4004 delivery today!

[basmansam]

Beautiful bass Ash. Love the knobs.
How much does it weigh and how does the neck compare to your other Ric basses?

[aceonbass]

IS there anyone making a quality volume pot in 1/4" to make a VVT harness?

There are also no manufacturers of quality pots in 250k & 500K values with a 1/4" bushing. That's why I use CTS pots with the same physical dimensions as RIC has always used. Like Woody says, just enlarge the hole as part of the upgrade. It sure beats the heck out of having to live with the stock single coil electronics in 4004 basses and 650 guitars.

[jps]

I, personally, am quite happy with the tone from the stock electronic. When I did the VVT mod to my first 4004, the Cii from 2004, I drilled out the shaft hole eccentrically to move the center of the new volume control shaft a bit away from the tone control and also used a large Forstner bit in a drill press to slightly lengthen and round out the end of the cavity where the new neck pickup volume pot was going in place of the selector switch. The centerline for the Forstner bit was at the edge of the circumference of the switch hole to move the centerline away from the "middle pot" (existing tone control) to keep the centers of all three control shafts equally spaced; that is why I rounded out and slightly extended the length of the control cavity.

If I do this again I want to keep it a lot simpler to do, which is why I was wondering if there were good pots made that dropped into the existing switch hole. Apparently, not. Another way I have considered doing this is by using two volume controls in the existing VT locations, and use the switch as a master three way tone selector, like how Gretsch does it on the 6120. I don't really need to switch between pickups, I don't play any music that requires instant switching between pickups.

[Kiddwad57]

Ash, Great looking bass, congratulations! Jeff, that seems like a sensible approach. Now about the fretless conversion...

[jps]

There are also no manufacturers of quality pots in 250k & 500K values with a 1/4" bushing.

How about these?

I know I would have to get knobs to fit the shafts but that is not a problem.

[aceonbass]

Jeff....I can tell by looking at that pot that it has a 3/8" bushing, and you need it to be 1/4" bushing to fit without enlarging the hole. The tolerance in these pots is horible at 10-20%. Mine are 0-8% max. 1/4" bushing pots arent hard to find, but I won't use cheap components in my customers instruments. Just enlarge the hole. Maybe you'll wanna keep the bass cuz it sounds so much better now...

[jps]

Jeff....I can tell by looking at that pot that it has a 3/8" bushing

http://www.precisionelectronics.com/0-40a-080b.html

[8mileshigher]

Scrumptious! Love the knobs!

Yeah, those knobs look great and I am partial to JetGlo's

[aceonbass]

Jeff....I can tell by looking at that pot that it has a 3/8" bushing

http://www.precisionelectronics.com/0-40a-080b.html

Ah...I stand corrected. Still, the tolerance is sub par, and I stand by my original statement that there isn't a quality 1/4" pot made that fits my requirements. I have it on good authority that the bass won't explode if you enlarge the hole though......

[jps]

No doubt the PEC pots don't meet the need for 1% (or better) precision, but I personally, don't need such in a guitar volume control that 99% of the time is essentially out of the circuit, anyway. The other 1% is usually to turn the volume all the way down. When I had two of the Zons I had made for me I was seriously considering no controls at all but then decided to have just a single volume control, mostly for when someone else used those basses. A mute switch would have been all I needed at that time in my musical life.

To PEC's credit, they are used on some very high end guitar amp brands, but again, for that sort of application, really tight tolerances are not that necessary, IMHO.

In other words, as I get older, I care less.....................