OP here. Thanks to all who responded. I was a bit surprised to see how many views and replies there were, as I haven't been on here much lately.
To update on my new, and first Ric, I did have to do some tweaking to my dual truss rod system, and all turned out well, as of today. So my bass was shipped from Colorado to where I live in West Virginia - 2 completely different climates. What started out as a great setup went downhill fast after about the first week. I'd say my RH is likely much higher than Colorado's at this time of year, which probably caused some swelling of the wood / fingerboard. The fret buzz got really bad to the point where if I played an F on the first fret of the E string, the string would go completely dead immediately.
I'm not a big on working on my own instruments, but my luthier is usually real busy and I didn't feel like waiting, and since what I needed was mostly turning wrenches, I decided to go for it. If it was something that required fret leveling or filing nut slots, I wouldn't have done it.
So when I put the capo on the first fret, pressing down where the neck meets the body, and checking halfway, there was no real neck relief to speak of, and measuring the action at the 12 fret was very low. I had backed the dual truss rod nuts about an eighth to a quarter turn a week or so ago to help with the fret buzz, an then today a little more after switching to Rotosound strings. It put just a slight amount of relief into the neck - about half the thickness of a business card. Then I raised the saddles just slightly, tweaking the screws about a quarter turn, which put the action at the 12th fret between two and three 32nds, going back and forth a little to get them to the point of just starting to buzz a little on the E string when I play it pretty hard.
I'm very happy with how it turned out. The adjustments went well, and I'm happy to have saved some time and $$ by not taking it for a setup. Kinda surprised myself. I'm very happy with the bass, and I'm actually glad that I got the 2021 model. I like that it coincides with the 90th anniversary of the company. I'm a little surprised that RIC didn't play up the anniversary date a bit with some kind of designation, a badge on the truss cover or something like that - or at least a STICKER!
Seems like Fender and G&L would have been all over that chance. 90 years is a pretty good milestone in my book.
All in all, I love the bass. I don't have a big preference either way for the skunk stripe or the dual / single rod setup, as long as they function properly. What I DO like a lot is the push pull vintage/modern setup with the treble cap, and the new bridge. Excellent engineering choices by RIC, in my opinion.
My next move is to experiment with the Ric-O-Sound. I just got the Rattlesnake connector box, which I think is going to be much better than a Y cable. I just have to dig out the old beast of a bass amp in the basement and pair it up with my practice amp and see what I come up with. Much fun to be had. Cheers.
JT
