RIHS 90's and present versions.

[Seans]

A friend recently bought a 91 CS, I have been all over this bass literally and have even gigged it (cheers man and YOU WILL sell it to me ). It is just simply massive and all there in the soundstage, I am trying to work out what is so special about it (to me that is) and I have come to the conclusion it's must be the HS.
The HS is a whopping 12.5K, having bought a 2010 RIHS that's 10.5K and fitting to my most favorite 74 (neck to die for) 4001, it's just not the same and I'm talking by a long way.
Not being that clued up on my pickup technical side, I know a certain amount of tonal depth is lost on the higher power winding, but it's not the case here in fact just the opposite.
A quick question to throw in to the experts, does a RIHS have a certain optimum peak, winding turns to magnet power (and all it's other points), that may contribute to this amazing pup, even though I have in the past unwound pups to get more depth, this one doesn't need anything like.

[aceonbass]

John Hall has said in the past that the wood and construction of a guitar had a bigger effect on sound than the pickups, so that should be taken into account. Also, the pot values are actually different between your '74 4001 and a 90's CS4001. Every RIC tone/volume pot I've tested from the 90's till early 2000's was actually around 180K ohms even though they were rated at 500K for tone and 250K for volume. I don't know what they were from the 70's.

[Seans]

Dane, I did actually measure the tone pot's ( why I didn't do the volumes I don't know), bridge was 540k and neck was 380k, all dated at mid/late 89.

The wood on this one is something special yes, acoustically it's louder than my other 4001's, but I'm not sure this is the whole story. My 74 pot's all read around near the standard.

[aceonbass]

Wow...Those sure are some variances from spec. Whenever I build a harness, I start with components that I measure to be within 5% or so of spec. I use 500K for my tone, 250K for single coil volume, and 500K for humbucking volumes. One thing to remember is that your '74 also came stock with an .0047uF bass cut cap on the bridge pickup. Removing or bypassing this makes a BIG difference in output and tone on that pickup.

[Seans]

Should have mentioned .0047 cap removed on 74.