Stupid things I read in these forums a lot....

[jhgreene64]

here are some goofy things i see alot, post your peeves

1. “A 100 watt is only 3 decibels louder than a 50 watt”. This is true of course. What these guys don’t understand (including the guy at Eurotube’s by the way) is that three decibels IS twice as loud. This is an inarguable fact. The decibel scale is logarithmic, which is to say that for every ten decibels there is a change in sound by a factor of ten. In case you still don’t get it, 20 db is ten times louder than 10 db. Thus 3 db is approximately twice as loud, 6 db four times, 9 db eight times (approximation’s; you math nerds put your Ti84’s away). The reason a 100 watt sounds only a little louder than a 50 watt is because your ears are reaching their thresh hold of perception. Try this experiment; put earplugs in. Now don earmuff protectors over those earplugs. Now smack an open G on each amp. Ta daaaa. NOW you can clearly hear the difference, right Spicoli ? Now, go smoke some more pot and stop saying “only 3 db”. It annoys me and makes you sound stupid.
2. “ The magnet in my super deluxe PAF clone has been weakened to sound like a sixties model”. Um, guess what dummy. When those recordings from the sixties and seventies were made those magnets were relatively new and had a full strength magnetic field. You have been had. Go sit in the closet and think it over……
3. “Nitrocellulose lacquer is magical, blah, blah…”. This is total BS of course. The reason many manufacturers use this is that it has a very short drying time, period. To achieve a deep finish, several coats of ANY lacquer are required. Nitro dries so much faster that it has become the first choice for medium quality US manufacturers. It DOES NOT sound different. Total BS. It is in fact inferior to other premium finishes. It checks easily and ages poorly. Fact.
4. People who call their guitars honey, sweetie, baby, or some other creepy weird term. I can’t get away from the idea that these people may be sodomizing themselves with honey’s headstock. Stop it, it’s a friggin guitar you freak….
5. People who ask setup questions. THERE ARE TONS OF PROFESSIONAL WEBSITES WITH THIS INFO. Have any of these people heard of Google? OK now I feel better……

[Philby]

Maybe you should take one of these and have a good lie down with Honey? You'll feel much better.



It works for me

I think I'll save my setup questions for another post then........

[Boogie Bill]

Well, yeah.

Mine are asking questions like, "How old is my guitar?" Or, "How much does it weigh?" They are not really relevant to how a guitar sounds or if the guitar is good, IMO.

Lately, the one is driving me nuts is the statement that Gibson Tune-O-Matic saddles are already cut at the factory for a 12" radius. WRONG!!!! I've NEVER, EVER seen a T-O-M properly radiused from the factory.

BTW, my Duncan Antiquitys with their aged magnets sound really, really good. I have both HB Ants and the Texas Hot Ants in a couple of Legacys. Highly recommended.

And in my experience, I think Poly finishes are fine on electric guitars. On acoustics, NCL is KING. I have both; trust me, the poly finish doesn't age like the NCL. I'm willing to put up with the inherent problems of NCL for its tonal benefits. But a thick, poorly applied NCL finish ain't so great either.

And the poly IS cheaper for the manufactures to apply and cure--but do we see this reflected in the bottom line. NO!!! Taylor, Breedlove, Collings still charge an arm and a leg for their guitars!

I'm done. For now.

Bill

[Tom Valentine]

4. People who call their guitars honey, sweetie, baby, or some other creepy weird term.
I can’t get away from the idea that these people may be sodomizing themselves with honey’s headstock.

Stop it, it’s a friggin guitar you freak….

Well OK on 1,2,3 .. and 5 (sounds like a Monty Python skit ,
but this one is rather subjective and reflects the unique personality
of the person playing said guitar, and their passion in naming something close to them.

