Can you scallop the top braces in a Taylor?

[Joe Sanders]

About a year ago I bought a Taylor DN8 CE and right off I noticed the tone wasn't very good when I played it without the Taylor expression system turned on. Eventually, I took it to a luthier and had the tusq nut and saddle replaced with bone. This improved the tone and volume somewhat, but not enough in my opinion. The tone was still a tad too bright. I'm learning to play flatpicking style bluegrass, and so far I can't seem to get the right sounding tone and volume out of this guitar. I'm wondering if scalloping the top bracing would help, and if this would weaken the braces too much for the Elixer nanoweb medium strings I've been using. Or should I just sell this guitar and buy a non-electric dreadnought which has a deeper body? This guitar is not as thick bodywise as say a D-28 or D-35.

[Joe Sanders]

One other thing I added, or changed, was to replace the ebony bridge pins with ox bone pins. This seemed to help a little with the tone/volume problem, but not as much as the bone nut and saddle. The braces are tapered towards the top, that is they appear to be around 3/8 inch at the bottom and narrower towards the top, but they don't look scalloped to me. As far as setup goes, it's close to the Taylor specs at the 12 th fret. The bone saddle and nut also eliminated the chronic buzz on the B and high E strings.

[Rob Mercure]

Hmmm, you're using the Elixers - which somewhat limit brightness IMHO - along with a rosewood body (same effect - I like Koa and Mahogany) and you've still got a brightness problem? Is this a problem with your guitar or your picking style? What type pick are you using? Before I'd start shaving braces - which can sometimes brighten the sound - I'd try different picks and strings and saddle materials. Maybe I'm reading this poorly but are you attempting to get the instrument to sound the same acoustically as amplified? If so lotsa luck cuz we're literally talking "mangoes and durian" as far as the physical/electrical signal chain. But if this is the case you may have to trade in this box for one that sounds the way you want acoustically and change the challenge to achieving a good amplified sound. Too many variables - sounds like you need to take the guitar and yourself to an experienced technician (and hopefully patient friend) and spend a few $$ tweaking. The curse of a comsumer society!

Rob

[Joe Sanders]

Thanks, Rob (and others) for your input. This was the first guitar I bought since I was 14, and I did play it along with several others in the shop. I say play, what little I knew at that time, which wasn't much. It sounded good in the small room where they were hanging from the wall. I think the problem is more one of volume, and playing unplugged. It sounds great plugged in to an amp, but I just don't like the electric amp sound. When I bought it, I wasn't sure on the type of music I would be playing. As for picks, I started out with medium to heavy picks like Fender and Dunlop.73-88 and 1.00, but the ones that sounded best were in the 1.5 mm range, especially the more expensive tortiloid and real ivory. The thinner plastic picks had a twangy buzz sound. I did replace the bone saddle with an elephant ivory one, and the tone was not as bright, but the volume went down, or so it seemed to my ears, so I went back to the bone. The bone makes the strings ring better and longer. I 've tried several different string brands and types, including Martin Marquis PB's, which sound a tad tinny on this guitar, also DR's, D'Addario EXP17's and D'Add. Bluegrass, (all mediums) but the Elixer Nanowebs PB's seem to have the best tone, but I agree they do sound "muted"...as you put it, especially when you move away from the first three frets or use a capo. One thing I have noticed, and I wonder if it's just me or has anyone else experienced this...since Elixer has started putting that "Anti-Rust " coating on the two plain steel strings, they sound different than the old Elixers...more tinny. I had some old Elixer Polywebs lying around, so I put the two bare wire strings on from that box and it sounded ok. You're right, Ned, the Taylor is not a cheap box, it's solid Rosewood with a Sitka spruce top, but I think that top can't vibrate properly..or enough because IMHO it is (a) overbraced and (b) the body is not deep enough. I suspect if Taylor had simply made the body a half inch deeper, there would not be a problem. Thanks again.

[Russell Vance]

I'm with Bob Mercure on this one, Firstly I'd try all the conventional ways of changing the guitar's response - If you're playing bluegrass put on a set of Bluegrass strings, light mediums (12-56 for starters) - also as has been noticed elsewhere Elixer strings are somewhat muted and not as loud as equivalent strings and probably not as suited to bluegrass as other specifically designed strings.

The bone saddle and nut will help I guess but the accompanying setup probably fixed your buzzing - and it seems pointless trying to enhance tone but at the same time using coated strings. Otherwize, if you play unplugged and can't get the tone you want I suppose you need a new guitar that meets your particular tonal requirements, Taylors are voiced differently from Martins etc. - also probably a good idea to play any new guitar before you buy it.
Rusty.

[Ned Knepp]

Personally, I like Elixir strings and find them pretty bright on the two guitars I play most. Personal opinion. I must confess that I recently got cheap and reverted to another brand that I used for years and have been very unhappy so it's back to the Elixirs.

