1980 4001 - no side fretboard markers?

[jps]

I am surprised the dealer made no mention of the refret and re-binding of the neck.

Missing the bridge pickup cover and has a few marks (as you'd expect for a 40yr-old guitar). The fretwear is minimal and weight-wise it comes in at 4.4kg (9.68lbs).

Overall the bass is in great shape and benefits from a new set-up / strings.

[Ontario_RIC_fan]

Welcome Steve, and congrats on the lovely Burgundy 4001.

I was looking through the register at other February 1980 4001 basses, to see if it was one of those odd factory anomalies, when they temporarily ran out of something. Unfortunately there are no good pictures, currently in the register to figure that out.

That is why the red dots appeared briefly, around early 1974, because they ran out of the stuff to do the black dots.

As has been mentioned it is most likely that the neck binding is not factory original.

I own a February 1974 4000 that, unusually, has neck binding, so I can confirm that sometimes there was some tiny variations, in what left the Electro Strings factory on Kilson Drive in Santa Anna.

[squirebass]

I just clued into the fact that you had posted the original sale pics, man that is a very clean, delicious example of burgundyglo. You don't see many that date back that far, that are THAT clean and undamaged. I WANT it!!! If you decide you can't get by without the markers, PM me, let's talk!

[Isaac]

Very nice looking BG.Looks redder than mine, but that might just be the light.

[bassduke49]

Burgundy (aka "Burgundyglo") varied a LOT from a deep red (well, burgundy), to bright cherry red, to kinduva washed out red stain look. There were even some in the early '70s that looked almost black - the famous "Eggplantglo" examples.

[Dirk]

I like the idea of Eggplantglo!
Do you have a picture of one Paul?
Dirk

[bassduke49]

All the pictures I have are in the book!

[doctorwho]

There are some pictures of the variations of "red" in this thread (guitars and basses):

viewtopic.php?f=3&t=396089

Oddly enough, I didn't include my 460 BG, which is the "Eggplantglo" variety of BG.

[rickenbrother]

It' no good, send it to me and I'll take good care of it.
Seriously though, that's a sweet Burgundy. You can have side dots put on by a good luthier or just leave it alone if you can play it without them.

[Dirk]

Thanks Gary,
now that is cool, I am digging that.
Eggplantglo no doubt.
Dirk

[CatHead]

Hey all! Thanks for all the comments about the bass. I think ill get my local Ric chap to add some fret markers on there, ive grown to depend on them over the years in low light situations so I think im gonna need them... or there may be some very interesting semitone harmonies ill end up coming out with! Haha!

[espidog]

Hey Steve - have you actually got the bass in your hands now? If so, I'd be really interested to see what that neck binding looks like in detail. Any chance you could take some big, hi-def macro photos of the binding surface and post them (or post links to them if they're really big)? I've still got a sneaky feeling the original fret markers might be hiding under a layer of something else...

[Korladis]

If you end up having to add dots, do red ones.

[Dirk]

How about LED's as an option, great for dark stages.

Or even temporary LED's like:
https://fretfx.com/

[scott_s]

Hey Steve - have you actually got the bass in your hands now? If so, I'd be really interested to see what that neck binding looks like in detail. Any chance you could take some big, hi-def macro photos of the binding surface and post them (or post links to them if they're really big)? I've still got a sneaky feeling the original fret markers might be hiding under a layer of something else...

The dealer listing is gone, so +1 on taking some more pictures, please!