I have many guitars, lots of G&L's too .. but only a few actually have 'names' given to them:
> My Honey S-500 is nicked "Hunie", a play on honey and I have a personal reason for naming her such.
> My Red S-500 is named "Redstone", mainly due to it's powerful tone which growls like a Redstone rocket leaving the launch pad! (/grin).
> My Tobacco Burst Legacy is nicked "Buddy", as in Holly, about as close to a '57 sunburst Strat as I'm ever gonna get ....
> My Martin 00-18 is nicked, of course, simply "Marty"

Most of the others just go by their model names: "F-100", "Skyhawk", "Legacy Special", "ES-345", etc ... although my little Martin Backpacker is occasionally referred to as "That amazing lil' critter"

Now then, if only that amazing lil' critter would produce 3db more volume ... /sigh

Cheers,
-- TV

[sirmyghin]

here are some goofy things i see alot, post your peeves

1. “A 100 watt is only 3 decibels louder than a 50 watt”. This is true of course. What these guys don’t understand (including the guy at Eurotube’s by the way) is that three decibels IS twice as loud. This is an inarguable fact. The decibel scale is logarithmic, which is to say that for every ten decibels there is a change in sound by a factor of ten. In case you still don’t get it, 20 db is ten times louder than 10 db. Thus 3 db is approximately twice as loud, 6 db four times, 9 db eight times (approximation’s; you math nerds put your Ti84’s away). The reason a 100 watt sounds only a little louder than a 50 watt is because your ears are reaching their thresh hold of perception. Try this experiment; put earplugs in. Now don earmuff protectors over those earplugs. Now smack an open G on each amp. Ta daaaa. NOW you can clearly hear the difference, right Spicoli ? Now, go smoke some more pot and stop saying “only 3 db”. It annoys me and makes you sound stupid.

Wrong, 10 dB is twice as loud to the human ear, 3dB is twice the power output. Power =/= volume. 3dB is about the smallest change in sound you will find noticeable. A 10W amp turns out 50% the volume of a 100W, 25W 75%, 50W 81%, and so on.

2. “ The magnet in my super deluxe PAF clone has been weakened to sound like a sixties model”. Um, guess what dummy. When those recordings from the sixties and seventies were made those magnets were relatively new and had a full strength magnetic field. You have been had. Go sit in the closet and think it over……
3. “Nitrocellulose lacquer is magical, blah, blah…”. This is total BS of course. The reason many manufacturers use this is that it has a very short drying time, period. To achieve a deep finish, several coats of ANY lacquer are required. Nitro dries so much faster that it has become the first choice for medium quality US manufacturers. It DOES NOT sound different. Total BS. It is in fact inferior to other premium finishes. It checks easily and ages poorly. Fact.

nitro takes a long time to cure properly, I agree it is overrated however.

4. People who call their guitars honey, sweetie, baby, or some other creepy weird term. I can’t get away from the idea that these people may be sodomizing themselves with honey’s headstock. Stop it, it’s a friggin guitar you freak….
5. People who ask setup questions. THERE ARE TONS OF PROFESSIONAL WEBSITES WITH THIS INFO. Have any of these people heard of Google? OK now I feel better……

People who name guitars are indeed creepy. 4/5 of your points are valid though, so not bad for a rant.

[darwinohm]

JG, good to see someone sound off once in a while. Some of your points are very well taken but lets assume that not everyone understands everything. I really understand you point on decibels. To begin with, a person who had studied that and actually measured decibels would understand the logic. There are many who don't and could not even care. Their observations are subjective. Measuring decibels is objective and the results are objective. There are many people who are really into the tone that they like and they are looking for the ultimate tone. Again that is an objective interpretation. If you were to measure the frequencies involved and the spectrum and you dialed into a specific tone, that would be objective. I happen to find the tone of all of my guitars very acceptable and appreciate each of them for what they do. The build quality is my hangup and if it is not what I expect, I don't want it. I recently had a dealer explain to me that the quality of Gibson is higher than it has ever been. You could have fooled me.

I am with you on the nito / poly concept and I think that Boogie Bill said it quite well. In fact, an unpainted acoustic would probably sound much more resonant than any painted counterpart. If you were to apply coats of nitro the same thickness as poly, the sound would be very similar. Poly cures quickly to a nice thick, durable coat. Nitro is thin and cures forever. It keeps curing, and becomes thinner and thinner year after year. eventually it cures to the point where it shrinks to the point where it starts to check. Now it is reliced. Some like it and I don't. I am not a nitro fan and never will be but thin is good on acoustics.

