail first appeared on the 460 or the 4001 (click to learn more)—which also launched in 1961—but it echoed an element that had already become part of Rickenbacker’s visual identity: the through-neck section of the body was left bindingless at the butt of the guitar.
This little gap in the binding already existed on the semi-hollowbody guitars, of course, but there was a practical reason for it there: the tailpiece “ramp” interrupted the edge of the body. On the 460 it appears to have been more a continuation of an established design language than a functional necessity.
The fancy continued on the neck, which, unlike the 450, was also bound and carried deluxe triangle inlays. Now you may look at this picture and think to yourself, “Shouldn’t a 1961 deluxe guitar have crushed-pearl inlays?” The answer to that question is complicated. 1961 Capris had the same poured-resin inlays they’d had since their introduction in 1958. The New Capris (click to learn more) replaced the “original” Capris mid-year, and they did indeed have crushed-pearl inlays.
Now, this wasn’t the crushed pearl you’re probably picturing—it had much larger flakes—but it was crushed pearl nonetheless. Despite that, other deluxe models from 1961—including the 4001, the F-body guitars (click to learn more), and the 460—had poured resin. By mid-1962, the New Capris would lose the crushed pearl as well.
That said, there is at least one prototype 460 from July 1961 with those large-flake crushed-pearl inlays.
This guitar also featured a gold plastic pickguard and a two-knob master volume/master tone setup that would not carry over to the production model.
The last “extra” the 460 got over the 450 was functional rather than cosmetic: a blend knob (click to learn more).
The blend knob had been introduced on the New Capri models earlier in the year. Unlike the binding and inlays, however, the blend knob was standard on both deluxe and standard Capris, and it would go on to be included on almost every new model introduced after 1961.
Which means it’s not strange that the 460 got it, but it is kind of strange that the 450 never did. I suppose it’s just one more data point reinforcing the 450’s entry-level status.
There was one “deluxe signifier” that the 460 didn’t get, however: Rick-O-Sound stereo wiring (click to learn more). To be fair, two face-mounted output jacks would have looked strange, but somebody must have decided that moving the output to the side would have added more cost than they were willing to put into an entry-level guitar—even on the deluxe entry-level version. So no Rick-O-Sound for you!
1963—1969
Changes to the 460 over its life were—I suppose, appropriately—an odd mixture of the evolutions that the 450 and deluxe models underwent at the same time. Those changes began in 1963 when the donor 450’s headstock wings changed from walnut to maple. So too did the 460’s.
At the same time, you’ll notice from the photo above that the Kluson Deluxe tuners found on the 450 were replaced by pearl-buttoned Van Ghent tuners (click to learn more) on the 460. While the Van Ghents would most notably be utilized as the standard tuner on the New Style 360 when it launched in 1964, I’m fairly certain the 1963 460 marked their first “standard fitment.”
The conflict between entry-level and deluxe reared its ugly head later that same year when the 450 got a new bridge: a floating, one-piece compensated unit replaced the standard Rickenbacker six-saddle adjustable bridge. Did the 460 retain the “better” old bridge? It did not.
The new bridge sat on a shorter bridgeplate, and the pickguard’s bridge cutout was refined to accommodate the new layout—and help hold the floating bridge in place.
The following year—1964—deluxe won out over entry-level as two features that appeared on the New Style 360 migrated to the 460: proper crushed-pearl inlays and silver-topped knobs.
We’ve discussed the “blank-top-with-indicator-line” (mid-1964) to “labeled-top-with-indicator-line” (mid-1965) to “blank-top-with-indicator-dot” (late 1966) evolution of the silver-topped knobs before, and the 460 followed just as you’d expect. The 450 would continue to wear the old Kurz-Kach knobs until mid-1965.
Of course, there were line-wide updates that affected the 460 as well. 1964 saw the paddle-shaped headstock used on all 6-string guitars lose about a quarter of an inch in width—creating the narrow “vintage” shape most people associate with 1960s Rickenbackers.
At the same time, “MADE IN U.S.A.” appeared on the truss rod cover below the Rickenbacker logo at U.K. distributor Rose Morris’s request.
The rest of the 1960s saw only minor changes—and none of them specific to the 460. Use of Van Ghent tuners on the deluxe guitars—including the 460—petered out in 1965, replaced by the Kluson Deluxes in use pretty much everywhere else in the line.
The most notable change of this era occurred in mid-1965 when the bridgeplate on all so-equipped guitars reverted to the longer version used prior to 1963. Once again the pickguard cutout was modified to accommodate the change.
The “MADE IN U.S.A.” imprint moved from below and parallel to the Rickenbacker logo around 1968 to above the nut, perpendicular to the logo. Higher volume models also had their model number printed above “MADE IN U.S.A.” The 460 did not qualify.
But we have to have at least one example of “Rickenbacker’s gonna Rickenbacker” in this story, and so here it is. Remember the whole “unbound neck-through section for brand visual continuity” thing? In May 1966 there was a production batch of 460s with binding around the top’s entire perimeter. Because of course there was.
Not gonna lie: it looks pretty good.
This oddity makes more sense, however, when you flip the guitar over and note that this batch of guitars featured a set-neck instead of the normal through-neck.
These would be the only 460s built with set-necks or full top binding.
1970—1982
Here’s something that feels somewhat ironic today. When it was first introduced in 1969 on the 381 (click to learn more) as the “381 Coil,” the Higain pickup was seen as a premium upgrade over the aging toaster. So it should come as no surprise that the 460 got the new pickup well before the 450, with the “transitional” threaded-stock polepieces first appearing on the 460 in late 1970.
To show you just exactly where the 450 fell in the line-up, consider this: it and its one-pickup cousin, the 420 (click to learn more), were the very last two Rickenbacker models to ditch toasters for Higains in 1974.
And yes, that 1972 460 above has glueglo (click to learn more)—something that until recently we thought only happened on guitars with checkered binding. I have no explanation for this, but you can read more about it here.
From 1973 to 1975, the 460 ran through all the normal transitional era (click to learn more) changes—button top Higains (mid-1973), poured resin inset triangle inlays (mid-1973), and injection molded raised-letter truss rod covers (early 1975). By mid-1975, the 460 had reached its final form.
I don’t have a lot of good pictures of 460s built in the late 1970s and early 1980s because there just aren’t that many. It looks like none at all were built between 1975 and 1979. While the 460 remained on the price list until the great pruning of 1985, there don’t appear to have been any made after 1982—not that anyone really noticed.
The 460 wasn’t the only Rickenbacker model to ever go out with a whimper and not a bang. Which to be honest, is the same way it appeared.
I still love the damn thing, though.