Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

No Jim, people are always asking...
It,s a December, with one of the very first hi gains which is quite weak in output. They hadn,t got it right yet, or the guy that wound that p/u had trouble counting or finished early for the christmas party...
Maybe he had trouble counting after the party...
A fantastic bass to play though. Very light and acoustic, and the neck profile is simply the best. All imo of course..
73 is a great year for F/G too, again imo. The guy in the booth had it going on at that time...

Andrew, my original 4001 was a 73 and was a lovely exapmle of Fireglo, I agree, 73 was a great Fireglo year !!!

the 4003 in post 3114 is an early 90's ... I traded it for a 70's hss american floyd rose strat and then sold the strat ... I had to do a little repair on that one ... some of the electronics were rusted out ... a guy in Toledo owns it now ... he is mainly a guitar player ... but he wanted a fireglo ric bass ...

"I've been hunting for a 73-4001 in Fireglo with Chequered binding for a while now"

Like this July '73 example?

Excuse my naivity but can someone briefly explain the differences of the 4001 vs. the 4003? Thanks

Yes Jeff, jut like that .... you just like to tease me .... !!!!

4003-4001 Differences

Ok,Ron bear with me here: The rest of you Feel free to add or correct dates and descriptions

The 4001 was an addition to, and eventually the replacement for the first bass Rickenbacker made the 4000 which was produced between 1957, and 1987. Some early 4001's have a "set" neck and were in fact most likely converted 4000's.

The 4001 first went into production in 1961, and was produced until 1983. There were several other variants of the 4001, the 4001-Fl, fretless, and a simplified stripped down version, the 4001-s.

In 1984, a 4001-v63 reissue was produced, the v63 was discontinued and replaced by the 4001-v64 around 1999

There were also two "signature" 4001's made. In 1991 the 4001-CS Custom designed and based on Chris Squires 1965 4001, approximatley 1000 of these were made between 1991 and 2000. The second signature model was only availible in Japan, 4001-v63-PMC which was based on Paul McCartney's 1964 4001.

A much rarer 4001 variant is the 4002, which was a delux version oof the 4001, with an ebony fingerboard, xlr outputs, when it was introduced in 1975 it had a $1200 price tag, expensive for the day, a very rare bass today

In 1980, Rickenbacker introduced the 4003 which was designed to be the replacement for the 4001, Stronger, and lighter with a more advanced truss rod system designed to cope with the higher tensions of roundwound strings.

Apart from the trusses, the construction of the 4001 neck slab is different. The 70's >4001's have 3 piece necks (not counting the fingerboard, and headstock wings). Two maple and one darker, contrasting laminate. Some say walnut others say paduk. Appears as a dark strip down the middle of the neck, and through the body.

The 4003 has a one piece neck slab like the 60's and even some early 70's 4001's.

The 4003 headstock is larger, with a more pronounced backwards angle where the 4001 was almost straight out. The new head shape is close to the early 60's shape.

The pickups are slightly differnt, and the newest 4003's have high gain humbucker style pickups.

The fretwire used on the 4003is wider and a little heavier than used on 4001's. It's probably the case that 4001's used the same fret wire as Rick guitars ..

Neck profiles are slightly different between the 4001, and 4003, and the early 4001's up till about 1973 had that wonderfull chequered binding. The "S" versions of both the 4001, and 4003 have no binding at all. The v63's and 64's also have no binding.

I've not touched on the 4003 specials, like the Tuxedo, the Blackstar, the Redstar, the 4003-s5, the 4003-s8 I'll let the others go into more detail on those !!!

the simple version ...

the newer 4003 bass has a stronger neck and hotter single coil pickups ...

Shadow!

A matter of semantics, but c64 not v64. Also I may be mistaken but all 4001s (dot neck, mono out, no binding) were set neck. Whereas the 4003s was neck thru. In addition there were odd variants like 21 fret 4001 necks and split pickguards on the first 4003 models.

99.9% of the 4001 basses were neck through ... and a lot of the 4000 basses were also neck through ... there were not many set neck Rics made ... and most of them were 4000 basses ...

and the 4001v63 and 4001c64 are really more of a 4003 bass from a structural standpoint ...

the old 4001 basses were stressed beyond the design specs by simply installing a set of round wound strings ... but we all did it and 99% were fine that way ...

...and the reason that 4001's *could* become overstresses from the use of roundwounds is the fault of the truss rods - if you torque them high enough to keep the neck flat you run the risk of popping the fretboard off at the headstock because of the "curling" of the rod ends downward. However, if you make and install a new thicker truss rod bar, you can torque the rods higher while eliminating the dreaded "curl"...

I've got three 4001's, all of which have 1/2" thick truss rod bars. All the necks have plenty of room for adjustment, but then again, I tune DGCF so the tension is lower...

Jim, Thank you very much! My head is swimming but I have learned a lot. I'm still not sure what I want but now have a bunch of notes and information as I begin my search for another cool bass. Thanks to all who have contributed to this thread. I would enjoy hearing more...

Why choose?

buy both-let the creditors decide!