Magnets??? A friend of mine puts magnets on his water pipes. I thought about asking him if he had them north and south or up and down!! We are in a bar having a beer and I just smile and I tell him, you can't beat that!! I should ask him if he is using Alnico or Ceramic.

I am guilty of having an artistic (visual) appreciation of guitars. Some would consider that weird but how would we consider someone who like art? So strange as I may be to some people, I have become comfortable in my advanced age with the opinions of others that I may not necessarily agree with and in some cases, just let it go in one ear and out the other. The last thing I want to do is want to do is waste time to convince someone else as I don't have enough time left to straighten everyone out. If I could do that there wouldn't be any politicians left. That is probably why most normal people are not politicians. So, sound off one in a while JG, and give us hell if we need it. If someone gives me too many decibels, I just take my hearing aids out.!!! -- Darwin

[Tom Valentine]

If someone gives me too many decibels, I just take my hearing aids out.!!! -- Darwin

LOL !!!

[yowhatsshakin]

here are some goofy things i see alot, post your peeves

1. “A 100 watt is only 3 decibels louder than a 50 watt”. This is true of course. What these guys don’t understand (including the guy at Eurotube’s by the way) is that three decibels IS twice as loud. This is an inarguable fact. The decibel scale is logarithmic, which is to say that for every ten decibels there is a change in sound by a factor of ten. In case you still don’t get it, 20 db is ten times louder than 10 db. Thus 3 db is approximately twice as loud, 6 db four times, 9 db eight times (approximation’s; you math nerds put your Ti84’s away). The reason a 100 watt sounds only a little louder than a 50 watt is because your ears are reaching their thresh hold of perception. Try this experiment; put earplugs in. Now don earmuff protectors over those earplugs. Now smack an open G on each amp. Ta daaaa. NOW you can clearly hear the difference, right Spicoli ? Now, go smoke some more pot and stop saying “only 3 db”. It annoys me and makes you sound stupid.

Wrong, 10 dB is twice as loud to the human ear, 3dB is twice the power output. Power =/= volume. 3dB is about the smallest change in sound you will find noticeable. A 10W amp turns out 50% the volume of a 100W, 25W 75%, 50W 81%, and so on.

Wrong! No matter the non-linear response of the ear or what constitutes 'louder', a 100W amp does only produce 3dB more than a 50W amp and is hence 3dB 'louder'. The error most people make is indeed mistaking power, which is expressed in Watts, and voltage, which is expressed in ... ahem, Volts of course. The dB scale is defined as:

Code: Select all

dB = 10 * 10log(P1/P0)

where P0 is your reference power. So it is easy to verify a 100W amp produces only about 3dB more than a 50W amp. Since for a given impedance Z the power scales as P = V * I = V * V / Z we notice that if we want to express the aforementioned formula in terms of a output voltages it would be

Code: Select all

dB = 20 * 10log(V1/V0)

, with V0 your reference voltage.
The main problem when talking about amps is that they are in effect current sources instead of voltage sources (speakers are driven by pushing a certain amount of current through the coils) but in that case the power is still a quadratic expression in current: P = I * I * Z and hence:

Code: Select all

dB = 20 * 10log(I1/I0)

with I0 your reference current.

In the provided link to the graph, which indicates what 'loudness' in terms of dB is necessary to hear a particular frequency as loud as another (with 3kHz as the apparent reference), one can notice that the physiological response of the ear is rather complex and optimized in a region between 2kHz and 4kHz, which conveniently is centered around the spectrum produced by human speech. In that respect the response of the ear is very similar to the response of the eye, optimized around the maximum of the black-body radiation emitted by a surface with a temperature of about 5800K (dang if that isn't the sun!), i.e. optimized for something that it has to deal with most often. But when one states that something is perceived as 2 times louder it depends very much on the frequency and the reference 'loudness' in units of phon. For instance, for a note at a frequency of around 110Hz to be perceived as loud as a note at 440Hz at the threshold of hearing, the former needs about 15dB more whereas at 80 phon only 7dB is needed. Complex indeed.

But if anybody knows better, I love to learn.

