What does it do to the value? When I see an Alembic on ebay with non-Alembic electronics, I estimate the value by adding the cost, including shipping the instrument to Santa Rosa and back if required, of restoring the electronics. Usually, adding the restoration costs to the current bid will raise the total cost beyond what I'm willing to pay. In the current case, if it's only the pickups and not the controls, and if the pickup cavities have not been altered, then it's the cost of purchasing new pickups from Alembic. So for me, that's what it does to the value. But that's just me; others will have different perspectives. Gale's point about the craftsmanship is certainly true; but for me, at this point in time, the value of an instrument is reduced by the cost to make it whole. Hmmm .., I'm thinking that the word value does have different meanings; so I'm using value here as a measure of the amount of money I would be willing to expend on the purchase of an instrument. Of course there are other meanings of value. My Essence has a high value to me because I've played it a long time and it's an important part of my life. But if I were to sell it, it's value to a perspective buyer would be reduced by its cosmetic blemishes. This question has made me think a lot. For instance, now I'm thinking about headstocks; the value of my Essence to Paul would be reduced because he prefers other headstock designs over the Cone design. So, again, what does it do to the value? It does different things to different people .
