cruisinon2

Very cool. All of his stuff on eBay seems to be silver finish...I'd be very interested in a gold finish one like yours. Does he have a separate website? Can't seem to find one anywhere...

You're never gonna be able to shave enough height from the nut to compensate for action that high. You'll just end up with strings buzzing on the lower frets. Its unlikely that this is the problem anyway. Nylon strings don't exert nearly as much force on the nut as steel strings. The nut should last decades unless it was cut improperly in the first place. I have a beautiful old Kohno nylon string that's 40+ years old with the original nut, and it's just fine. An acoustic that's been left sitting for an extended period of time could have all sorts of issues, depending on the conditions. An excessively dry environment will likely give you a significant forward bow, which would account for the high action. Too much humidity and the top may have swelled, raising the bridge and the action along with it. If you're not comfortable diagnosing the cause, take it to someone who is before you put axe to wood, or you might make things worse.

That's OK. I'm fairly certain he wasn't trying to be...;)

Rumors persist about a lefty Shuriken at some indeterminate point in the future. So if you're content with an oddly shaped shred-meister guitar with a 27" scale neck and a reverse headstock, then hang around a while longer and see if it actually happens. That's a pet project of the guy from 12 Foot Ninja, and involves another guitar company, though. If you're holding out for a lefty JTV or Standard, you're probably wasting your time. Theses guitars aren't exactly a household name as it is, and I seriously doubt there will ever be enough demand to justify the expense of tooling up the factory to make them. It's mind boggling that they're even considering it with the Shuriken, as even the righty version is already very genre-specific, and targeting a small demographic as it is. Otherwise your best option is gonna be buying a Standard, then having someone who knows what they're doing transplant the guts into the lefty guitar of your choice. It'll cost more obviously, but it can be done.

If mine had shown up that way, it would have gone back. I'd probably have overlooked, and/or remedied myself, any one of those issues...but together, imho that guitar should not have passed Q/C.

Lol...and it gets worse. So there is absolutely no consensus at all as far as pick choice. Awesome! ;) To sum up: If it works, use it. Toothpick, q-tip, chunks of garden mulch, shards of broken glass...

Well it doesn't have to be that exact one, obviously...I dunno, rounder picks don't cut it all for me for the acoustic stuff. Just sounds dead. To The OP...There you have it. Two polar opposite recommendations. The lesson here is that experimentation is the only way to find what you're after with these things. They're a bit quirky, and what works for one guy will be a disaster for the next.

No link handy, but a sharp pick (think Jazz III) and a light touch (probably a lot lighter than most are accustomed to), especially when strumming chords goes a long way towards getting a convincing acoustic tone.... but the biggest piece of the puzzle is running through some sort of FRFR speaker solution. If you're trying to coax a good acoustic sound out of a guitar cabinet, just give up now before you go insane. It's a losing battle. What makes an acoustic sound like what it is, are frequencies that guitar cabinets simply can't produce. End of story. Run, and run quickly. ;) As for the 11's, I play those anyway. The first thing I did when I unboxed my JTV was rip the 10's off before I played a single note. Couldn't swear that the heavier gauge makes it any better or worse, as it's all I've used.

As loathe as I am to resurrect an 8 month old conversation, I gave things a quick re-read, and I think I grasped the substance of the conversation just fine. I was responding to a post lamenting the lack of the "amp in the room" sound that seems to be an insurmountable hurdle for some who attempt the transition to modeling. With that in mind, I'm content to stand by what I said.

Well clearly someone pi$$ed in your Wheaties this morning, but it certainly wasn't me. And thank you for proving my point for me, albeit in a thoroughly obnoxious fashion. I didn't criticize you're opinion, nor your decision to voice it. Put your hands wherever you like...I couldn't care less. I merely expressed my opinion as to why you're not likely to see L6 produce this unit. Have a lovely day.

What it is, is lost cause. There just isn't enough interest at that price. The guitars themselves are $1K... less if you buy a Standard. Another thousand to hear it? It's like selling someone a car, and then telling them the steering wheel is an extra $30K. Aside from a handful of touring pros who might want one, and the occasional well-off weekend warrior, they'd sit on warehouse shelves forever.

Baby steps...;)

I won't be happy unless the next Helix iteration can clean toilets and file my taxes...

