I've written Phil Jones an email and he graciously replied, making a fair offer, so I think we have a deal. He has shed a little more light on the bass too:
"This T-bird is the world's only Thunderbird VI. Gibson made a Firebird 1,3,5,and 7,and a T-bird 2,and 4, but there was always a gap, in the numerical series of the instruments. So I made this as a T-bird 6,with ebony fgbd. with block pearl inlay and white binding, gold hardware, and it is the only one of it's kind,in the world. It also has a unique history to it's Korina 9-ply neck through construction. It was originally built in Kalamazoo for the Scorpions band bass player,in 1981, and had an ugly tobacco sunburst on it, which was so ugly, they did not want it. I pulled it from the prototype collection, and kept it near my bench, for the 15 years I was master luthier at Gibson custom shop, in Nashville. I stripped the tobacco finish, got the color out of the grain, and finished it in antique natural, and slowly gathered parts for it. It was my final, and penultimate instrument that I took with me from Gibson,and I was planning to keep it for the rest of my life."
So while I'm not knowingly related to Francis Buchholz (= the Scorpions bass player mentioned), in a way that bass is - to quote a Scorpions song of that particular era - "Coming Home".