If you will pardon me, Joe, you sound like someone that purchased without playing (AKA, bought online) . I've played a lot of "great", brand name guitars that I didn't like for one reason or another and, in the process, learned that the name on the label doesn't insure that I will like any particular guitar. I actually think it's one of the cool things about acoustic guitars. What I don't like, someone else will love. Of course this idea carries the caveat that you can't always take anyone's word for how "good" a guitar really is.

Your Taylor isn't a cheap piece of wood so while it sounds like you are fairly unhappy with it, there's a fairly good chance that someone else will like it just fine. It seems to me (personal opinion, again) that you should move on rather than tinker with this guitar. Visit the local music shops... even if they are a bit of a drive, and play some guitars. Find one (two?) that you like and replace it.

One last bit of (unsolicited) advice; If you sell the Taylor, don't make a deal out of your displeasure with it. Let the potential buyer make up their own mind.

Ned

PS, I just did a "refresh" and saw that Rusty posted. I disagree about the Elixirs but he makes a good point about the lighter gauge strings. The only guitar that I ever ran medium strings on for bluegrass was a '50s Gibson Jumbo and I changed that after a neck reset. Another of my personal opinions is that it easy to overdrive some guitars with too heavy a picking hand a too large a string gauge. I own a Bourgeois that is a wonderful bluegrass guitar, lots of volume, etc and it's designed for light gauge strings. I think a great guitar is in the building and setup, not in the string gauge. I really do think that it's better to find a guitar that you like rather than try to make so radical a change to one you don't.

[Joe Sanders]

A couple people have looked at it, and liked it, but there were some surface scratches on the top and back which I am having reworked now. Probably not a good idea to go carving around on the braces. It might really screw things up inside. My wife tells me I need a hearing aid instead of a new guitar. Women!

[Ned Knepp]

Joe,
Have you ever sat in front of your guitar while someone else was playing it. It could be that your volume problem is because you are behind the guitar. All of mine sound different to me when someone else plays them and, yes, they are louder than I tend to think they are.

Ned

[Joe Sanders]

Once I did hear someone else (guitar instructer) play it for about 30 or 40 seconds, and there was a big difference in the way it sounded, but we were in a tiny room, so it might have been the acoustics of an enclosed place. If I play while sitting in the den, which is larger and more open, it sounds different than when I play in my small kitchen, which is like 8'x20' with a sliding wooden door at one end. If I walk out into the garage, which is bigger, has no carpet or furniture, and has a high ceiling, it sounds different (louder) in there.

Donald, the sound hole is the normal size, 4 inches I believe. I notice that Taylor places the x bracing in the top a tad closer to the soundhole that some Martins I have seen. I was looking at an article on Frets.com by Frank Ford which was titled "Martin Top Braces" that had some nice illustrations of the different bracing techniques that Martin has used over the years, including the scalloped bracing they used before World War II. These were sample dreadnought tops from the Martin factory.

I have another question for you guys. Have you ever been taking apart or a piece of furniture like a wooden table, and when you loosened a screw, the whole thing would creak or pop, as if it had been under pressure when it was assembled? I wonder if it's like that occasionally with some guitars. Suppose when they attach the neck or the bridge, the parts being assembled end up being under stress. Wouldn't this effect the way it sounded? Just curious.

[Donald A. Fortune]

I'm no expert on the subject of tone as for brite and bassy but from what I understand -- if the sound hole is small-
say about 3-1/2 in apposed to say 4 in. then the tone will be briter . ( correction excepted in this case because I may be all wet)
AS far as the volume I believe it has more to do with the lay out of the braces, rather than the thickness or the scaloping of them.
I made a dred here about a year ago and was reading a thing by Dan Earlwinnie about the layout and the angle of the braces.
Heres what I did-- I made the braces out of Alder of all things and I put the angle of the top braces at 110 degrees, and the tone bars at 120 degrees to the X brace, didn't scallop them ether.
I must say that my son in law plays a jazzmaster and he and I jam sometimes and I can play the dred without and amp or mic. and be heard as a backup.
Hope Im explaining this rite so a you all can understand what Im saying here....
Peace,
Donald

[Joe Sanders]

Got the Taylor back from the shop. The top looks great..like a new one. Guy here who makes electric guitars buffed out the scratches. Can't play it right now because I had hand surgery last week. I don't know if this is common among guitar players or not, but I had "trigger finger" in two fingers of my left hand (index and ring) and my fingers would actually lock up and I would have to grab them and yank hard to get them to straighten back out. Doc gave me cortisone shots twice, but said he would not keep doing that, so he operated. The tendon in the fingers gets an enlarged area or bump which slips under and hangs up when the finger is bent. Hope it works.