New owner of a Megatar, technical assistance

[Seraph87]

I recently bought a used megatar off the net. At once, I noticed the action seemed excessively high for a tapping instrument, and as such I took it to a shop.

They, however, apparently had no idea what to do with this beautiful beast of mine, and I fear they may have botched the adjustments.

As it stands, the action at the top, near the dampener, is maybe 1/4'th of an inch between fret and string. As it goes down, it keeps increasing to maybe half an inch once I hit the 15 fret mark. Is this too much? Im pondering taking it again.


Another problem I seem to have is the fact that the melody notes seem to have off tune harmonics built into them, specially the lighter strings.

This is really frustrating to me , as Im attempting to learn this but I find that I have to really mash on those melody strings to get any sound out of them.

Any input will be GREATLY appreciated, can provide pictures if requested.

[rjgoos]

Half an inch at fret 15? That would be hard to imagine.

I guess there would be a few possible explanations:

1. The bridge adjustment pieces needed to be lowered, a lot.
2. The neck needs adjustment badly.
3. Assuming it has a bolt-on neck, something is wrong with that, bolts were loosened or somehow got loosened, causing the entire neck to move with the tension of the strings.
4. The neck has warped.

Regarding point 1, it's pretty easy to look at the bridge and tell if the bridge pieces can be lowered.

Regarding point 2,
If you have a spring clamp-type guitar capo (the kind that reaches in from the side and doesn't wrap around the entire neck), capo one of the set of strings at fret 1 or 2, and hold a string down to fret 24 or 25. Look at the distance between the string and fret 12. Is there a gap? There really shouldn't be a gap.

Regarding 3, I had a 12-string guitar in the 70's (every hippy did) where the neck was a bolt-on, and somehow there was a problem with bolt-on mechanism, and the entire neck would move with the tension of the strings. But, how to diagnose or fix that in your case, I don't know.

Anyone else have a suggestion?

[traktor]

I cannot tell what is true from the info given, but something is horribly wrong.

The distance between string and fret near the nut should be measured in a few thicknesses of a sheet of paper. NOT 1/4"!

The distance between string and fret at fret twelve should be in the neighborhood of the thickness of a US penny.


Perhaps you should send it to us in the factory? It sounds fairly unplayable as you describe it.


I don't know what's been done to it, but whatever it was, it was about as wrong as it gets.

It is also pretty much certain that the 'in tune' advantage of the Buzz Feiten Intonation System has been lost, as it would be unlikely to survive the radical change that's been made on the instrument.

I'm sorry that the 'shop' didn't have the foresight to at least call us.


-- Traktor

[Seraph87]

It seems the US penny rule applies to my second fret, not my twelfth...

Im adding some pictures, but as it stands im probably going to send it to the factory to see if it can be salvaged : (

Instrument
http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b154/boidi/SDC15895.jpg

Penny at 12'th
http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b154/boidi/SDC15909.jpg

Measuring tape at 12'th
http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b154/boidi/SDC15906.jpg

15'th
http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b154/boidi/SDC15898.jpg

[traktor]

Can't tell much from the photographs, except that it appears that the string is not actually 1/4" above frets near nut as first reported, though string looks darn high up the neck, and absolutely is too high above fret two, if that's where the penny is located.

Be happy to take a look at it. Probably can be set right.

Call us. Contact info given in full on megatar site.

-- Traktor