Alembic Guitars Club
Alembic products => Owning an Alembic => Serial Number / History Requests => Topic started by: Thomasio on February 16, 2022, 08:19:42 AM
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Recently purchased this beauty from another member here.
The serial number appears to be 853115 USA.
This bass has the tone I have been searching for.
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I love that bass, congratulations!
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Thank you. I've been searching for this tone for years.
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Wow, tough one! :-)
That's an early '84 number, truss rods cover is also 84 style.
Though everything is possible with Alembic, most common sizes for those covers are:
Very small with squared edges until about '83
Slightly larger (like yours) with squared edges in '84 (maybe also late '83 and/or early '85)
Again slightly larger (same size as what's standard now) with squared edges in '85 (maybe also late '84 and or/early '86)
Modern style, large with rounded edges on fingerboard side since '86 (maybe also late '85)
And that's clearly a 5, not a 4... :-)
So maybe "finished" in '84 and the customer wanted some extras which took it into '85?
Also looks like there was some restamping done, double 8, maybe double 3, double 1 in different fonts (?) and double US.
Subscribed! :-)
Awesome bass!
That's a custom variation of the Spoiler body, or maybe somebody slipped and bumped the lower body portion when they were being glued up. ;D
Anyways, almost get Scorpions vibes from that more symmetrical look. 8)
And that's a Series II style neck, one more cooler than Series I innit! :-)
Congrats and enjoy!
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😃
It’s the one with the whammy!
Welcome to the camp Thomas!
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Good for you! Enjoy the bass!
Mike
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Nice.
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That’s a very cool bass, congratulations! :)
…and I like your in-ear monitor :)
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The bass stays in tune as well as any of my other high end basses, even with the tremolo.
The tremolo is fun to dive the E string to the depths of the earth, on occasion ;)
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Update: we played our first "post-COVID" show (I'm not really sure that COVID is in the past, but that's a different topic),
and I'm very pleased to find that a bass guitar with a Kahler tremolo will stay in tune for a 15 song set!
Yes: a 38 year old bass guitar with a factory installed tremolo stayed in tune perfectly.
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😎
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I'm also curious about the S/N being double struck, it is an interesting quirk.
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We dug up some more photos of #853115
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I'm still looking for this file. As Flip said, the sequence isn't quite right, and that stamping looks a fright! I see the two different fonts, and that's a little concerning since we only have one set of numbers. The 1985 numbers start at 3449. I'm going to pull that 3115 file and see if it matches here and what is going on with the numbers adjacent to it.
Regardless, it's lovely and I'm glad to hear it's satisfying your tonal needs.
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Hey Mica - here’s a clearer picture of the serial number I took while I cared for it.
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Thank you OJ Dorson -
what is baffling to me is that the digits that appear to be double stamped are the same digits as what is behind them. Both of the "1" digits were "1" digits before the double stamp.
I'm very curious about all of this.
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Here is another Alembic that must have been stamped by the same person :)
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I bought this bass thinking it was a 1984 Series I. While there were a number of things wrong with it, serial number or year discrepancies were not among its problems.
When I was considering buying it, I called Alembic and spoke to Mica and she was able to pull its build card just fine. After seeing comments in this thread about the serial number stamping, and talking with Thomas about it, something really wasn’t sitting right with me. I was sure this was 843115 when I had it!! After thinking about it earlier today I realized that the most likely point in time for something to go wrong was when it was refretted. Chicago FretWorks did an amazing job with the frets, but they were the only people to work on it. I realized that when they had the frets out they likely dressed the fretboard and I realized, “maybe they made the numbers a little light when they sanded it and re-stamped them with good intentions.” I talked myself out of that… “nah, they would’ve said something!!”… but I couldn’t shake it. I stopped by after work today and the owner assured me they’d never do that - he didn’t even think they had the number punches to do it! After I left, I called Thomas to let him know and not five minutes into the conversation Chicago FretWorks called me and said they did it after all. When he took the bass in, he made a mistake and wrote down 853115. The tech took pictures “before” working and clearly it was 843115. At some point, he realized he sanded away some of the numbering and restamped it according to the owner’s intake notes with the wrong serial number.
So, that’s how this happened. Chicago FretWorks said they’ll correct it and I’ll work with Thomas to make sure this gets resolved. I’ve suggested that Thomas should send it home to Alembic for the RF upgrade and to have Alembic set the serial number right at the same time. This bass has had a wild journey with a whole lot of story, but i loved it as well as I could and Thomas is taking great care of it now.
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So… https://club.alembic.com/index.php?topic=24187
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Thank you for getting to the bottom of this OJ Dorson -
I'm going to see if Mica is willing to refinish that area of the fretboard to make it back to correct.
Chicago Fretworks has indicated that they will make it right, but I would feel better about Alembic assisting here.
I must say I give Chicago Fretworks a lot of credit for owning up to this, that had to be embarrassing. Luckily, the fretwork is beyond perfect.
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Mica - can you please combine this thread with the information request for 843115? Thanks!
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Mica - can you please combine this thread with the information request for 843115? Thanks!
That would be this thread (https://club.alembic.com/index.php?topic=24187.0).
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Mica - I am ready to send the bass back "home" to have the S/N restored, along with an RF upgrade and maybe a spa treatment.
What do I need to do to initiate this?
Thanks!