Guitar weight

stickyfiddle

I like a lightweight guitar, but that comes after literally every of thing on the checklist, and it's entirely because I don't like having a 10lb+ weight on one shoulder for too long at a time. I don't buy into any notion that weight automatically means a better or worse sounding guitar. 

Blueingreen

Age and back issues have a lot to do with it in my case.  In my 20s I mainly played a Norlin era Les Paul Custom.  I never gave the weight a second thought but I’m pretty sure It’d feel like a boat anchor now.

Later I switched to bass and played mainly 5 strings in the 9-10 lbs range.  

Now I m playing guitar again everything I gig is between 7 and 7.5lbs.  If nobody made electric guitars lighter than 9 or 10 lbs I’d get by with wide straps and a little bit of shoulder ache but I just don't see the point when light guitars are more comfortable and not particularly difficult to come by.  I've never believed that heavier guitars sound better.

Slash'N'burn

impmann said:

I have another friend with a late 70s Les Paul Custom in Natural - it genuinely weighs far more than 10lb and I wouldn't be surprised if it was closer to 14 but I've never weighed it. Dreadful thing, dead as a dead thing and sounds plinky. He tried selling it five years ago, and each time anyone came to view the guitar (or pick it up from an eBay sale) they'd hand it back and say there's something wrong with it - as its just dead. Its under his bed currently... he won't give it away (or use it for firewood as I've suggested many times) and is waiting until such time as the values are very high... I think he'll be waiting a while. And he still won't be able to sell it.

Hmm, sure it's not dying pickups or wiring/switch issues here? bad strings? hard to imagine that a big lump of Mahog body & Maple neck is 'dead' and can't be put right.

Slash'N'burn

Didn't they make a thin body LP in the 80's? The Les Paul Lite? 

Affectionately known as the 'Les Paul Shite'

Philly_Q

Slash'N'burn said:

Didn't they make a thin body LP in the 80's? The Les Paul Lite? 

Affectionately known as the 'Les Paul Shite'

The Les Paul Custom Lite, 1987-1990.  They also reissued it in 2013, but with a rosewood board.  I had one of the reissues, loved the thin body and improved playability but there were too many other things I didn't like (neck shape, neck angle, rosewood board).

FelineGuitars

People do need to differentiate between a fantastic sounding guitars that happened to be a lighter weight and an utter piece of crap guitar that weighed like a feather but had no musical qualities at all, which might have made them feel that all lighter weight guitars are lacking in tone.

fretfinder

FelineGuitars said:

I know that it is a varied subject with some people not concerned with the weight of a guitar, whilst for others it's a real make or break thing with a guitar.

Generally with the guitars I build I aim mostly for what is considered the middle ground - not overly light but certainly not heavyweight. I decided to look at the weights of my main playing guitars seen here:

Lion Cub singlecut - has a little careful chambering and clocks in at just under 7lbs

Lion Supreme Light 25th Anniversary (Floyd Rose equipped model) - under 7.5lbs

Lion Special (all mahogany variant) under 7.5lbs. Exactly the same weight as the Floyd Equipped one!

Lion Cub HH (based on "the Paul", but essentially a Flying V stuffed into a LP shape). Surprisingly heavy compared to the other junior but no chambering on this one.

Lion Supreme 20th Anniversary - the heaviest of the pack , but still only 8lbs, so pretty comfy for an LP shaped guitar.

Nice guitars. Out of interest is the Lion Cub SC the only one with body chambering?

LastMantra

FelineGuitars said:

People do need to differentiate between a fantastic sounding guitars that happened to be a lighter weight and an utter piece of crap guitar that weighed like a feather but had no musical qualities at all, which might have made them feel that all lighter weight guitars are lacking in tone.

I always thought lighter guitars were rocky like SGs and juniors. My the Paul dlx (thin mahogany) is like that and it sounds good to me. Good for riffage and rhythm with the les pauls etc doing the solos with their singing sustain.
I remember seeing primal scream with that kind of approach, that was good!

Don't know if there's any truth in that.

ICBM

Slash'N'burn said:

Hmm, sure it's not dying pickups or wiring/switch issues here? bad strings? hard to imagine that a big lump of Mahog body & Maple neck is 'dead' and can't be put right.

There are some guitars that just don't resonate properly and do sound dead, but it's completely independent of weight - you can find medium and light ones the same. It might be true that there are more heavier ones this applies to, but equally my experience is that there are more overly light ones as well - there's a range of weight in the middle where you're more likely to find good ones, and it's different for the different designs. There are also great-sounding guitars at almost any weight, but they don't sound the same type of great.

dindude

7lbs to 8lbs is the correct answer for me in all cases - Strat, Teles, LP’s, Semis