- Jos

[Boogie Bill]

I was going to add that many of my guitars have nicknames. Now keep in mind that I have 48 guitars, and many of those are duplicates. Eight Legacys, ten Les Pauls, etc.

Miss Leslie, my personal confidante, paramour, and financial advisor, also acts as my roadie; and she helps me load the car and pack the gear. (I can see all of you turning green with envy!) What the name really is, it's a code word. Instead of me having to say, "I want the Root Beer colored Les Paul Supreme," I simply tell her I want "Diana Ross". My Lake Placid Blue Legacy is "Ice". The Gold Metallic Legacy is "Goldilocks". The Fullerton Red Legacy is "Jo-Jo" (Miss Leslie's alter ego). My 1960 Classic Plus in Heritage Cherry Sunburst is "Lolita"--she has a spectacular flamed top and beautiful color--she is a floozy!

Can you guess what color my "Impala" S-500 is?

So the names are cute, and usually tied to the color or something that makes the guitar memorable. Not all of them have names--the 1958 Les Paul Historic Reissue is usually just referred to as, "The '58". But when I need to have a bit of shorthand in communicating which guitar I want Miss Leslie to pack, a nickname is a handy way of doing things.

Now people who name their cars--they're weird!!

Bill

[sirmyghin]

Wrong! No matter the non-linear response of the ear or what constitutes 'louder', a 100W amp does only produce 3dB more than a 50W amp and is hence 3dB 'louder'. The error most people make is indeed mistaking power, which is expressed in Watts, and voltage, which is expressed in ... ahem, Volts of course. The dB scale is defined as:

Code: Select all

dB = 10 * 10log(P1/P0)

where P0 is your reference power. So it is easy to verify a 100W amp produces only about 3dB more than a 50W amp. Since for a given impedance Z the power scales as P = V * I = V * V / Z we notice that if we want to express the aforementioned formula in terms of a output voltages it would be

Code: Select all

dB = 20 * 10log(V1/V0)

, with V0 your reference voltage.
The main problem when talking about amps is that they are in effect current sources instead of voltage sources (speakers are driven by pushing a certain amount of current through the coils) but in that case the power is still a quadratic expression in current: P = I * I * Z and hence:

Code: Select all

dB = 20 * 10log(I1/I0)

with I0 your reference current.

In the provided link to the graph, which indicates what 'loudness' in terms of dB is necessary to hear a particular frequency as loud as another (with 3kHz as the apparent reference), one can notice that the physiological response of the ear is rather complex and optimized in a region between 2kHz and 4kHz, which conveniently is centered around the spectrum produced by human speech. In that respect the response of the ear is very similar to the response of the eye, optimized around the maximum of the black-body radiation emitted by a surface with a temperature of about 5800K (dang if that isn't the sun!), i.e. optimized for something that it has to deal with most often. But when one states that something is perceived as 2 times louder it depends very much on the frequency and the reference 'loudness' in units of phon. For instance, for a note at a frequency of around 110Hz to be perceived as loud as a note at 440Hz at the threshold of hearing, the former needs about 15dB more whereas at 80 phon only 7dB is needed. Complex indeed.

But if anybody knows better, I love to learn.

- Jos

To produce 3 dB more speakers (or near enough) need to do double the work, but what does it matter if you don't hear it as twice as loud is more my point. How you hear it rules the game. But yes, I am in no position to argue with you if you want to go into that much detail.

[89skyhawk]

This makes me think about how / why my ears (hearing), start to adjust to volume in the room. I'll goto a blues jam and my ears behave like they're being controlled by a internal zener diode in my head. What I mean is they (my eardrums and internal ear), react like a zener when it reaches its avalanche voltage, (my hearing just automatically lowers the volume level if it gets too loud). I notice many times when I get back into my car and start it up the radio is blasting away and I wonder 'who was driving my car'? Well ... all of this and more must factor into the discussion along with the log rhythmic way in which we hear and the way analog devices adhere to a log rhythmic scale. So even though it may be hard cold facts about a 3db difference, that fact doesn't determine the whole truth regarding loudness when comparing the 100watt and 50watt amps. Just my 2 cents.

