Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

I got a deal on a '73 4001 which had suffered some in the years of its existence, including the addition of two new strap pin holes. where finish had been worn off the back, it was very unprofessionally painted over. The truss rod cover looks like a replacement (clear/bakpainted) as it isn't nearly as beat as the rest of the instrument. The mute and all its bits are gone, replaced with some tin foil contraption under there. Needless to say, I don't think this was too much of a collector's piece.

Since I don't ever use the tone controls, I decided to to a mod that would allow me to change the sound of the bass while retaining its original look and sound as well. I simply replaced the treble tone control (wired the cap to the other one) with a rotary switch, and can now switch the original bridge pickup capacitor in and out of the circuit. Works great, and looks original. The cap is a .0047mf, and I thought of adding an additional one for three distinct tones (this is a three way switch). The bottom end sure opens up with that cap out of the circuit, so a half step between could be interesting as well.

When I purchased my '76 4001, it was pretty well beat as well. The strings weren't changed in 15 years, and there was a wad of hair underneath my treble pickup!!! It must of been from a cat.
But, after about 2 months of TLC, it's basically back to new again. Good Luck with your new toy!!

i purchased a 1977 mapleglo 4001 bass in 1991. it had been for sale in a local traders paper for $200.00 -- thats not a misprint. a dealer bought it from the guy the day before i called on it. i asked who the dealer was,and went to see him the next day. it needed work-- no strings, only 1 jack worked, neck kind of warped,and belt buckle wear. he was going to try to fix it up. i said i would give him $300.00 for it as is,and he went for it. i put vintage re-issue pickups in it,got the neck aligned and frets sanded to remove the buzzing, fixed the bad jack, put rotosounds on it, and made a $300.00 investment sound like a million bucks; nothing plays or sounds like this bass. just thought someone might like to hear a story about someone who got lucky.

As long as we're talking about saved beaters:

I picked up a 75 4001 a few months back for $400. The neck pup didn't work, the triangle inlays were cracked, the tuners were dirty, and it had some godawful cables for strings! Plus it had been painted a kinda Azure blue color, and they didn't bother to mask the binding. Looks like they just took a straight edge and scraped the blue off the binding (just the front of the bass and the neck, not the sides!).

I cleaned it up, put some new strings on, had the pup rewound, and it is the nicest bass I own! Even with the funky blue paint!

I've got a '79 4001, and it's a BEATER! I've got a grand total of $350 into this bass, and that includes the used bartolini pickups and used badass that I put on it. I bought it for $200 from a local guitar store where it took a fall off a hook and the headstock was snapped almost completely off. It didn't have a bridge pickup, and has a bad auto-body burgundy refin with several large chunks of paint missing... I bought it, took it home, fixed the break, reworked the truss rods, installed the barts and badass, leveled the frets, and voila! Kickass beater 4001 for $350! and it sounds grrrreat!