Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

Barry the 1st 4 string picture is a stock 4003 early 80s 4003 tailpiece ... the 2nd was my old 1968 4001 before I sold it ...

I will be looking forward to the pics, David.

I had some tailpiece lift on my c64. It was getting worse rather quickly until I yanked off the Pyramids. I put on some Chromes and it stopped moving.

Once the part of the tailpiece casting with the holes where the strings pass through at the rear leaves the deck, it is no longer a cosmetic issue as the lack of contact in this area WILL cause the sound to thin out a bit in the lower frequencies. In my experience, once the extra two screws are added and this area makes firm contact with the body, the sound gets "thicker" in the lower frequencies. The present material in the die cast tailpieces is actually much stronger than aluminum, but the break angle of the strings is steeper and the casting has more voids in it at the rear.

The 60's and early 70's tailpieces simply do not lift...

Dane, I agree with your accessment of the tone changes. I looked at my tailpiece (had a small 1/16" lift) and I added 3 flat washers beneath the lowest screws (the deepest body rout) because of the gap between the bottom of the tailpiece and the wood. That took kcare of the lift.

That and drilling out the recesses where the bridge allen screws seat so the screws touch wood made very noticable changes for the better. Less metalic sounding, deeper tone. I did not replace the bridge lift allen screws as they were always so high I kept catching my palm on them and now they are just protruding and no more catching.

Thank you guy's for the advice,and thanks Gary (e-mail sent).I think i may get the engineers in work to drill the two extra holes for me,as i have just bought a new tailpiece and with my track record with tailpieces,i'll let someone else do it as i like the tailpiece to be flush to the body.

C'mon guys,

You want to talk LIFT?

OK, I'll give you LIFT!

Anyone remember this one?

THIS IS NOT A GENUINE RICKENBACKER PART.

THIS IS A JAPANESE COPY RIC that was listed on Ebay a while ago!

Now that's lift.So would that be a fault with the design/shape of the Ric tailpiece or has Ric used different metals over the years.As Jeff said his 60's bass no lift,yet now various degrees of lift.Or is it the introduction of the roundwound string.

I used rotosound strings on my 68 4001 for 33 years and it had absolutely zero tailpiece lift ... I think the metal was different back then ...

I don't think a real 4 string Ric would ever lift as badly as that picture ... but Gary had a 4003s5 that was almost that bad ...

My 64 4001S had Rotosounds on it through the 70's and 80's and also had zero lift.

Not quite as bad as that 'faker, but it still was scary:



"... but it's, only a memory, only a memory ..."

Gary ... you should put vintage knobs on that bass ...

And that is the worst pull up I have ever seen on a Ric bass ... I find it hard to believe that a 4 string Ric could ever get that bad ...

Count those strings again, Jeff. That's Gary's 4003S/5 "notreallyaBlackstar"!

ya that was my point ... that one pulled up that bad because it had 5 strings ... if it were a 4 stringer it would not have pulled up that badly ...