Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

When did RIC change from a little box to a stacked pot for the vintage tone selector?

They didn't change from a little box; the vintage/modern connection has always been inside the instrument.

I don't know the dates, but it went:

1st: A .0047 capacitor in series with the treble pickup = a high pass filter (ie. a bass cut). Unfortunately, because it is a passive circuit, it made the treble pickup quieter.

2nd: They took out the cap to beef up the output of the treble pickup. Unfortunately, that lost some of the classic Ric sound.

3rd: They added a switch, in the form of a push/pull pot to switch in or bypass a .0047 cap to select between the "vintage" (with cap in series) and "modern" (no cap). That gives you the choice.

I think what Jason is referring to is the original push-pull pot that had a rectangular housing attached that was the actual switching mechanism with contacts on it. The current pot is a modified stacked pot that CTS makes for RIC that, unlike the early push-pull pot, is only capable of closing a circuit or not. Oh, and I don't know when RIC changed pot styles.

I seem to recall that the new switch came out in 2011/2012, it's been quite a while...

aceonbass wrote:I think what Jason is referring to is the original push-pull pot that had a rectangular housing attached that was the actual switching mechanism with contacts on it. The current pot is a modified stacked pot that CTS makes for RIC that, unlike the early push-pull pot, is only capable of closing a circuit or not. Oh, and I don't know when RIC changed pot styles.

Ah, OK.
All it needs to do is short out the small cap to take it out of circuit.

thanks guys! I was just curious. I installed one of the rectangular housings in a '79 4001 soon after RIC started doing that whole push pull thing. Recently I peeked under the hood of my 2015 4003S (which I'm almost done modding like a 1999) and saw the funny little double-pot and wondered.