Alembic Guitars Club

Alembic products => Owning an Alembic => Serial Number / History Requests => Topic started by: 52spoiler on July 19, 2011, 02:35:19 PM

Title: (x) SN# 87S4501
Post by: 52spoiler on July 19, 2011, 02:35:19 PM

Hi I've had this Spoiler 5 string for a while I believe it has a walnut top. It seems to have a quicker attack as compared to koa.
 
Any info would be greatly appreciated.
 
Thank you

Title: (x) SN# 87S4501
Post by: 52spoiler on July 21, 2011, 12:13:26 PM

(http://club.alembic.com/Images/394/109541.jpg)
 
Here's a photo of SN# 87S4501

Title: (x) SN# 87S4501
Post by: artswork99 on July 21, 2011, 01:13:08 PM

Very nice bass Paul, I believe it's the first time I've seen triple Purpleheart laminates on a Spoiler.  What a beautiful top too.  Play it Healthy! Art

Title: (x) SN# 87S4501
Post by: mica on December 17, 2015, 09:46:29 PM

Hi Paul,  
 
Here's the details from the instrument file:
 
serial number: 87S4501
model name: Spoiler
model number: SMB5
top: Walnut
body: Mahogany
neck: 7-piece Maple and Purpleheart
scale: 32 medium
fingerboard: Ebony
inlays: Pearloid (plastic) ovals
pickups: AXY45
controls: SBII volume, pickup selector, filter, Q-switch, mono output
originally made for: not recorded
birthday: August 13, 1987
 
The electronics were repaired in 2001. I'll transcribe my dad's repair note, since he doesn't usually get this wordy:
 
replaced volume control and jack. (actually replaced customer's harness since it was pretty badly mangled with another good harness that also had a bad volume control).
 
what wasn't expected was on the circuit board. the selector switch had either be replaced or at least removed and re-installed. the solder was not electronic grade and the traces were mangled so the circuit was intermittent. the switch itself was in perfect shape, however, so i removed spongy solder from each terminal and added small buss wire for reliability. also has to remove corrosion probably due to non-electronic grade flux being used on the board, but strangely this corrosion was at the opposite side from the switch, and was causing intermittent connection on the 5-way connector. fortunately the gold could not be attacked by the green corrosion so cleaning the contacts made that work reliably and got all the corrosive material off the traces at that end of the board as well.
 
so the effort was approx 2 hours although i hadn't expected it to be so long what i was just looking at the description to replace the pot and jack.
 
It must have been horrible to make my dad write all that out.  
 
The only previously registered owner was in North Dakota.

Title: (x) SN# 87S4501
Post by: mica on December 17, 2015, 09:51:04 PM

And yes, my observations comparing Koa to Walnut are in line with yours, that Walnut has a quicker attack.