On my three Ricks there is the same thing - if I turn the fifth knob counter clockwise all the way - the neck pickup is too strong. If I turn it fully clockwise the neck pickup is too dull and low in comparsion. I see a use for it that way cause I sometimes use a ebow. But I started to think. If I remove the fifth knob, would it be the same as if I turn the fifth knob all the way counter clockwise = the neck pickup will be too loud?

If so, is it so that the neck pickup is hotter or is there something else going around there? For example, what will happen if I just switch place and put the neck pickup in the brigde place, would the bridge pickup be hotter?

Now, no. The pickups are the same. It has not always been that way.

In the late '70's and early '80's, the pickups were different: underwound for maximum brightness in the bridge, @ 6.1 to 6.5 kohms, and overwound for maximum darkness in the neck, @ 12 to 14 kohms. This made the neck pickup "hotter" than the bridge pickup.

For those instruments that have the .0047 inline capacitor on the bridge pickup, that functions as a high-pass filter, and will reduce the fundamental output of the bridge pickup slightly.

Finally, The bridge pickup is right next to the bridge where there is less string excursion, therefore less magnetic interaction, therefore less signal generated from the bridge pickup. This contrasts to the neck pickup with wider string excursion, therefore more magnetic interaction and therefore a stronger signal generated from the neck pickup.

All these issues are solved by the 5th knob, which being inline to the neck volume control, helps balance all of these situations.

I just adjust the bridge pu closer to the strings than the neck pu and that balances things out nicely.