Someone messaged me that this thread was being resurrected and asked me to comment on how things went with this restoration (good/bad). I think it's important to be very clear when you own a guitar of this vintage that you consider if you absolutely need to refinish it or not. Knowing what I know now, it may have been possible to use a needle to inject glue along the neck joint and set the guitar neck back in place. I've repaired several of my friends guitars with neck issues over the past year using the needle injection method and I would have attempted this on my Rickenbacker before getting it refinished. If that failed, I would have had it done again.
Before reading my comments below, please understand that I'm incredibly particular, not just a little particular, more than most people I know. People who have seen this guitar have remarked that it is incredibly beautiful and stunning and their mouths literally hang open when they see it. I love the guitar, and think it's a work of art, and I'm very happy with it. I'm extremely particular about every detail of these guitars, down the point that I notice things that are 1/2 mm off, so I'm being brutally honest in my evaluation of the work done.
So here are my thoughts after having the guitar for some time now. I'll start with the PROS first:
PROS:
1) The guitar was unplayable when I sent it to Paul. A crack had formed where the neck meets the body, resulting in high, unplayable action. The guitar now has perfect action up and down the fretboard, better than any Rick 12-string I've ever owned or played. I own another Rick 330/12 from 1966 but this guitar still beats it for low action up and down the neck. The playability is incredible, and it sounds amazing!
2) I've always wanted a mid-60's double-bound 12-string, and this was one way to get it without shelling out $10k+.
3) Paul's work was top-notch, and he put a lot of care into the restoration.
4) Paul did his best to meet my requirements for the fireglo finish based on photos I sent him. I can't recall all the photos and things I shared with him, but he did his best to meet my expectations and kept me informed along the way with photos of the guitar in process.
CONS:
1) In all honesty I preferred the original finish on the guitar. The new finish is just a tad too yellowish for my tastes. I would not have had any ambering applied if I had it refinished and would have gone for the case queen look. In Paul's defense, he offered to take it back and refinish it at no cost, but I decided to keep it as it still looks very stunning. I think Paul tends to like the more vintage finishes from the late 50's that have more of a warm hue to them as opposed to the reddish/pinkish hues of the mid-60's. Then again, I've not seen a restored Rickenbacker by any luthier that nails the look of a mid-60's Rick. Perhaps the finish used back then is simply not possible to recreate these days. I believe Paul used 3 separate colors when he sprayed the finish. In hindsight, what this does is make for a more subtle gradation between the middle of the guitar and the edges. I hate clownglo, but the transition between wood and finish on this guitar is a bit too smooth for my tastes. Somewhere in between is the correct spray pattern for a Rick of this vintage. Particularly on the horn, the finish should hug the edge of the guitar as it works its way around the horn and not cover the horn completely. Paul's spray pattern is close, but doesn't match most Rick's of this vintage. Likely this is due to using multiple sprays of different hues. If you look at Harrison's Rick, the upper horn actually has a sharp spray line in the upper and lower horns. Also, the spray (on my guitar) doesn't cover as much area behind the R tailpiece, giving the guitar a slightly different look (IMO) by shifting the wood highlight in the middle towards the back of the guitar more (behind the bridge). The bridge pickup should be the location where the center of the highlight resides, not behind the bridge as on my guitar. Not sure if I can explain this adequately.
Moderator edit: Photo removed. Please ask RIC for permission to use copy-written photos prior to posting. RIC will most likely allow the use of photos with the proper copyright notice.
2) Refinishing the guitar probably reduced it's value from an historical perspective, while increasing the value from a playability standpoint
3) The guitar was not set up properly before shipping it out to me. The neck was bowed up pretty drastically and it took me some time to eventually get it adjusted. The truss rods were not adjusted properly. The intonation was not set up properly. Take this into consideration if you are getting your guitar refinished.
4) The guitar arrived with a non-stock 80's or 90's era bridge plate. My 60's bridge was sitting on top of the plate with two screws in two holes, and the other two cocked up and riding on the plate because the plate didn't have the correct hole locations. Apparently Paul lost my bridge plate and thought I wouldn't notice.
I had another plate I installed of the correct vintage, but the hole locations were off compared to my original bridgeplate resulting in poor alignment of the bridge and strings. The strings would now pop off the frets, particularly on the bass side of the guitar. Paul sent me a couple others to try, but they never worked. Paul searched his workshop and eventually (about a year later?) found my bridge plate on a shelf and mailed it to me. Now it's back to normal.
5) I would not have had the neck bound because it reduces the playable area of the neck width-wise. This was a 330/12, so the frets went right to the edge of the fretboard. When you add binding, it takes away a bit of the fretboard space, leaving less room on the edge of the neck for frets. I believe a 60's Rick (at least my 70's Rick bass) has frets that go into the binding and the binding is actually carved away to continue acting like a fret. The fret stops at the edge of the binding. Whereas Paul's frets go over the binding about halfway, so it doesn't look the same. I asked Paul to reuse the stock nut, so as a result, some of the strings are very close to the edge of the fret, and due to the rounded edge of the fret they can sometimes slip down the side of the fret if you aren't careful. This was not the case with the guitar originally, which is why I don't recommend getting a 330 neck bound.
6) The nut is not exactly centered/glued in the exact location it should be. It's off by about a half millimeter towards the high strings. Sounds crazy, I know, but if it were shifted towards the bass side of the guitar 1/2 mm, it would be perfect.
7) I'm not too happy with how the crushed pearl inlays turned out. They weren't cut properly to increase in size incrementally as they work their way up the neck of the guitar. The short side of the inlay should remain the same size, while the other side increases in size. Paul's cuts in the fretboard were not measured carefully enough. There is also a defect in most of the inlays where it looks like the fill interacted with something and caused a cloudiness/milkiness along the edges. There's not enough crushed pearl in them to match the look of a vintage Rick. In hindsight, I would not have gotten crushed pearl inlays.
8 ) The binding itself is not exactly per vintage spec. It appears to be a bit narrower than a vintage Rick would have, especially when looking at it from the side.
Ok, there it is in a nutshell. Am I happy with the guitar? Absolutely! I'll never sell it! I love the look, the playability, and the sound of this guitar. I think Paul did an excellent job on it, and aside from the few issues above (I mean come on, who in their right mind complains about 1/2 mm???), I'm very pleased with the work he did. I wouldn't hesitate to send him another guitar to refinish, but I'd be more anal about my requirements next time based on my comments above.
