just to keep this on the radar. anything to report?

any progress on this one Mike?

Curiosity bump.

I remember seeing that bass when I was in the planning stages of my bass. I am extremely interested in the restoration of that beautiful and rare Alembic shorty.  
 
It just goes to show just how strong and well build Alembics are, and being that some of the wood selections are from hurricane areas, that's in it self,  is an agreement with nature's fury.
 
With so many inspirational, and beautiful stories of New Orleans; and its many tragedies, this bass is a wonderful example of symbolic musical quality, from the birth place of Jazz.
 
I also remember touching this bass, and sadly remembering the people who lost their whole way of life. Yes, this bass is special to me too and it represent something still standing, and still strong as the great people of New Orleans.  
 
Peace and Love,
 
Hal-
 
(Message edited by toma_hawk01 on June 28, 2010)

How did this story end, or is it still ongoing.?

I saw the bass in the workshop last september.It still needed a whole lot of love to bring it back to life.
 
Graeme

My recollection is that in addition to a whole lot of love, there is a whole lot of research and testing involved as well.

Any further word on this one?

I was just looking at this bass with Keith today when he picked up his Starfire. Still salt oozing out of the endgrain, but it's slowed enough that I'm just about confident enough to start taking the sucker apart.  
 
It was crusting up every month with salt. My adviser on the project suggested waiting until it took 6 months to crust. We're about at that point. Will be nice to get this bass going strong again!

Aaaannnd another bump.

It's been a crust fest, I think all the increased humidity from rain we had this winter has been bursting out. But I haven't checked the level in about 2-3 months, so I'll look at it tomorrow.

Wow! Talk about the tenacity of the folks at Alembic.
Kudos to you for persisting.
I cannot even begin to fathom the true value of this instrument
- much more than dollars can express.
This is a living piece of humanity

I just think it's the coolest that they're going to fix it. I love a good basket-case story anyway.

The more humidity it can see the better. Once it gets back to Michael it will see real humidity all summer long and a good portion of the rest of the year too.

So, it's not too bad, only scraped about 1/8" of salt off the inside of the upper horns. I'm going to watch it more closely now, as it seems we might be close enough to get to work on it very soon. The fog is crazy this week!