Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

One more....
Even at it's lowest setting, the foam bridge mute just barely contacts the underside of my E string (all other strings OK) , which kills the note from ringing out, and creates a weird little false harmonic. Is it OK to bend the spring metal plate downward, put a washer in under the adjustment screw to force it downward, or should I just shave the foam pad down a bit? I really never use the mute, so I guess I could take it out, but don't like the look of an empty hole there.

Yes, you can bend and/or make other adjustments. I am not sure a washer will help lower the mute. Most likely, you will need to shave the foam a bit, no big deal.

Thanks Jeff, i'll take it apart tonight and see about shaving it down.

That's probably the best solution, as the metal bar is pretty tough, actually.

I took it apart and see how it works now, the foam is glued to the flat bar, probably easiest just to peel it off, shave off some of the glued foam side, and re-glue it to the bar. The nuts holding the bottom end of the screws are held captive by a drop of what looks like epoxy, which I had to break free to remove the captive nuts. I assume I should re-epoxy these after shaving the foam?

I don't know, but my next band name will be The Captive Nuts.

Yeah, you need to glue those back on. On the old bars on 4001 basses they are just threaded holes in the bar for the screws to go through, no separate nuts; I have not looked at how it is done on a 4003. While you have the foam off the bar, slice it longitudinally to make it about half as wide and glue the foam back onto the bar along the edge that is closest to the saddles. This will bring the mute's witness point closer to where it needs to be for better intonation if you use the mute.

jdogric12 wrote:I don't know, but my next band name will be The Captive Nuts.

Is it better to have the bridge ground connected to the bottom mute bar screw, or one of the bridge wood screws? The mute bar effectively "floats" in the bridge assembly, and the mute screws seem isolated from the bridge itself by the white plastic washers. Wouldn't a connection to the bridge wood screws be more positive ground?

On the subject of the bridge mute:

Why is it so hard to turn the screws? Obviously, you don't want it to be so easy that it changes position while playing, but every time I try to raise the mute pad, I feel like I need to get out a pair of pliers!

Isaac wrote:On the subject of the bridge mute:

Why is it so hard to turn the screws? Obviously, you don't want it to be so easy that it changes position while playing, but every time I try to raise the mute pad, I feel like I need to get out a pair of pliers!

Is the pad full width on yours? If so, it can tend to bind on the sides of the teeth.

It already helps if you turn the screws for half turn (little by little) each side alternatively until you are satisfied, instead of doing the whole adjustment of each screw