1979 Rickenbacker 4001 rebuild - | P1 | P2 | P3
 
 
Blank glued and trued - now to the wings
 
 
     
 
 
The wings had steel locating pins that would not pull out easy but i got them, then drilled out the messy bits and plugged the holes. [ist one out - see the yellow pointer in pic 1]
 
 
Begin sanding the faces
 
 
Then the edges
 
 
All neat and tidy
 
 
Run em through the sander - the chalk is to show the low spots
 
 
Ok all sanded ready for prep -
 
 

First meeting - Everything looks really wide but is pretty much bang on size - the neck looks big as it is not yet tapered and it is aboout 100mm too long. Once the fingerboard and trussrod arrive i can get the trussrod and CF spar slots cut and start work on building it into a neck. The wings will be glued on after the neck section and headstock is completed.

Not much can be done until the trussrod and finger board arrive from Perth. Next steps will be to position the finger board in relation to the bridge. Once we have the layout finalised I can mark out the neck detail and begin cutting off the excess timber to reveal the neck that is hiding inside.

The wings will go on once the neck section is fully completed. It will be way easier to work on the neck section with out the wings. There is quite a few complex tasks to be completed in that phase. The neck carve will be done after the wings are glued on. Still quite a long way to travel.
 
 
While plotting my next moves I decided to make the clamping cauls which will be critical at the time the wings are glued on. I'll use the same steel pin method of locating them as Rickenbacker used in the original build. Glue will be rolled on and mechanical force will be applied with a number of clamps. I will do one side at a time and probably the top wing first. This won't happen untill the neck is complete. Fret board and truss rod are here. The CF stiffening spars are also here, and apart from a dead neck pickup things are moving forward nicely.
 
 

It is all about locating the bridge at this point so I have cut the trenches in the main spar. The treble pickup rout is high at this stage and I hope not to have to cut it too deep. It will be easy to cut the floor to depth later with a router. I want that spar to stay as stiff as possible till the wings are on.

Once the bridge is located, the position of the 12th fret can be determined and the scale length set. The trenches for the truss rod and CF stiffening spars can then be marked, cut and the spars and rod installed.

I have had a big influx of guitars in for service this week and i need to get some of the backlog of pickup changeouts and setups out of the way. I doubt I will get much progress next week but will be looking forward to the infusion of cash these more mundane tasks bring.

I am happy with the way things are panning out with the project and beginning to see a finished bass in my minds eye.

 
The rockstars arrived just after my last entry with a carload of guitars to be fixed up for the busy summer touring / festival season, so not much has happened to Rick for the last 2 or 3 weeks.

It is back on the bench and the task of positioning the fingerboard in relation to the bridge is the next step. There is a problem with the bridge which calls to mind the the fairly primitive tooling used back in the 70's when this bass was built. The saddle adjusting screws were binding badly and hindering the movement of the saddles in their tracks. This I am told was "sorta kinda" done on purpose to ensure the saddles stayed still. One of the screw heads was looking a bit gummy so i decided to ream out the holes a little so the screws could travel in the tracks smoothly.
 
 
If you look clsoely you can see the hole in the saddle is way high. In my humble oppinion this is a truly awful bridge and it is going to be a challenge to set the intonation any other way but by eye. I hear there is a mod that does make this job easier and does not change the outward appearance of the bridge. Even doing the mod looks quite awkward. If I was choosing a bass bridge this one would definitely not be in contention.
 
Docked the fingerboard both ends [21 frets again] and started looking at how the action and positioning laid out.
 
 
 

To get the fingerboard close enough to the line [yellow ruler] I have jacked up both ends. I was hoping get away with glueing a flat section on top of the neck to elevate the fingerboard to the correct height but it seems. as in the original design, it must slope down away from the bridge by around 3mm along its length.

