Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

I bought this 75 4001 in 1981. Did people give a **** about these sort of things back then? That's what always made me feel like this 4001 is 100% original...

Is the loss of flexibility from losing one tone pot offset well by having the capacitor on a "dimmer?' I was planning to yank the thing altogether on the '77 I'm soon to have, but the idea of having a bass adjustment intruiges me.

Unless you are using the Rick-O-Sound two tone pots are pretty redundant.

ric-o-sound also bypasses the cap ...

What gauge wire should be used for the bypass? Should it be shielded or anything special?

Any gauge, the smaller the better and it doesn't need to be shielded. I always keep both tones the same anyway so they are redundant for me.
If Ric-o-sound bypasses the cap that explains to me why my bass always sounded better when I ran it stereo back before I knew about it. Are you positive Jeff, it seems to me it would still go through the cap because it is before the volume control.

http://www.rickenbacker.com/pdf/19507.pdf

yep the ric-o-sound by-passes the cap ... also you can plug a mono jack into the ric-o-sound jack and it will essentially become a 1 pickup 4000 bass ... bypassing the cap ... whereas if you flip the toggle switch you get the bridge pickup with the cap in the circuit ...

somebody with a 4001 and the cap test this stuff ... I am relaying it all from memory ... it has been a few years since I had a 4001 with the cap and ric-o-sound ...

Oh that link didn't work, I'll check out my one capped bass later but the way it looks in the schematic is that the cap's in the circuit either jack.

I have two 4001's. One is a '72, which I bought new at the time, and the other I think is a '65 judging from the serial number.

Both basses had the bass cut cap on the treble pickup.

They apparently did this because the toaster neck pickups were actually guitar pickups, and without the cap the treble pickup has quite a bit more low end then the neck PU!

Using the bass in stereo does not bypass the cap, since it's between the treble volume and the PU selector switch. The output jacks are after the volume controls. The only switching that goes on at the mono jack is to connect the two volume controls together for mono operation.

Using the bass in stereo would sound different however due to the fact that running two pickups in parallel lowers the inductance and gives a much brighter sound. This also affects how both the tone and the bass-cut cap would operate. Using the bass in stereo would give you the full output of each pickup.

I did this modification (using the treb tone control to bypass the cap) years ago. Eventually I just removed the cap so I could use the treb pickup by itself.

Using different value caps will give different amounts of bass. If you go with a larger value, you will get more low end. They were using a .0047 (.005) MF cap. Try a .01 or .05 instead.

That's interesting Dave, did you notice any treble loss if you backed one of the volume controls way down?

Ricks wire their volume controls "backwards" as compared to the way Gibson does it. By that I mean that on a Gibson type wiring, the wiper of the potentiometer is connected to the output jack, so basically the amp is being shunted to ground.

On a Rick the wiper is connected to the pickups, via the pickup selector switch. So when you turn down the volume you are shunting the pickup to ground.

The advantage of this method is that when you turn one volume all the way down, it doesn't turn both pickups off. The disadvantage is a slight roll off of highs. This probably happens with the Gibson method too, but you don't hear it as much.

I got around this by installing a small buffer preamp. It was a Bartolini. Of course I had to find a way to fit a 9v battery in the bass. We won't talk about that! (involves routing)

It never bothered me as I usually kept both volumes full or just backed off the neck slightly and just adjusted the tone with the cap control and treble control. but what I find strange is that stock they don't do that, it seemed to be something to do with putting both tones on the same pot that did it. Hey nice to meet someone who came up with the same idea David. I was living in Lima Perú with not a lot to do except fool with basses and amps all day. I think I had one all apart and was just staring at the circuit and got inspired, haha!

I also bought the most beat 70's SVT head you ever heard for 300 bucks (cosmetically it was fine) and just about totally rebuilt it including replacing all 14 tubes, cap job, etc. etc. etc. and brought it back here on the plane, it even had 6L6's instead of 6550's with no mods and they didn't burn up or even glow. I had it apart for months on the floor checking diodes caps, resistors. The thing sounds great now.

I always wanted an SVT, but a few years ago I picked up a Mesa 400+ head, and 4X10 cab. Damn that thing is heavy!

I'm into solid state again now, so I'll be selling it soon...

David, any chance of a pic of that 65....

I don't know which is heavier a Mesa 400+ or an SVT. I know I Like the sound of an SVT a lot better though, they have a lot of bite.