First off, Mrs. Anderson would have us avoid the use of "kind of," apparently because it lacks specificity. I still use the phrase occasionally, despite the 9th-grade warnings against its dangers. Here's the theme of the week: guitar rehab. See, I bought this guitar on craigslist, and I'm hoping to sell it at a very small profit (making it a flipper, I guess, or a flopper). There were a couple minor problems with it when I got it, which means I had a bit of work to do to get it up to my high standards before trying to sell it. One thing I can't and don't want to fix is the presence of a few small dings on the top and on the headstock. The way it see it, these give it character. Plus, I have no idea how one would go about fixing those.
The guitar came with a plastic nut and saddle, and while I have no intention of chiseling out the nut and making a new one to install, I did pull out the crappy saddle and upgrade to a bone saddle, with what I believe is a much better profile.
The strings were cutting into the top of the original saddle a bit, so this seemed like a natural upgrade. Note that the notch cut into the bottom of both saddles is an unfortunate consequence of a factory-installed under-saddle piezo pickup. The pickup sits too high in the saddle slot, so I really had to work the underside of the new saddle to make sure that it sits evenly over the entire length of that pickup. Annoying.
It is nice having a pickup in the guitar, though, I think that makes this thing a bit more interesting to play, especially when I have to get up on stage and rock out. Aside from the saddle replacement, I also thought it would be a good idea to dress the frets and adjust the neck a bit to make it play more like a classical guitar and less like an electric. I figure if people want a nylon-stringed instrument, they're going to want relatively high action so they can really pull some sound out of the thing. But if they don't like that, they can always adjust the neck back down. I don't really care what they do after they buy it! Ha. Oh, finally, the stupid people over at the factory somehow thought I'd want to tie my guitar strap to the headstock, so they didn't bother installing a strap button on the neck side of the body, or in the heel.
I had to do that for them. Since it's a cutaway, I went with the heelcap position rather than the underside of the heel. Very clever of me, so as to allow for full use of all those extra frets on the body! (note that the previous owner seems to have considered putting a button on, so there are two pin-point blemishes on the underside of the heel - bad form, don't you think?) Anyhow, that's all the news that's fit to print today. Most of it's probably not even fit to print. But if you're in the area, and looking for a mighty nice guitar at a reasonable price, let me know. I'm not even charging for the time I've invested in this guitar, that's how nice I am!
First off, Mrs. Anderson would have us avoid the use of "kind of," apparently because it lacks specificity. I still use the phrase occasionally, despite the 9th-grade warnings against its dangers. Here's the theme of the week: guitar rehab. See, I bought this guitar on craigslist, and I'm hoping to sell it at a very small profit (making it a flipper, I guess, or a flopper). There were a couple minor problems with it when I got it, which means I had a bit of work to do to get it up to my high standards before trying to sell it. One thing I can't and don't want to fix is the presence of a few small dings on the top and on the headstock. The way it see it, these give it character. Plus, I have no idea how one would go about fixing those. 
The guitar came with a plastic nut and saddle, and while I have no intention of chiseling out the nut and making a new one to install, I did pull out the crappy saddle and upgrade to a bone saddle, with what I believe is a much better profile. 
The strings were cutting into the top of the original saddle a bit, so this seemed like a natural upgrade. Note that the notch cut into the bottom of both saddles is an unfortunate consequence of a factory-installed under-saddle piezo pickup. The pickup sits too high in the saddle slot, so I really had to work the underside of the new saddle to make sure that it sits evenly over the entire length of that pickup. Annoying. 
It is nice having a pickup in the guitar, though, I think that makes this thing a bit more interesting to play, especially when I have to get up on stage and rock out. Aside from the saddle replacement, I also thought it would be a good idea to dress the frets and adjust the neck a bit to make it play more like a classical guitar and less like an electric. I figure if people want a nylon-stringed instrument, they're going to want relatively high action so they can really pull some sound out of the thing. But if they don't like that, they can always adjust the neck back down. I don't really care what they do after they buy it! Ha. Oh, finally, the stupid people over at the factory somehow thought I'd want to tie my guitar strap to the headstock, so they didn't bother installing a strap button on the neck side of the body, or in the heel. 
I had to do that for them. Since it's a cutaway, I went with the heelcap position rather than the underside of the heel. Very clever of me, so as to allow for full use of all those extra frets on the body! (note that the previous owner seems to have considered putting a button on, so there are two pin-point blemishes on the underside of the heel - bad form, don't you think?) Anyhow, that's all the news that's fit to print today. Most of it's probably not even fit to print. But if you're in the area, and looking for a mighty nice guitar at a reasonable price, let me know. I'm not even charging for the time I've invested in this guitar, that's how nice I am!