The original design had a 10mm thick fingerboard and the only precut, slotted bass fingerboard available was the standard 6mm thick at the radius crown. Not quite thick enough for this bass. So it was always part of the plan to glue a thin fillett above the truss rod trench to give the fingerboard the required hieght above the body and headstock. I have a section that was cut from the main spar which will do this job. It should be pretty much invisible unlike the origininal which had a FUGLY stripe of fingerboard poking out under the binding strip :-// Once it is down the fingerboard will be glued to it.

Doing it this way happily precludes the awkward scenario of attempting to cut a slope into the main spar.

The next job is to machine a slope into the section from 7mm to 3.5mm at the nut end. A tricky task to do accurately but fortunately I have the tools do a fair job of it. When this is done I can emulate the setup of the action and mark the fingerboard. This will give me the location of the trenches for the truss rod and CF stiffening spars and they can be in turn machined into the neck.
F
 
 
After some soul searching I decided to use a zero neck angle and I have cut the spacer slightly taller. As you can see the tring line is almost on the board. The bridge is on the deck and I have around .030" under the string which is a smidge less than i want. I might take another shave or two off before I call it right.
 
 
You can see the old nut at the front looking a little low but a spacer will go under it and above the truss rod channel. You are looking at what will become the face of the headstock. An angle will be cut from the nut shelf giving a little more downward pressure at the break [witness] point. The original design is pretty much a zero angle design but there is a very slight almost indescernible angle on the neck with a bigger, but still very slight further fall on the headstock.
 
 
Loaded in some springs to keep them saddles in place -i got told on the rick forum that they were built originally with saddles and screws outa line so they wouldnt move around but to me that is just an excuse for bad engineering. Besides the old philips head screws are a little gummy and easily would round out with out too much persuasion. Now they ride up and down nice and easy
 
 

Should look something like this after setup...Meanwhile the critical step of fingerboard mark out has been done. Once those marks are in place i can start cutting holes. First come the channels for the truss rod and cf spars
 
 
 

Views from both ends - While i was at it I glued on the headstock ears. You can see on the left side of the headstock, the traditional blood stain that is purposely put on every build. This ramps up the mojo effect tremendously.

Firstly fillets of mahogany will be glued on top of the truss rod and cf spars. After that is done and planed it will be time to cut the neck taper which will run from the nut to the rear of the main spar. At last it will start to look like a bass
 
 

Carbon fiber spars are in place with fillets epoxied on top and truss rod is in place. A fillet of maple is clamped and glued on top to ensure no glue gets near the trussrod threads when the fretboard is glued in place.

After the fillets are planed flush and the top face is trued up, the job will be flipped and the shape of the neck will be cut in plan. The neck angle will start at the nut and terminate at the butt. There will be a slightly larger width between the the wings at the back of the guitar than in the original design. Approximately 1mm on each side from memory.
 
 

There is the final surface that the fingerboard will be glued to. Needs a bit of a tidy up on top of the trussrod access port. Not really the beginning of the end but the end of the beginning.

The bass will really start to take shape from here. Next I will true up both faces of the headstock and mark it out on the back out ready for cutting. The plan of the neck will be marked out also on the back and then it will be time to cut both shapes out.
 
 
 
The headstock template in position. Now that i can mark out the headstock I can mark out and cut the neck taper.
 
 

But before I do that i need to thicken the butt end by a couple mil. I have glued cheeks on either side whill get get cleaned up very quickly with the bandsaw and router.

The neck taper will run from the nut right to the butt of the body. This is the easiest and most efficient way to get the body wings on without weird transitions at the end of the fretboard. Not strictly as it was built but it will work and make the job flow more easily
 
 
 
At last we get a glimpse of what is coming. Body tapered, headstock shaped. Next job is to cut the headstock down to the correct thickness followed by glueing on of the fretboard. The wings are not glued on as yet and may not be glued down until the very last, even after the neck carve. There are a few niggles around the job but by and large I am satisfied at this stage.
 
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