Converting a Rickenbacker 4003 into a five string bass

[Ric5]

Originally Posted by Musiclogic

Very cool. looked at my 2 4001's and shook my head..told myself to get that right out of my head.....maybe an idea for a new personal build this year....hmmmmmm

I would not do this to a 4001 with the old neck and old truss rods. I only convert Rickenbacker basses made 1986 and later. I knew someone who tried to convert a 4001 into a 6 string bass ala the Fender VI. It ruined the neck. Now a 4001 may be able to handle 5 strings, But I would say use a 4003.

[Ric5]

Originally Posted by mc_muench

You didnt happen to do a conversion like this for an Al Cisnero of OM did you? He plays a 5'er Ric now and you are the only person I know of doing Ric conversions.

I have not done any work for Al. I am not the only one who have done a 4 to 5 conversion of a Rickenbacker. There are at least 5 others that I know of. One of my 4004 basses was a semi-successful conversion that I bought on ebay and tweaked the conversion and now it is a good player.

[Ric5]

Originally Posted by HaMMerHeD

Pretty sure that's what he means by "embarrassing".

Personally, I think Rickenbacker purposefully sabotaged their 5-string offering.

By making it basically unusable, it didn't sell very well, so they discontinued it. Now, when people clamor for another one, they can say "We made one and nobody bought it, so no!"

Both the 4003s5 and the 4004cii5 were almost great basses. The s5 had the tone and look of the 4003. The cii5 had the playability. If they had simply gone the extra step and made them work ...

There was one guy who had 2 of the cii5 basses and was convinced that Ric would eventually fix it if only no one complained about the problem ... Well that didn't happen.

[Musiclogic]

Originally Posted by Ric5

I would not do this to a 4001 with the old neck and old truss rods. I only convert Rickenbacker basses made 1986 and later. I knew someone who tried to convert a 4001 into a 6 string bass ala the Fender VI. It ruined the neck. Now a 4001 may be able to handle 5 strings, But I would say use a 4003.

Yeah, I would never do it, my 74 and 84 are my children, they stay in tact, but I may build one this year. A 33" 5er might be interesting or a 32.5".....will definitely think on this more....LOL. great job

[UncleFluffy]

That's extremely tasty. Would you be willing to sell / trade-for the bridges? I have everything else, but milling up a bridge would take more time than I have spare right now.

[Ric5]

Originally Posted by UncleFluffy

That's extremely tasty. Would you be willing to sell / trade-for the bridges? I have everything else, but milling up a bridge would take more time than I have spare right now.

It is really hard and expensive to get the bridges ... I have to find a machinist who is willing to do the work and then get them down to a good price. Then I have a few made. When I run out the machinist quite often doesn't want to make more because there is not much profit in machining small batches of unique parts.

I have 2 or 3 and I want to hang on to them.

[UncleFluffy]

Have you tried http://www.emachineshop.com/ ?

I've had some car parts made up there, and I thought the prices were fair - not cheap, but fair for small quantity stuff.

[Ric5]

http://www.3dentourage.com/425/425.htm

[Floyd Eye]

I was going to suggest getting a hold of Ric5 or a gay named Dane. Then I looked at the author of the thread. lol