[Michael-GnL-Michael]

here are some goofy things i see alot, post your peeves

1. “A 100 watt is only 3 decibels louder than a 50 watt”. This is true of course. What these guys don’t understand (including the guy at Eurotube’s by the way) is that three decibels IS twice as loud. This is an inarguable fact. The decibel scale is logarithmic, which is to say that for every ten decibels there is a change in sound by a factor of ten. In case you still don’t get it, 20 db is ten times louder than 10 db. Thus 3 db is approximately twice as loud, 6 db four times, 9 db eight times (approximation’s; you math nerds put your Ti84’s away). The reason a 100 watt sounds only a little louder than a 50 watt is because your ears are reaching their thresh hold of perception. Try this experiment; put earplugs in. Now don earmuff protectors over those earplugs. Now smack an open G on each amp. Ta daaaa. NOW you can clearly hear the difference, right Spicoli ? Now, go smoke some more pot and stop saying “only 3 db”. It annoys me and makes you sound stupid.
2. “ The magnet in my super deluxe PAF clone has been weakened to sound like a sixties model”. Um, guess what dummy. When those recordings from the sixties and seventies were made those magnets were relatively new and had a full strength magnetic field. You have been had. Go sit in the closet and think it over……
3. “Nitrocellulose lacquer is magical, blah, blah…”. This is total BS of course. The reason many manufacturers use this is that it has a very short drying time, period. To achieve a deep finish, several coats of ANY lacquer are required. Nitro dries so much faster that it has become the first choice for medium quality US manufacturers. It DOES NOT sound different. Total BS. It is in fact inferior to other premium finishes. It checks easily and ages poorly. Fact.
4. People who call their guitars honey, sweetie, baby, or some other creepy weird term. I can’t get away from the idea that these people may be sodomizing themselves with honey’s headstock. Stop it, it’s a friggin guitar you freak….
5. People who ask setup questions. THERE ARE TONS OF PROFESSIONAL WEBSITES WITH THIS INFO. Have any of these people heard of Google? OK now I feel better……

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Good griping is like brainstorming and should not be stifled by anything but especially not by facts, reality, feelings, physics, other opinions, caution, etc. When it comes to what bothers you, it's all about your world and how certain guests do not behave in it.
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[sickbutnottired]

Love this!!!!!

I think Jos is right but my physics classes where a lot of beers ago, also I'm with sirmy. decibels mean absolutely nothing to me. I have a cyborg friend, though, who get's totally torqued when I get heavy decibels playing on my guitar--over 113 db.

My wife names a lot of my guitars, but she is kinda stuck in a rut. They are all Lucky. As in LUCKY your still married...

Darwin, electric guitars are unique in that they are tools, that can be made to look and sound beautiful in many ways. Right there with you.

Oh, yea, Bill riddle me this...Have you seen any adjustable setting on a Les Paul w/ TOM that is right from the factory in the past decade or so (/exaggeration off)?

BTW, I am back in the market for a LP, probably gonna be named Lucky..

jeremy

[jhgreene64]

On the subject of power; ummm- assuming an efficient speaker, power and sound increase in a linear fashion, together.
On the subject of db; sound, power or any other quantity can be measured in decibels as long as a starting reference is established. In this case I was referring sound. A 100 watt amp will run at about 115 db sound, a 50 roughly 112.
To the contrarians who posted regarding this point, you proved my original statement. You can learn the math here, assuming a college level understanding of algebra and mathmatics. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decibel

[emieboo]

I was thinking of calling my George Fullerton Signature Legacy, uh... "George"!

[SouthpawGuy]

I was thinking of calling my George Fullerton Signature Legacy, uh... "George"!

I prefer Ringo

Sorry couldn't resist !

[Michael-GnL-Michael]

Life is a work in process.

+1 creeped out when people refer to guitars as "she" or "her."

[Muleya]

I appreciate all the volume and power discussions...brings back some college physics, though most of this exceeds the 2 1/2 years I took...either that, or 20 years is too long to remember those discussions!!

