Members FinkPloyd Posted November 4, 2011 Members Share Posted November 4, 2011 Weight relieved and chambered are not the same. Chambered is pretty much a semi hollow body, weight relieved has a bunch of holes drilled to make the body lighter. I'm sure someone will be along shortly with the x-ray pics that show the difference. IMO "semi-hollow and swiss cheese pattern" guitars can NOT produce "the Gibson sound". It takes 9-12 pounds of wood to arrive to the coveted sound. It's the body weight... NOT the pickups. My 2c. P.S. Not ignorant, just confident. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members RaVenCAD Posted November 4, 2011 Members Share Posted November 4, 2011 Well, sometimes even a Les Paul that is weight relieved can hit that range. My Joe Bonamassa gold top Studio weighs between 9.2 and 9.8 lbs, depending on the mood of my bathroom scale. I was shocked that it was so heavy considering that it's supposed to be weight relieved. The thing roars and purrs just like a Les Paul should. I bet if I put some Dimarzio pups in there, it'd lose that classic "Les Paul" vibe though. So yeah, a lot of it is the pickups. The weight simply makes it FEEL like a Les Paul. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members tiltsta Posted November 4, 2011 Members Share Posted November 4, 2011 My 2008.5 standard (chambered) sounds pretty much the same as my 80 standard. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members GCDEF Posted November 4, 2011 Members Share Posted November 4, 2011 IMO "semi-hollow and swiss cheese pattern" guitars can NOT produce "the Gibson sound". It takes 9-12 pounds of wood to arrive to the coveted sound. It's the body weight... NOT the pickups. My 2c. P.S. Not ignorant, just confident. You don't think an ES-335 can produce the Gibson sound? You don't think a 7.5 pound SG can produce the Gibson sound? I have a swiss cheese LP and it sounds like a Gibson to me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members soundcreation Posted November 4, 2011 Members Share Posted November 4, 2011 my Orville by Gibson 89 Les Paul standard weighs in at 8 pounds even, of resonant solid beauty. African mahogany just like the original 50's gibsons (that should stir up some {censored}...lol). Three pieces worth...just to mess with the traditionalists...hell it even has a neck heel cap. Produces the most amazingly round tones. So balanced. MAN! I love Japanese guitars. They just {censored}ing know what they are doing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members GAS Man Posted November 4, 2011 Members Share Posted November 4, 2011 IMO "semi-hollow and swiss cheese pattern" guitars can NOT produce "the Gibson sound". It takes 9-12 pounds of wood to arrive to the coveted sound. It's the body weight... NOT the pickups. My 2c. P.S. Not ignorant, just confident. I'd tend to agree EXCEPT the weight relieved models, while they may not have the same classic LP sound, have a bit of a light, airier (no pun intended there) chimier tone to them which I also like. Although that big thick LP tone (with the longer sustain) is classic, I actually tend to prefer the lighter tones, at least on some occasions. They sound a bit more Fender-ish. To some degree, I just think they shouldn't be compared. Like one is a horse and the other is a zebra. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members razordave Posted November 4, 2011 Members Share Posted November 4, 2011 I believe "weight relieved" is the term that descibes your wallet after you pay for one of these. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members RaVenCAD Posted November 4, 2011 Members Share Posted November 4, 2011 I believe "weight relieved" is the term that descibes your wallet after you pay for one of these. I'll admit, my wallet felt like it'd been through a vacuum cleaner factory after I bought my Joe Bonamassa, but the rest of me didn't care. Best $1429 (after discounts, $1093) I ever spent.. Not to say it beats my Carvin CT4, but it sure gives it a run. I'd honestly say I have co-#1s now. The Carvin is more versatile thanks to the Floyd, but the 2-3 tricks that the Les Paul does are VERY nice tricks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members GAS Man Posted November 4, 2011 Members Share Posted November 4, 2011 I'll admit, my wallet felt like it'd been through a vacuum cleaner factory after I bought my Joe Bonamassa, but the rest of me didn't care. Best $1429 (after discounts, $1093) I ever spent.. Not to say it beats my Carvin CT4, but it sure gives it a run. I'd honestly say I have co-#1s now. The Carvin is more versatile thanks to the Floyd, but the 2-3 tricks that the Les Paul does are VERY nice tricks. Wow, you did $207 better than I did , but I pre-ordered mine from Sweetwater before they even knew there was going to be such a thing, so I didn't have much leverage for haggling. For some reason I thought they'd be here and gone much faster. I see they are still around for sale. But weren't they supposed to also be a fairly limited run? