Hello everybody,
Happy to be here. This is my first post (and quite a long one!) in this forum, but I've already been doing some reading as I was in the market for a new acoustic and strongly considering buying a Taylor.
So after reading lots of topics I finally found my way to my local guitar shop and tried out a few Taylors, from GS mini to Taylor 214ce DLX (at the very top of my budget). Spent about an hour in the store switching between 214ce, 114e and 114ce and I couldn't not find anything justifying the putting down xx more than a 114 series would cost. Especially since also now in 2017 the 100-series gets the full blown ES2.
What struck me most was really the action on those guitars (on all 5 Taylors I tried)... very often I read here on NGD posts on how well these taylors played with their low action coming out of the factory. I disagree. Maybe it's the difference in climate in Europe, or humidity in the store, I don't know but all of them had pretty high action. Thinking I could easily fix this at home I also bought a spare saddle to sand, just in case the action would not lower by itself in the course of a few weeks, or a truss rod adjustment wouldn't help.
After about 4 weeks keeping the guitar at factory settings (besides some truss rod adjusment) the action was still way to high for me, meaning e.g. 5mm (really!) on the bass E string (sorry, I don't measure in inches). Nothing changed actionwise, so I guess the guitar did not need to settle in to our climate anymore.
Up next: thinking and reading a lot about what might be the best approach to lower the action. I read here about neck resets using shims (only at taylor amsterdam possible for me, but that's far from where I live) or sanding down the saddle. Fortunately I bought a spare saddle so I got to work on it, bit by bit. Nothing to lose. Now the action is more inline to what I've read being the optimal distance between the top of the 12th fret and the strings, somewhere at a good 3mm.
Ofcourse this resulted in some buzzing near the 10th fret, so I had to tweak the truss rod a little to fix this.
Those were the facts. Now getting to the questions par of this post...
I'll try do describe this as best as I can, but I'm not a native English speaker, so please accept my apologies.
- While fretting notes or chords often come with some added notes. I guess some strings not hit that particular fret but also other frets, just before or after on the fretboard. It annoyes me playing acoustic without pick. Doesn't bother me that much when plugged in or using a pick, seems like those added notes don't get picked up the ES2. These added notes become more present (louder) fretting closer to the body where the action is higher. Does anyone experience similar ? Is it normal? Did I make a mistake shaving the saddle?
- With some strings, while hammering, starting like the 10th fret (could by 9th) towards to soundhole, the notes produced are progressing from high to low. Starting at the 1st fret towards the 9th or 10th the notes ring fine from lower to higher. So it kind of inverts only maybe for 1 or 2 strings (G string for sure). Anyone some idea's? Again as a result of sanding the saddle?
At this moment the truss rod is set to allow lowest action possible without buzz. I don't have the feeling that any adjustment would help on these two issues.
Looking forward to some opinions of experts. Appreciating best would be to go to a Luthier I guess.
Thanks for your replies, have a nice day!
Razz
$ (euros), per forum rules
