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  #1  
Old 10-04-2021, 11:42 AM
Monk of Funk Monk of Funk is offline
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Default Distortion on Taylor pickups

I have a Taylor with expression system 2. The battery died yesterday, so I went and replaced it. Put a new battery in it, and went and played it, and all of a sudden I was getting some distortion out of my pickups.

The distortion wasn't constant. It sometimes disappeared, then I'd hit certain notes and it would come back, but this wasn't consistent. Like sometimes some notes would trigger it and sometimes they wouldn't. The distortion sounded a lot like digital clipping distortion.

There is a switch on the board in the body of the guitar that selects between pickup options and the distortion appears for both settings. I looked at the inside of the guitar and everything looks fine aside from maybe a little bit of dust.

My endpin does turn a little, but that doesn't look like it should make any difference when I see how it's connected.

Also, the distortion will appear, even if the gain of the Taylor is set to zero. So, I don't hear any sound, but it looks like the vibration of the guitar will still create distortion.

Any ideas on what it could be, or how to further troubleshoot the problem?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
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  #2  
Old 10-04-2021, 11:53 AM
pieterh pieterh is offline
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No idea what could be causing the distortion but maybe if we know the whole signal chain. Maybe the new battery (or battery connection) is bad and is causing odd signal issues.

Incidentally, the internal switch on the ES2 has nothing to do with pickup choices - there is only one source with the ES2, the switch is a polarity switch which flips the signal and is useful to tame potential feedback issues…
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Old 10-04-2021, 12:13 PM
Monk of Funk Monk of Funk is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by pieterh View Post
No idea what could be causing the distortion but maybe if we know the whole signal chain. Maybe the new battery (or battery connection) is bad and is causing odd signal issues.

Incidentally, the internal switch on the ES2 has nothing to do with pickup choices - there is only one source with the ES2, the switch is a polarity switch which flips the signal and is useful to tame potential feedback issues…
oh I didn't know that lol. Thanks for the info. Could maybe be the battery connection issue. Is there a way I could test for that?

I had to cut my battery holder in order to accommodate larger batteries. Did that a couple years ago. Never had problems so far.

Distortion seems to come with louder playing.

There's no signal chain. Just guitar straight into interface. Tried 2 different cables.

Could be a battery thing. Distortion sounds like it might be the right sort for that. I will try padding behind the battery more to force a stronger connection.

Tapping on the battery door did cause similar distortion.
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Old 10-04-2021, 12:31 PM
Monk of Funk Monk of Funk is offline
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Here's maybe a weird question. Can a battery be bad in that sense?

I tried putting the old battery back, and it got some of it's mojo back juice-wise, but the signal was nice and clean. No distortion. So, the new battery is giving distortion? They are the same brand, and came in the same package.

Is that possible? Or is something else at play here?
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  #5  
Old 10-09-2021, 11:43 AM
Monk of Funk Monk of Funk is offline
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I tried a different battery, and the problem has gone away. Really weird.
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