Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

I came across a metal bridge pickup cover on eBay.
There's almost no difference in appearance with the later plasic ones from nowadays.
So I bought it for my '73 4001.
I was wondering when were they in use?
From mid sixties I believe? To what date?

AFAIK they were always plastic, from Jan 1969 when the high-gains replaced the horseshoes until this day.

As Ilan stated the covers have always been plastic. The original HorseShoe pickup had two 'C' shaped metal pieces. These were magnetic and part of the pickup. When the original HorseShoes were replaced with HighGains, the plastic cover was introduced. I think this was to keep the 'look'. So more of an aesthetic type of thing maybe protecting the Rickenbacker brand, Trademark, Patent kind of thing. We all know how guarded Rickenbacker is with all of that.

Here are the pics.
It's made out of thin sheet metal.
As you can see the corners are more flat.

Cor163 wrote:I came across a metal bridge pickup cover on eBay.
There's almost no difference in appearance with the later plastic ones from nowadays.

Actually, it looks quite a bit different from the current covers, but are very similar to the thinner earlier covers, as you can easily see in your photos. Many years ago, John asked around here if anybody had one or had seen one of these early metal covers. Looks good to me.

A rare find indeed - a bridge pup cover that, unlike the plastic ones, should actually provide a bit of hum shielding. Nice one!

Cor, do you have pictures of the cover off of the bass (before you installed it)?

This is how it looks like.

This part came off of a Japanese 70's Rickenbacker copy. RIC never made them from metal. Since the factory part is triple plated plastic ( copper, nickel, chrome) it eill indeed provide shielding just the same way copper foil does in a guitar control cavity.

Thanks for those photos, Cor. I don't know its origin, but I have to say that it does look rather thin, and perhaps a bit flimsy? How stiff is the cover? Does it flex when pushing on it?

aceonbass wrote:Since the factory part is triple plated plastic ( copper, nickel, chrome) it will indeed provide shielding just the same way copper foil does in a guitar control cavity.

Useful to know! I stand corrected...

It is very stiff. No warping possible.
Sorry to hear the Japanes invaded my project.

Japanese or not, I like it!

Yeah, I kind of like it better than the real ones, it's a bit more sleek. While I love the look of a ric with the pickup cover on, they are kinda chunky.

Finch wrote:Yeah, I kind of like it better than the real ones, it's a bit more sleek. While I love the look of a ric with the pickup cover on, they are kinda chunky.

The early ones were thin and looked better, IMO. Plus, the way they were mounted, they did not ride up and down with the pickup when its height was adjusted, so it did not interfere, potentially, with the strings if the pickup was set low.