Batteries suck. End of story. Use the cable.

That's a capital crime in Ireland, isn't it? ;)

You don't, really. Piezos are a different animal. They're very sensitive, and they're picking up resonances from the string, the bridge itself, the saddle it's sitting in, etc... no two guitars will be identical in that respect, and it's at least part of the reason that some Variaxes suffer from the dreaded "piezo plink" while others don't. And, palm-muting with high gain tends to make it worse. Some of it may be mitigated with a good set up, as even a little fret buzz that would likely be inaudible with mag pickups, will tend to slap you in the face with piezos. Unfortunately, a lot of it boils down to "did I get a good one"?

EVERY time you change the way you're listening, you can expect a change in tone... sometimes a drastic change. Headphones will never sound the same as an amp, or even another FRFR speaker solution. For one thing, they're right on top of your ears...there's no room acoustics to contribute to what you're hearing. But even if that weren't the case, no two amps, FRFR speakers, or even 2 different pairs is headphones will ever sound exactly the same. Just the way it is. The fact that you are happy with the tone through the Friedman indicates that there's nothing wrong with the gear, only that you'll habe you EQ things differently for each output method. It's the nature of the beast.

Got same thing happening on my low E and A string saddles. No discernable difference in sound as far as I'm concerned. Cheap plating, I suspect.

If studio direct works better, use it... forget the manual. That aside, no matter what output mode you choose, switching between studio monitors and a guitar amp will always result in massive tonal change. They have VERY different frequency responses, and any one patch will sound drastically different from one to the other. Patches need to be EQed differently for each monitoring method you use... sometimes much differently. It's really just trial and error until you find what works for you.

Sorry, but that's just plain wrong. Just because the low E is physically thicker, doesn't mean it exerts more force than any of the others. Look it up for yourself if you don't want to take my word it, but it's not an arguable point. D'Addario publishes tension charts for every set of strings they sell, which are all readily accessible on their website. For the set in question, the A string has more than 2 pounds more tension on it than the low E. Several of the other strings in that set also have more tension on them than the low E. This is not peculiar to D'Addario either... it's just the way it is for most sets of strings out there, with the exception of "balanced tension" sets, where a deliberate effort has been made to have the exact same amount of tension (very close to it, anyway) on every string when tuned to standard pitch.

If you're playing a lot of high gain, palm-muted stuff with the drop D alt tuning, you can have them ship you 100 guitars, and they're all gonna suffer from this. The problem is piezo crosstalk. Your hand creates a bridge across the strings when palm - muting, and vibrations from other strings (mostly the A) are being picked up by the low E piezo saddle, and detuned...hearing both the original note and the bleed through to the adjacent saddle with a ton of gain, and the result is an unusable mess. It's a problem with any tuning that is not applying the same correction to all strings, particularly the drop tunings. Those that are altering every string by the same interval generally work quite well, as cross talk is a non-issue. I use half step down all the time with no issues, but the drop tunings are useless. Bottom line is, the alt tunings are a compromise. Some work better than others, and are absolutely impacted by playing technique and gain. It's a limitation of the technology more than "defective" units, per se. Frankly, the tech as it currently exists just isn't ready for prime-time, imho. Good luck. Oh, and what's mentioned above about hearing the strings acoustically is absolutely an issue too... if you're not cranked loud enough to drown out the guitar itself, you're gonna hear both. Equally ugly, and it's a whole lot easier to hear the strings directly than you might think.

Actually, its not. The low E rarely has the most tension on it, and according to D'Addario's tension chart for that particular set, the A string has it beat by more than 2 pounds. I seriously doubt the amount of tension has anything to do with it anyway. But who knows? L6 ain't talkin'...The "plink" is likely to be a mystery until the end of time. Good luck.

Actually, its not. The low E is rarely The highest tension string, and according to D'Addario's tension chart for that particular set, the A string has it beat by more than 2 pounds. I seriously doubt the amount of tension has anything to do with it anyway. But who knows? L6 ain't talkin'...The "plink" is likely to be a mystery until the end of time. Good luck.

Just for my own morbid curiosity, what difference would it make if there were 10 or 10,000? They're extraordinarily unlikely to become collector's items no matter how many there are.

Magic 8 ball, Ouija board....