Alembic Guitars Club

Alembic products => Alembic Basses & Guitars => Topic started by: grass903 on February 26, 2009, 05:01:29 AM

Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: grass903 on February 26, 2009, 05:01:29 AM: http://www.mule.co.kr/mule_data/trade/sell/2009-02/ar003.jpg

http://www.mule.co.kr/mule_data/trade/sell/2009-02/002_bach_s.jpg

http://www.mule.co.kr/mule_data/trade/sell/2009-02/0000[2].jpg

Anybody can figure out what model this is?

I did some researches, but I couldn't figure out.

I guess I'm not experience in Alembics enough yet.

Help me here, people!

(Message edited by grass903 on February 26, 2009)

(Message edited by davehouck on February 26, 2009)

(Message edited by davehouck on February 26, 2009)
Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: FC Bass on February 26, 2009, 05:13:07 AM: Looks like a Distillate with modified electronics.;-)
Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: tbrannon on February 26, 2009, 05:39:25 AM: I agree with Flip on the Distillate with modified electronics. The pickups look like Alembic pickups- can you take a photo of the electronics cavity and post it? There are lots of folks on here who could take a quick glance at the electronics and probably tell you what you have going on there.
Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: adriaan on February 26, 2009, 05:44:38 AM: The Distillate is not offered as a standard model from Alembic, but they will gladly build you one.

The pre-amp is not standard. It looks like someone replaced the two quick tone switches for bass and treble (cut/neutral/boost) with bass and treble pots. And the knobs on the pots are not original. It's difficult to see if the Q switch is still in place - it would be connected to the filter pot (not your average tone knob). You'd need a picture of the control cavity to see if it still qualifies as an Alembic pre-amp.

If you're interested in buying, you should know that Distillates are usually 32 (medium) scale. All the early ones had that small LED near the jack socket, which has proved to be a battery drain - easily fixed.
Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: David Houck on February 26, 2009, 07:16:07 AM: An older style Distillate with a very nice top. The knobs tend to suggest that the electronics may have been replaced with non-Alembic parts. The truss rod cover appears to be missing.
Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: bsee on February 26, 2009, 08:49:47 AM: I agree, Dave. This bass started life as a Distillate in the 80s.

I tried to blow up and play with contrast and brightness on the pics. It looks like the hole for the center of the three toggles may either be there or have been filled. It would be unusual to see those knobs on Alembic guts, but not impossible. They do look an awful lot like what you might find on an EMG preamp of that vintage. It was way too common in the 80s and early 90s for people to play with swapping electronics and most didn't get it done to their advantage. Here's hoping that the original guts were neatly removed and still traveling with the bass.

Value in the US? I would guess probably around $1K with EMG or Bartolini guts, $1500-1750 with the original electronics. Admittedly, someone less bigoted in favor of Alembic electronics might go a little higher for it in the current condition, but that's not me. Obviously, this bass is not in the US, so value will be impacted by that as well. I have no insight to the Korean Alembic market.

-bob
Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: lbpesq on February 26, 2009, 09:45:15 AM: For some reason, I can't open the pics?

Bill, tgo
Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: elwoodblue on February 26, 2009, 11:46:15 AM: I'm having the same prob...can someone maybe upload them to here?
thx
Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: speicky on February 26, 2009, 11:49:52 AM: didn't you enter your correct credit card number and expiry date ?

huh, I cannot access these pics also, must be something else...
Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: olieoliver on February 26, 2009, 11:59:16 AM: I opened them this morning but can not now.

OO
Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: terryc on February 26, 2009, 02:41:26 PM: me too..guess the web page fee has expired
Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: David Houck on February 26, 2009, 05:03:56 PM: Well that was strange. I've restored the original post to the way it was. For some reason unknown to me, when I made the addresses clickable links, they wouldn't work. But the pictures are still where they were. Some of you Firefox users may be able to highlight and right click to open as url; others can just copy and paste to open.
Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: bsee on February 26, 2009, 05:20:16 PM: It's not unusual for a content website to block certain referring pages/domains,especially for images, when they see an unusual amount of traffic. Those images are probably a part of the for sale listing on their website and they don't want to pay for bandwidth to serve them for other peoples' purposes. Maybe that's the answer, maybe not.
Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: elwoodblue on February 26, 2009, 06:31:48 PM: That works...thanks Dave!
have a good evening
Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: David Houck on February 26, 2009, 07:01:02 PM: Thanks, you too!!
Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: grass903 on February 28, 2009, 05:09:47 AM: so it's a distillate.

I like its condition and looks,

and quite... okay price(slightly less than US 1200dollars. Geez.. you guys would be surprised if you know much korean Won's value has been cut down.)

It seems like the current owner has changed the original circuit to a different Alembic circuit. Fortunately, the owner's still in hand of the original circuit and he'd hand it over to the buyer.

I'm still considering it.

Thank you all for your time and info.

Visit South Korea someday soon, people.

It's really cheap to sweep the korean market these days due to the currency.
Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: dannobasso on February 28, 2009, 06:23:46 AM: I work in a school with an almost 50% Korean population and they have already mentioned some financial difficulties.
Title: Help my figuring out what model this is.
Post by: David Houck on February 28, 2009, 07:24:57 AM: Jongsu Chang; let us know if you get it. The price sounds very reasonable if it has the original electronics. Oh, and welcome to the board!