However, for me personally, it boils down to the fact that the volume differences are pretty well moot, AFAIK. In this day and age, both produce more volume than you really need. I can't imagine there are many, if any, clubs that would allow a fully cranked amp in the 50W-100W range. If the venue is really big enough to allow that, I'm sure they'll mic up the amps, eliminating the need for that kind of volume. I read an interview with Alex Lifeson not that long ago that said their stage volume was probably quieter than many people's home stereos. And Joe Satriani, who's been playing a 100W Marshall JVM on his last tour, usually has his master volumes around half, give or take. If arena gigs can do that, it seems that the 50W/100W volume debate is now pointless!

I also never really understood the guitar naming thing. I've had friends who name objects, whether it be a car or a guitar or whatever...I just never understood the need to name these things, but I'm live and let live, so do what makes you happy!!

[CGT]

I prefer labeling rather than naming guitars, e.g. Number 1, Number 2, My Main Ax, My Player, My Beater, etc. but I do somewhat wince at the use of the feminine pronoun in reference to guitars. Below is my pet peeve and it's corollary:

1) "The guitar doesn't matter." BULL! If the guitar didn't matter, you wouldn't see all these guys trolling forums, message boards and craigslist for tips, tricks and newer instruments. Pros don't spend thousands of dollars on custom instruments and full time guitar techs for bragging rights. A badly made/setup guitar will hold back a player's development.

1a) is an offshoot of 1) above: "<INSERT GUITAR LEGEND HERE> would sound amazing on any guitar, even on your crappy plywood acoustic." OF COURSE <INSERT GUITAR LEGEND HERE> would sound good on any guitar. He/she and he/she is miles ahead of you in technique due to having invested the time required to play and usually upgrading to pro-level equipment. You will never sound as good as <INSERT GUITAR LEGEND HERE> on your crappy acoustic because you are being held back by your poor quality instrument.

[sirmyghin]

I prefer labeling rather than naming guitars, e.g. Number 1, Number 2, My Main Ax, My Player, My Beater, etc. but I do somewhat wince at the use of the feminine pronoun in reference to guitars. Below is my pet peeve and it's corollary:

1) "The guitar doesn't matter." BULL! If the guitar didn't matter, you wouldn't see all these guys trolling forums, message boards and craigslist for tips, tricks and newer instruments. Pros don't spend thousands of dollars on custom instruments and full time guitar techs for bragging rights. A badly made/setup guitar will hold back a player's development.

Overall guitar quality obviously matters, but the shape/size/company the instrument is made from is irrelevant though. If you have a ASAT, a Legacy, or a LP isn't going to make much difference (as long as you spent the 5k on an acceptable LP). As far as bad setups holding you back, that is a touchy subject. I learned to play on a bass with 1/4" action and could rip the living hell out of it. It certainly didn't hold me back, I played that thing for on 9 years. Learned Rush's entire back catalogue in the process too. Motivation is more important than setup and quality.

[CGT]

Overall guitar quality obviously matters, but the shape/size/company the instrument is made from is irrelevant though. If you have a ASAT, a Legacy, or a LP isn't going to make much difference (as long as you spent the 5k on an acceptable LP). As far as bad setups holding you back, that is a touchy subject. I learned to play on a bass with 1/4" action and could rip the living hell out of it. It certainly didn't hold me back, I played that thing for on 9 years. Learned Rush's entire back catalogue in the process too. Motivation is more important than setup and quality.

I'll have to disagree with you on that. I stopped playing my old Sonex because of a bad setup. I didn't know any better. After it lay in a case for years, I took it out, took it to a technician and got it properly set up. It was a different guitar. It was infinitely easier to play, and it sounded a lot better. I wanted to play. A proper setup motivated me to practice more, and I switched to Strats and realized that single coils, a maple neck and a different scale made sounds that better approximated what I heard in my head, I played even more.

Hundreds of players give up prematurely because they have instruments with high action that are impossible to play (especially acoustic instruments), and I've seen so many Squiers on craigslist that have been abandoned for being too hard to play and bought up by people who knew what they were doing and transformed through proper setups and hardware/pickup upgrades.

Perhaps you're the exception that proves the rule.

[jwebsmall]

I would have named my G&L Honey but I didn't think of it
probably because I'm really stupid.

