Back in Black - 73 4001

[nofi]

nice bass, indeed. i had a couple of maple glo of that era but always wanted a black one.

[SeanS]

Pretty sure this particular pickup surround can go on either way... I remember being confused which way to put it on when I took the cover off last year.  I looked back at this pic of it from 2007 as point of reference.  Guess I should have compared against another 4001  

They will only go on one way, as the screw holes are at different spacings, both vertically and width wise.

[SGD Lutherie]

That's a beauty!

Reminds me of my two Rics. Or at least it will. Mine are both '73s, and they were both Mapleglo. My first Rick was made in August according to its serial number. It's a transitional bass, has a toaster, but no checker binder and the newer tailpiece. It did have the pickup closer to the neck, and wavy tuners.  The other bass I picked up used in '76. It was made in March. It has the checkered binding and split bridge. I've modded them to death over the years, and they sit in disassembled states. So I'm taking the one with the checkerboard binding and I'm going to refinish it Jetglo, because I always wanted one.

Funny thing is the newer bass' body is wider then the older bass, and wont fit into its case. It also has a orange fingerboard that looks like tulip wood. The older bass has the usual bubinga. Another odd thing is the top two tuners on the head. On the newer bass they go straight across, and on the older one they are on an angle.

[chromium]

Cool basses SGD!  Are you going to keep the mudbucker in that one bass?  The size of that route looks like it might have been for one of the big-uns from the mid-60s.

I've been using the 73 a lot lately.. that and the Triumph.  Somewhere there are some gig pics floating around which I'll post here if I can get ahold of them.  Put my usual EXL170s on it and bypassed the cap, and it sounds fantastic.  I still get excited every time I look at it - the Ric I always wanted!

[hieronymous]

Nice shot - I never got to respond in the "multiple bass" thread - glad you got your dream Ric!!!

[SGD Lutherie]

Cool basses SGD!  Are you going to keep the mudbucker in that one bass?  The size of that route looks like it might have been for one of the big-uns from the mid-60s.

I'm thinking I'm going to put the toaster back in. It was a NOS mudbucker that I picked up somewhere. It had the full frame and was adjustable for height, unlike the mudbucker in my EB-2 that was just the pickup sitting in the rout. It removed so much wood that the neck shifted a little and raised the action slightly. The bass also had a larger pickguard on it at one point.



It sounded really cool with the mudbucker, but now I want to restore the bass to stock. I miss having a working Rick, and want that vintage 4001 tone. Since the Rick's not my main bass anymore, I don't need it to do more than what it does. Unfortunately I lost some parts when we moved last time. So I have the split tailpiece for it, but don't have the bridge itself. The bridge for the newer basses does not fit into the older tailpiece. I'll either have to stick the newer bridge/tailpiece on, a Hipshot, or make a new bridge unit.

The Mapleglo bass had more extensive mods done; I filed in the routs to make it into something like a 4004, before there were any 4004s. But I thought it would look cool without a pickguard. So I filled in the routs and started to glue maple veneer on the top. I had also converted it to a lined fretless. It has an interesting fingerboard that looks like tulipwood.  I'm not sure how I'm going to fix it. I might remove the body wings from the neck shaft and make new ones from figured maple to match the neck.

The dumb things you do when you are young...