LeftyBassist.com

the seller seems to be willing to ship anywhere so i thought i'd post it
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Rickenbacker- ... 4d0014c457

look fellow punk rocker Sid Vicious even "Played" one sorry was looking through pics on my pc and had to post

Cool, but if you look at one of the photos you can see that the action is not that low, even if the bridge screws are almost at their minimum. Plus there is a little tail lift.

On a general Rickenbacker 4001 sound note, I have a copy of Jammit on my iPad and I bought Roundabout (of course) to re-learn the tune. I haven't played it in years. For those not familiar with Jammit it's an app that has original master recordings of a number of rock tunes (etc.) that they have re-mixed so that you have 4 tracks with faders. The isolated bass track, the band track, a click track, and a user track so that you can record your own version along with the original master of the rest of the band. Very cool. A good friend of mine is the senior software engineer for the app.

Anyway, I was listening to Roundabout the other day with the bass track soloed and Chris Squire must have had VERY low action. All kinds of buzzing and fret noise. Although it works well in the context of his sound and that tune. I also bought Heart of the Sunrise. Great stuff. Love Chris Squire's Rick sound from that era.

http://www.jammit.com

I wouldn't be able to tell anything about the action... shows you what I know about Rick's.... which is essentially nothing!

I'm sure I'm gonna get schooled by someone here who is far more knowledgeable than myself but I used to own a bass almost identical to this - sold it to buy my wife a little something special (sigh) - and I wouldn't make any major judgement based on the action in the photo.

These old 4001 basses have COMPLETELY different truss rods than the newer basses. They really weren't designed to handle the higher tension of most round wound strings. (As a side note, the 12th Fret guitar pro shop here in Toronto got called in to do some "emergency" work on Chris Squire's old 4001 last time Yes was in town and they remarked to me about how ridiculously high his action was.) Anyway, you can get the neck adjusted with rounds on it but the little aluminum block that the nuts for the truss rods push against are pretty soft and they get gouged by the rods/nuts and lose the adjustment fairly quickly. I had a buddy of mine who works in a machine shop build me a block out of stainless. It held the adjustment brilliantly and allowed me to easily use a set of Super Slinky's with nice low action good relief.

When it comes to the "lift" on the tail of the bridge, I think this is also pretty common. Those original Ric bridges are pretty soft aluminum. You can buy an official Ric replacement bridge that will sit flat - at least for a few years - for around $195. Although, IMHO the Hipshot replacement bridge for these basses is incredible. I used one on mine and it adds tons of sustain. They are made of brass, use the original mounting holes - so no drilling or mods are necessary, have exactly the same footprint and offer REAL intonation adjustment only dreamed of by the original bridge.

I know some of you vintage purists will call me a blasphemer but I'm not suggesting anything irreparable or irreversible. I'm a player and a collector like most of you guys. But, I'm a player first. It doesn't matter how old and rare it is if I can't play it the way I want to play it.

Finally, having said all of that, I think £3000 is a little much for this bass. The ridiculous overvaluing of old, beat up Rics is starting to ebb. (Thankfully) $3000 USD might be a little closer to a reasonable valuation. But what do I know...