tobereeno

it'd be nice to see an old Airhead around these parts, running, that is. The BMW Motorrad dealers in Korea all have a few old bikes restored to at least physically new condition, but they're part of the decor, not for riding or for sale. Sad. I hope to get around to owning a boxer one of these days, but I'm having quite a time with my F800S parallel twin. I love how while BMW cars are so mainstream and for the social-ladder-climbing conformists (for the most part), BMW bikes are for the outright eccentric motorcyclists with outright bizarre engineering - you either get it and love it, or you don't and look at the things as weird two-wheeled aberrations. Here's me with the final evolution of the Boxer Twin engine - at least they wrapped it up nice in tons of carbon fiber: I did not buy it - it sold for $40,000!

my favorite shot of me, if I have to pick one: for recent, we'll go with this one: I remapped the bike with a piggyback ECU. It was already frigheningly fast before the remap.

around October '99 is when I started posting too. Became rather obsessive the first few years, but haven't been around much the past year or two. I have, however, made nearly 3,500 posts in ten months on the GTR Owners Club board in the UK.....

most of my guitars have had extensive modifications, to where I'd never recoup the cost if I sold them. I have over $1000 in pickups, Sperzels, new bridges, etc in two of my doublenecks. My Hamer might fetch some money, but I have just as much in an Epiphone doubleneck, which wouldn't return virtually anything compared to what's been put into it. The only untouched one is the Virt. But that guitar doesn't really need much in the way of mods.

fuckin' A, that's mad money for a Cali. Have Cali prices really gone that high?? Are setnecks really $2K (I've been out of the market a LONG time)? we only benefit if this spurs Hamer to start building new ones - I'd love to put down $5K on a custom order Californian. But if they don't, then fighting tooth and nail whenever one comes up, that sucks. Well, it makes my personal stash more valuable, but I wouldn't sell them even if I lost both my arms. I'd figure out how to play with my feet or something - these guitars are that good.

<<He probably established that account years ago, vowing not to use it until this exact scenario.>> sounds about right. But I hope it's Atquinn's account.

how much you wanna bet that's a shill bidder?

I'm crying. seriously. I can't go after this one. And that makes me want to throw myself out the window. And I live on the 21st floor!!! oh god....utterly gorgeous, the most beautiful Hamer I've ever, ever seen.

jesus fucking christ. oh LAWD helpme! helpme lawd helpme.......

I just get my guitars to sound exactly how I want them to. Some of it is pickup selection, or other modifications. Mostly I'm just sick of guitar gear and having been freed of that, I find that I can get a lot out of fingers and a Roland Microcube. Yep.

Do I like Californians? Yes.

So, buy it and then part out the rest. :-) Craig is a standup guy. We spent some time in my guitar room last weekend just chatting. And Craig, you'll be out playing again a few years. sunburst Centaura? too nice to part out!!

argh, what I really need is just the neck from a non-reverse Centaura....

is it a prototype, what's with the 0010 serial#? an early one with either a kahler or sustain block?

just as a ballpark figure, depending on which Virtuoso it is (there are only some 20-odd examples), anywhere from $2K to $4K or more. It all really depends on how bad someone wants one at the moment. Some pics or at least a description would be cool, so we can add it to the list of Virtuosos accounted for.

I do prefer the low profile stuff, but I'm pretty sure Ibanez bridges won't match the post spacing. Floyd Pro bridges will, but you will have to A: switch the block as the stock Floyd Pro block is too long, and B: rout out the trem cavity from the top. It's not too hard but you need a good router and you'll have to take off about 1/16" on the back end and increase the depth a good 1/2" or more. I do like the Ibanez ZR trem, but that would take even more surgery to fit. The Floyd Pro is an excellent bridge, and is a lot more solid and well built that the Ibanez versions. I've never had even the slightest issue with one (which is more than I can say about the Schaller Floyds!) edited to add: don't quote me on the post spacing thing, frankly I don't know for sure!

Mike Oldfield on Tubular Bells. As much as I love that album, it sounds like he plugged direct into the board. I can't think of a worse recipe for bad tone - guitar to 70s vintage transistor distortion stompbox to mixing board.

that's wonderful about your son! I can't believe how bad this storm was....I keep thinking I gotta do something to help.

it's a stacked humbucker in a single-coil space. the hotrails, is, well, a very hot pickup.

it does have one humbucker..

yeah, I'm such a muckraker poor guy, a second divorce, and he loses his kid too. I don't envy him at all - this can't be a good time for him, Ferrari notwithstanding.

just to hear it again and to keep myself out of big trouble, the 12 string neck on the Fath Californian is warped, right?

IIRC the auto industry and supermarkets survive on profit margins that are around 2%. Volume suddenly becomes very important $3k ain't so bad for that Celestial Virt, but the $1k to bring it back to asia...? my wife'd kill me...

that's what I thought too about Virts, until I owned one for awhile. Truth be told, I bought mine because, well, how often do you see one hanging in a shop? After a month or so though, I realized why it's so awesome. It's not the 36 frets. It isn't really the scalloping either. It just has that Hamer magic, and it's really a perfectly made guitar. FWIW, I paid $2400 for mine, after wearing the shop down from $3000 over about two weeks of daily badgering. I think this is on the higher end of what people have paid for Virts in recent years, but really, the market for Virts is far too small to define a "fair market value", which can be done with vintage Gibsons and Fenders because, even in their "rarity", there are zillions of them compared to Virts. If it's worth it to you as an instrument, then it's worth it. I can definitely say that the Virt is plenty guitar at $4k or $5k, but looking at Virt deals recently, I think Joe's trying to set the market price at about $4800. If one sells, that market value will be validated. If not, then....?

I used to use TI Power Brites. A little pricey, but there is no string on earth that crunches harder or better than those strings. Can't imagine getting a blues tone outta those though, and the coating on the plain strings is high friction - I was constantly using String Ease as I couldn't get used to them. But Thomastik-Infeld was definitely far and away my #1 string until I came across Snake Oils.