[Ken Baker]

here are some goofy things i see alot, post your peeves

Fascinating.

1. “A 100 watt is only 3 decibels louder than a 50 watt”. This is true of course. What these guys don’t understand (including the guy at Eurotube’s by the way) is that three decibels IS twice as loud. This is an inarguable fact. The decibel scale is logarithmic, which is to say that for every ten decibels there is a change in sound by a factor of ten. In case you still don’t get it, 20 db is ten times louder than 10 db. Thus 3 db is approximately twice as loud, 6 db four times, 9 db eight times (approximation’s; you math nerds put your Ti84’s away). The reason a 100 watt sounds only a little louder than a 50 watt is because your ears are reaching their thresh hold of perception. Try this experiment; put earplugs in. Now don earmuff protectors over those earplugs. Now smack an open G on each amp. Ta daaaa. NOW you can clearly hear the difference, right Spicoli ? Now, go smoke some more pot and stop saying “only 3 db”. It annoys me and makes you sound stupid.

Let's introduce some variables because, well, it's rock & roll and variables are a way of life. These aren't even physics kind of variables, though I'm sure there's some science floating around in there someplace.

If you need to get louder, you don't necessarily need more power. What you need are more cones moving a greater quantity of air. Decibels (SPL) are important to the engineers designing the speaker cabs (more so bass cabs) because their product takes the electricity coming from the amplifier and turns it into mechanical energy. I can only get so loud with one of my 12" cabs powered by an old G-K 400RB, but if I change to a 4X10 I can get a lot louder without touching a knob on the amp. This has a bit to do with SPL (1KHz/1W/1m), but it has more to do with greater square inches of cone and sound projection.

3. “Nitrocellulose lacquer is magical, blah, blah…”. This is total BS of course. The reason many manufacturers use this is that it has a very short drying time, period. To achieve a deep finish, several coats of ANY lacquer are required. Nitro dries so much faster that it has become the first choice for medium quality US manufacturers. It DOES NOT sound different. Total BS. It is in fact inferior to other premium finishes. It checks easily and ages poorly. Fact.

Did you know that nitrocellulose lacquer actually builds very little from coat to coat? Same with shellac. The carrier (lacquer thinner or denatured alcohol, respectively) of subsequent coats actually partially dissolves the previous coats so that the solids of the various coats become "one". There isn't much in the way of solids there, which is why it takes so many coats of the stuff. That thinness might do little to the tone of a solid body instrument, but it can many times allow a hollow acoustic instrument to sing.

Oh! And good quality upright basses are finished in varnish.

4. People who call their guitars honey, sweetie, baby, or some other creepy weird term. I can’t get away from the idea that these people may be sodomizing themselves with honey’s headstock. Stop it, it’s a friggin guitar you freak….

Yeah, I know this is all about the rant, but maybe Philby had some good advice.

5. People who ask setup questions. THERE ARE TONS OF PROFESSIONAL WEBSITES WITH THIS INFO. Have any of these people heard of Google?

So, um, what might a stringed instrument forum be used for? Discussions of our pets? Perhaps cost/benefit analyses of owning a personal island?

OK now I feel better……

Good!

Ken...

[zapcosongs]

Life is a work in process.

+1 creeped out when people refer to guitars as "she" or "her."

It's when the instrument is referred to as "him" or "he" that makes me a bit uncomfortable... ;+) - ed

[zapcosongs]

btw, I need to put new strings on "Larry" tonight. Ha! - ed

[Ken Baker]

It's when the instrument is referred to as "him" or "he" that makes me a bit uncomfortable... ;+) - ed

So what happens with a double-neck?



Ken...

[yowhatsshakin]

btw, I need to put new strings on "Larry" tonight. Ha! - ed

Darn Ed, I hope it's more than just g-strings ...

- Jos

[zapcosongs]

Confession: Thanks to Bill (who turned me on to the stuff), I will be applying Nut Sauce. G-d help me! - ed

[Michael-GnL-Michael]

Add to the list ACRONYMBONICS aka the use of letters and sometimes numbers to replace entire words to such an extent that it is nearly impossible to understand unless you spend too much time on internet forums.