4004Cii/5's are coming of the line!

aceonbass · Post by **aceonbass** » Mon Aug 18, 2003 5:11 pm

I had a long talk with Tommy at Rickenbacker today and among other things discussed, he told me that the first few 4004Cii/5's were finished so there should be product in the pipeline very soon! However, it is my sad duty to report that 4005's are still out of production.

ricnvolved · Post by **ricnvolved** » Mon Aug 18, 2003 6:27 pm

Dane-- I'll be very surprised if the 4005 series is ever reproduced again during my lifetime. I've really wanted one of those for quite awhile but I refuse to pay the current market price for one in excellent or better or condition. This subject of putting the 4005 back into production for a limited run has been discussed here in the forum before. If memory serves me, Mr. Hall has talked about the enormous cost of doing that; the projected MSRP would be necessarily high for Rickenbacker to make a decent profit and recover the start-up expense.

In other words, a limited edition 4005 re-issue ain't gonna happen.............

rickenbrother · Post by **rickenbrother** » Mon Aug 18, 2003 7:00 pm

You mean my 4004Cii5 dream bass may finally get put into production? I can hardly believe it ! I was just about to give up hope! I'm gonna see about ordering one tomorrow.

banta · Post by **banta** » Tue Aug 19, 2003 8:32 am

Me too. I can't wait to get one and immediately modify it.

rictified · Post by **rictified** » Tue Aug 19, 2003 10:07 am

Lakland has a hollow body bass in production for about $5000.00 I think, maybe a little less, but I would pay that for a brand new 4005 before I would for a Lakland.

bottom4 · Post by **bottom4** » Tue Aug 19, 2003 1:19 pm

I spoke to Tommy yesterday also – checking on my 4004Cii 4 string - for which, by the way, the order is now 526 days old!

The 5 strings that they produced are “test” basses. He could not confirm that commercial production runs were taking place on the 4004 anytime soon – 4, 5 or even 8 string versions.

He knows about my order and will push to make it happen – whenever that might be.

I WANT MY BASS!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thank you and have a very nice day!

Shoen Tag!
(For my German friends!)

jwr2 · Post by **jwr2** » Tue Aug 19, 2003 2:30 pm

I want a 4004Cii5 ...

But until then I will play my 5 string 2030 and my 4004L5 and both of my 4003s5's ...

Hey John Hall ... do you need a working musician to test your 4004cii5???? I am available ... I can compare it to my other 12 five string basses ...

dougp · Post by **dougp** » Tue Aug 19, 2003 3:23 pm

Andy - at least you're not waiting for a 4004LK (over 900 days for me) ... I don't suppose there's been any word on these since the guy who was carving the tops got poached by F****r?

ken_james · Post by **ken_james** » Tue Aug 19, 2003 7:13 pm

Hmm, I didn't hear about that, what's the story?

bottom4 · Post by **bottom4** » Wed Aug 20, 2003 1:26 pm

Doug, I'm pulling for you guy. I could only hope that this doesn't go on too much longer!

I heard they lost their LK guy. Haven’t heard anything about it in a while though. Do you know how many LK’s they get out before the F-er’s lured him away?

You know what, I wish RIC would stop making the 4001C64's. They're beginning to pile up out there. Time to make alot of the 4004Cii 4 & 5 strings!

Stop making basses that aren’t selling and make those that you have actual customer orders for.

By the way – that brings up an interesting question for Mr. Hall. Who is your customer, the dealer or the player?

Good luck Doug!

Cheers

dougp · Post by **dougp** » Wed Aug 20, 2003 3:01 pm

Thanks for the sympathy, Andy! The story can be found on the alt.guitar.rickenbacker newsgroup (an advanced google search for 4004LK OR Lemmy on that NG since about 1 April 2003 will turn it up), but yeah, apparently the guy who was carving the tops got hired by the F----r Custom Shop, which put a (hopefully temporary) halt to 4004LK production. I don't think that more than about a dozen have gotten out, but I have no real way of knowing.

I'm not upset at anyone over this (not even that *other* employee-poaching guitar company!), just impatient, but I know that good things come to those who wait ...

jwr2 · Post by **jwr2** » Wed Aug 20, 2003 5:54 pm

I can't imagine myself ever buying a 4001c64 ... I'd rather get a used 4001v63 ... or gee I'll play the real thing my 1968 4001 .... but you know the old 68 sits in a case ... I play the 5 strings ...

But I am also major interested in a 4004cii5 ...

The local guitar center has 4 or 5 ric guitars ... they hang on the wall and look pretty ... but they have no Ric basses ... Now if they had some 4004cii5's that would generate some real interest ...

pma · Post by **pma** » Sat Aug 23, 2003 2:35 pm

seems as if Rickenbacker has moved from the prototype phase (the one and only unit pictured on their site) to a small pilot run. This is likely to debug the process just before building in any volume. If so, I would be optimistic that these basses might be available sooner than originally expected.

Still is very odd that certain customer orders are well over a year old on exisiting models. I just don't understand Rickenbacker's manufacturing strategy.

Paul

shamustwin · Post by **shamustwin** » Sat Aug 23, 2003 3:14 pm

So, how long would one expect to wait if one were to place an order today?

shamustwin · Post by **shamustwin** » Sat Aug 23, 2003 3:27 pm

Jeff Rath,

Why you're feelings on the c63/c64? How much of a difference is there?