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members jhorne Posted November 4, 2011 Members Share Posted November 4, 2011 IMO "semi-hollow and swiss cheese pattern" guitars can NOT produce "the Gibson sound". It takes 9-12 pounds of wood to arrive to the coveted sound. It's the body weight... NOT the pickups. My 2c. P.S. Not ignorant, just confident. Based on my experience, I'd probably agree with you to some degree on the chambered models. However, the swiss cheese models I've played have all had 'the Gibson sound' (and they've all been over 9lbs). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members RaVenCAD Posted November 4, 2011 Members Share Posted November 4, 2011 Wow, you did $207 better than I did , but I pre-ordered mine from Sweetwater before they even knew there was going to be such a thing, so I didn't have much leverage for haggling. For some reason I thought they'd be here and gone much faster. I see they are still around for sale. But weren't they supposed to also be a fairly limited run? I've read that they were making 600 of them, but knowing Gibson, that was just the test run to see how fast all 600 would sell. My price came from a 15% price match AMS did because of MF's Columbus day coupon.. Then it came and there was a little scuff near the neck strap button, which got me 10% more off.. YAY for Gibson QC =) So I got a total of 23.5% off the $1429. Plus, going through AMS instead of MF, I didn't have to pay TN's lovely 9.75% sales tax. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members GAS Man Posted November 4, 2011 Members Share Posted November 4, 2011 I've read that they were making 600 of them, but knowing Gibson, that was just the test run to see how fast all 600 would sell. My price came from a 15% price match AMS did because of MF's Columbus day coupon.. Then it came and there was a little scuff near the neck strap button, which got me 10% more off.. YAY for Gibson QC =) So I got a total of 23.5% off the $1429. Plus, going through AMS instead of MF, I didn't have to pay TN's lovely 9.75% sales tax. Yeah, I like to avoid the 8.5% sales tax for WA State too if I buy through MF or M123. So Sweetwater, AMS and ZZ are my friends. But dang, I still end up give a lot of biz to MF just cuz they have so many crazy blow out deals that no one else has or can match. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members satannica Posted November 4, 2011 Members Share Posted November 4, 2011 It doesn't bother me a bit what the guitar looks like under the maple cap. But my experience recently, the Les Paul standard I played was only very average, not worth the Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members jlb32 Posted November 4, 2011 Members Share Posted November 4, 2011 Less wood for your money. It actually cost more for Gibson to weight relieve than not. It's another step in the process but I doubt many want 15lbs. guitars. Pretty much all companies weight relieve their guitars in one way or another. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members soundcreation Posted November 5, 2011 Members Share Posted November 5, 2011 It actually cost more for Gibson to weight relieve than not. It's another step in the process but I doubt many want 15lbs. guitars. Pretty much all companies weight relieve their guitars in one way or another. that's not necessarily true. By chambering and weight relieving they can be less selective in choosing their mahogany. which means they probably just buy a lot of bulk mahogany at cheaper prices. If they wanted to hit lighter weights before, they'd have to reject a ton of mahogany (no pun intended) and their purchase price would probably be higher. I'm betting the total cost for them in terms of labor to select lighter pieces and the added time etc..it actually saves them money to chamber. At the very least it's probably around the same. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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