'03 4004Cii"/5" -- as if it jumped right off the page...

[CageyPea]

. . . page 137 of our dear bassduke Paul's book, that is! WiNot wanting to miss the coincidental opportunity of his no doubt difficult decision to put it up for sale, I took him up on the offer and next thing you know, my unintended Ric 400x trifecta is now complete. I am glad to now be the benefactor of the rich history of this unique implement of low-end lordship. Thanks to Paul and also jps/Jeff for the advance informations about it, and to its prior owners too for initiating or continuing its 5-string destiny.

I was never one for natural finishes on my electrics but this one, now live in hand proves to be a stunner, what with that flame-maple and the walnut layer going on!

I have set it up now in high C, drop D tuning, using D'Add. XL's in (light) gauges .110*, .075, .056, .042, .030. Intonating the dropped low D proved to be the first issue, but resolved; I clipped the bolt that drives the saddle and snipped its spring a bit to make it travel back further. Despite these gauges being not-heavy, as expected, the neck began to bow forward. This may have to do with one of several mild curses on me (all my axes suffer this, at some point, it seems) but I moreso suspect the cold dry NY winter air. I tightened the truss rod nuts carefully over the course of a few days, not wanting a repeat of the Great And Horrible Truss Rod Incident Of March '13, and they are now pretty snug. The neck isn't that kind of prescribed dead-straight, but I'm going to wait until Spring to see how it changes with the air then. [*to be replaced with an S.I.T. .115 taper-core; .110 is little too lite, and D'Add. doesn't make a .115]

As you may know already from the thread about its sale, or the book (a copy of which all reading this now own...right?! Right??!) it started life as a 4-string. The +1 conversion has, I offered, succeeded in out-R.I.C.ing R.I.C. themselves, in that the string spacing is a better fit than that of the stock 4003s/5 (though I still love that model no less!) (I can't comment upon the production model 4004Cii/5 as I've yet to encounter one). True, the bridge pickup isn't quite wide enough to fit the C string in its span, but it turns out just as I was advised: the effect is minimal, and I think in fact to a benefit, in that it prevents the C string from being too strident in the output. Other prior hands' augmentations include the backpainted Plexi TRC and control reconfig into V/V/T. The bridge is an oddball, but does its job -- the word was that the make and model of it isn't known; does anyone else here have info about it...?

I took it for its maiden voyage last night in a studio jam in town, and it got rave reviews for both looks and sound. The studio owner said it's one of the best tones he's ever heard, "so clear..." (running through an Aguilar head & Bergantino cabs didn't hurt!). My guitarist suggested I just get rid of all my other basses, now that I've found the "ultimate" one! -- this coming from a guy who belongs to the "Strat-of-the-month Club" or something . . .

[jps]

I am not sure of the bridge plate, itself, but the saddles are Hipshot ones for their A style bridge. I am surprised the E string has to go that far back in relation to the other strings but if that is what it takes to intonate properly, so be it.

Here are some photos from shortly after I did my mods to it.

4004CiiJPS Body_800_01.jpg

4004CiiJPS-800-02a.jpg

4004CiiJPS O 05 PS sm.jpg

And, a photo from a Rare Blend gig in Columbus.

Enjoy the bass Kevin, very cool that you are using a different tuning on it than the rest of us did; I had thought of doing the same with one of my old ZON basses.

[cassius987]

So it's tuned DADGC?

I too am surprised about the intonation of the current low D string. I bet you'll need to go back to something more in the norm with the replacement, especially if it is tapered. (But like Jeff said, whatever works...)

[edski]

What happened to that bass that required the truss rod channels?

It is a stunner.

[CageyPea]

An update . . .

Though repetitively tightening the truss rod nuts would help cure the forward-bowing, I found that the next day it would be right back. The nuts are about as tight as they'll go now, though the treble-side one still has some purchase. I'm not going any further with them, though!

So, I decided that it needs ultra-light gauge strings: I put D'Addario XLs on as follows: .110 / .072 / .055 / .040 / .028 -- an average of about ~31 lbs. of pull tension per string (the prior set was ~35 lbs. on average). Though too lite for my manual tastes, better to not torture the neck of the thing, or risk the expense of another truss-rods' replacement-and-heat-treatment-neck-reset job (e.g., what I accidentally put my 4003S/5 through ). Also, I figured that since it was born a 4-string, the neck wasn't really ever prepared for the added tension of a fifth one.

Fortunately, sonically, all still wound up sounding awesome. The neck pickup puts out more than sufficient bottom end, especially.

Re: the bridge: Jeff, I suspected that the saddles were Hipshot, but that bridge plate is . . . odd. Really odd -- the string-feedholes don't line up with the saddles, drifting more and more to the right as they go toward the bass side. I'm thinking of replacing it with a Schaller one, though its outermost saddles' rollers may have to be ground down a bit to duplicate the current 2 7/16" spacing. (I have done this for my '85 Ibanez -- an original 5'er, though narrow-spaced).

[bassduke49]

Kevin, did you not find the TI Jazz round five set that I installed satisfactory? I'm not an expert player, mind you, but I don't recall the bass having much of a bow with those relatively low-tension strings on it.

[CageyPea]

Kevin, did you not find the TI Jazz round five set that I installed satisfactory? I'm not an expert player, mind you, but I don't recall the bass having much of a bow with those relatively low-tension strings on it.

Paul -- I actually did like their feel, but AFAICT they currently don't make a commensurate single for the drop-D tuning on the low string that I use. (Plus I don't like silk wrappings on strings -- I find I'm forever dusting little silk fibers off the headstock...)

However, who knows, I may try them in the future, on this bass or another. Did you find they lasted much longer (i.e., didn't go dead) than the average string . . . ? They're relatively, ah, quite an inve$$$tment!

[bassduke49]

Kevin, I didn't play that bass more than a few hours over the time I had it, so can't tell you about the longevity of the strings. The TI Jazz Flats are another matter. I have them on a couple of basses including my primary, and have had no problems with them in eight years.