Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

GONE!

missed that one as well...

Thanks Erik,
This 4003S/5 has found a good home. MINE!!! I saw this post before leaving for work this morning and my itchy trigger finger got the best of me. I'll keep ya posted...

the 4003s5 mb with black trim looks cool on stage ... and it is a thunderous instrument ... when you get used to it you will find it to be very finger friendly and very fast and smooth playing ... here's me with mine ... I love that slender neck on a 5 string ...

Jeff, this will be my first 5 string. So how hard will the switch from 4 to 5 be? Any advice?
Also, does yours have the toaster? I can't tell from the pic.
P.S. Nice S/5 ya got there!

Yep ... that one has a toaster ... my 1989 4003s5 I put a 6 pole high gain in there ...

I was a 4 string player for 30 years ... the 5 string messed up my head ...

It took several months to get used to it ... I had to play only tight spaced five strings for a while ... then I got to the point that 4 string basses felt weird to me ...

so you got to reprogram your brain where you can feel natural on a five string with tight spacing ... but when you do you will be able to play faster and cleaner and have the extended range ...

so don't give up work at it and the effort will pay off ...

Im in the same situation Jeff, I've got 9 4-strings lying around that I just love, but more and more I find myself playing my 1 lonely 5-string. It just seems to work out better with my blues band and eliminates the need for d-tuning or hipshot key replacements. I play a Warwick with what I would call medium string spacing and have gotten quite comfortable with it. But I'm looking for a 4003-5, which looks even tighter, but I primarily play with a pick so I dont think it will be to much of a transition. I'd like to order a cheyenne II 5, that looks like it offers a wider string spacing, but I'll be 43 this month and I'm afraid I wont be alive when its delivered.

I didn't have any problem moving to the S5 other than the usual adjustment dealing with the low B. I like the spacing, as it's much easier to play than some of the wider guitars, especially when moving to 5 or 6 strings. My S5 has a bit beefier neck than my other Ric 4 strings, but not too much. You'll get the hang of it soon enough, I wouldn't worry.

That's what I'm thinking too. I have sampled a few 5 strings over the years (all non-RIC) and I didn't like the wide spacing. I originally started playing rhythm guitar at a young age. My older brother has an Imperial hollow body that I use to play all the time. I think the switch will be a smooth one.

I got my MB 4003S/5 !! Actually I got it Monday, but this is the first chance that I've gotten the time to post here all week. It is very nice. The action is super low. I thought my '79 4001 had super low action, and this one beats it. I notice there is less clearance between the strings and the pickguard, so definitely not a slappers bass with that and the string spacing. I don't do much of that anyway. One thing I am kind of disappointed in is that the string spacing varies. The D string is very noticably closer to the G string than it is to the A string ! I'm going to have to find an unslotted saddle to put in place of the D string saddle and slot it myself. It arrived with flatwound strings installed. They are very high tension strings except for the B string. The seller included a set of GHS boomers that I haven't had time to put on. The mute pad was all the way up, so with the flatwounds it really gave a great upright bass tone.
Anyone know where I could get an un cut bridge saddle ? I called RIC this morning, they won't sell one to me.

Actually with a little practice I can do thumb slapping very easily on my 4003s5 basses ...

basically it is just retraining your hands to be comfortable with a different spacing ...

Congratulations Joey on the arrival of your 4003S/5 MB. Yeah, I noticed in the pic that the string spacing between the D and G was very close. Try e-mailing Mike Parks @ www.the-music-connection.com. He has uncut 4-string bridge saddles (complete) on his site. Maybe he has a spare he can sell to you. If not, you could buy the complete bridge saddle for $45. Maybe one of our forum members knows of a better solution. Good luck with her. Keep us posted on your progress...

Sorry to hear about that, Joey. I hope you can find proper uncut saddles for your new baby soon.

Actually, I checked with Chris Clayton a while ago about the availability of the 4-string saddle/bridge assemblies and he said they hadn't been available for a while. Don't know if they're back in stock or not. Maybe there are still some 5-string ones at Clayton's or Mike Parks'?

Joey, when ordering saddles, make sure they are the pre-2000/2001 specs, whose thread hole center is 5/32" from the bottom of the saddle triangle.



These are very hard to find as dealers now only have the newer/post-2000 ones that have the 6/32"-7/32" measurement and won't fit your existing bridge piece. Ask them anyway.

Good luck.

Thanks guys for the suggestions and tips. I can probably widen the slot for the D string until I can find new saddles. The string would get pulled in that direction (center)anyway. The B string is actually about 1/32" closer to the E string than it should be, which is not as noticable as the gap between the D and G strings, but widening the slot won't help since the string gets pulled to the center because of the shape of the tailpiece. I guess RIC's quality control went out the window when this bridge was made. This is something I expect and have seen on F**d*r basses at the nut. So much the the best basses coming from RIC have been in the past few years.

Maybe the bridge is in backwards ... ie rotated 180 ... my 4003s5 MB came that way ... when somebody changed the strings the bridge fell out and got put back wrong ...

The five string saddles are ground down from the four string version to narrow them, so either would work, but you do need to watch the spaing from the hole to the top as indicated above. The bridge on my five was manufactured incorrectly with the G string hole too high (since all the replacement saddles I tried were the same), so I had to strip the threads off the adjustment screw to get it to work properly.

Incidentally, that only showed up when the bass had returned from the Ric factory for a warranty paint issue...