Different Rick Paint Jobs: Do they affect tone??

[lovecity]

Hey everyone!

I'm going to be getting my first Rick in a few days (I had a 650D a while back though...) and I'm either getting a 330/360 in either MG or JG.

Is there a difference in tone between the two because the JG has a heavier/different paint job??

Any help would be great!

-J

[beatlefreak]

Welcome to the forum. A difference in tone due to different paint jobs could be very subjective. I would say no.

[jingle_jangle]

No doubt in my mind that there IS a difference.

Also no doubt that Superman could possibly hear it, an oscilloscope could pick it up in a nanoheartbeat, but ordinary humans could not pick the two apart in a blind listening test.

Why not post sound clips like my good friend Proteus does on the Gretschpages Forum? It would be fun to try.

[teb]

...yeah, but you would have to strip and refinish the same guitar over and over to make a decent test out of it....and your not allowed to sand away any wood in the process. If your ears were so good that you could hear the difference between jetglow and fireglow the fact that no guitar actually plays perfectly in tune would probably drive you nuts. The guitar that "sounds" best is usually the one you like best - for various reasons. Buy one you like.

[admin]

Paul: You are in the perfect position to test out the theory. Simply record before and after your refinish. Voila.

[paologregorio]

There is an actual difference in thickness between the two finshes, yes? Both have a sealer coat, but I would assume that the difference is that opaque/solid finishes such as JG are thicker overall because they have color coats followed by clear coats, while MG has fewer layers because after the sealer there are just clear coats, yes?

I wouldn't have thought that the human ear could detectthe difference even though it is measurable by oscilloscope (and Superman, of course). Nice to hear that that is the case. Thanks for the 411, Paul W.

With respect to a much thicker, Sparkle top, Gretsch Silver Jet type finish, do you think the tonal difference would be audible to the human ear?

[BlueAngel]

I agree with Paul - although actually I think that the human ear is far more sensitive than an oscilloscope, for this sort of thing: the ability to tell very subtle differences in very complex sounds. (Equally, an oscilloscope can be used to accurately measure different things that are undetectable to the ear.)

If there is an audible difference between a heavy polyester finish and a thin nitro finish - which there is, and you don't have to compare the same guitar with both finishes... listening to hundreds of guitars over a long period will allow you to build up an 'average' picture that's just as accurate if not more so - then there is almost certainly a tone difference between any two different finishes. The only question is how large and whether it's audible.

It's the same with very many other things that some people claim to hear and others say don't make a difference - if a big change can be shown to matter, then a similar smaller one might too, even if it can't be clearly shown to. I also think that things which can't necessarily be positively identified in a straight blind test could have a subtle effect that changes your perception of the tone over a longer period - a negative in a blind test does not prove there is no difference, it just means that at most, it's small.

All my Ricks are Jetglo, and they all sound great by the way .

[jingle_jangle]

There is an actual difference in thickness between the two finshes, yes? Both have a sealer coat, but I would assume that the difference is that opaque/solid finishes such as JG are thicker overall because they have color coats followed by clear coats, while MG has fewer layers because after the sealer there are just clear coats, yes?

I wouldn't have thought that the human ear could detectthe difference even though it is measurable by oscilloscope (and Superman, of course). Nice to hear that that is the case. Thanks for the 411, Paul W.

With respect to a much thicker, Sparkle top, Gretsch Silver Jet type finish, do you think the tonal difference would be audible to the human ear?

A color coat is less than a thousandth of an inch thick, in the case of JG. Other colors are thicker due to the size of the pigment particles and coverage of the paint itself. The difference in most cases would come down to how much CV had to be sanded off to get the guitar smooth for buffing. Actual color has little bearing.

An oscilloscope is a way to quantify and display a signal. Theoretically, a human ear is far more sensitive than the finest condenser microphone. But the brain attached to it rejects most of the sonic input, and the wearing effects of abuse and aging further compromise the quality of the sounds that we can hear.