Pickups
Our breakthrough pickup design spawned this guitar. Vintage sweetness together with the power to drive an amp gives you the best of both worlds, plus some fresh sounds that¹ll lead you to a world of your own.
It was one of those "Eureka!" moments. We'd been pushing the envelope hard on magnetic pickup design for some time, working on a more "electric" version of our hybrid T5. But these new pickups had such distinctive character they called out for a new type of guitar. Definitely a solid body.
Our unique humbuckers balance the sweetness of a vintage pickup sound — where you hear the woods and the ways the guitar is responding to the player — with the power to fully drive an amp without being super hot and overpounding it. No matter what your electric pickup of choice has been, these pickups will appease your sonic cravings, plus dish out some new tonal flavors with the help of our combo settings and tone controls.
Choose from two different versions of Taylor electric humbucker:
Style 1 (Classic, Custom models). Don¹t let the slightly smaller, 3/4-size fool you. This full-output humbucker is punchy, dripping with tone, and will keep up with every type of player.
Style 2 (Standard models). Our full-size humbucker lives large, unleashing raw rock power and great sustain without sacrificing balance or great tone.
Style 1 | Style 2
Bridge
Another fully original design, our sleek, all-aluminum bridge looks great, feels even better, and it's ultra-adjustable. Once you lock it down it holds perfect intonation and makes those strings sing — or wail — in your hands.
Designed entirely from scratch, our all-aluminum bridge solves the intonation drift and ergonomic problems that often plague other electric bridges. The bridge height can be adjusted both front-to-back and side-to-side. Each of the strings sits in its own saddle, and once the intonation is set, the saddles are locked in place with screws located discretely under the bridge (accessible from the back). Once everything is locked down, you can take the strings off without the saddles moving, maintaining precise intonation. We also tweaked the perfect break angle for the strings, so that no matter where each individual saddle is positioned, it maintains the perfect amount of downward pressure and string length for easy playing and great tone. And we specially contoured the bridge to give it a curvy, ultra-smooth feel; your picking hand will be happy to camp out there.
1 | 2 | 3
Neck
We wrote the book on straight, easy-playing necks. Our innovative T-Lock™ neck joint brings Taylor's trademark consistency and comfort into the solid body player's hands.
Taylor's golden heritage of easy-playing, superbly intonated necks continues with the single-bolt T-Lock™ joint first used on the T5. Like the NT neck, a precisely milled pocket spacer is used to dial-in the perfect neck angle. As the neck is bolted in place, it pulls both down and back toward the bridge for perfect alignment and stability. It¹s simple to put on or take off to switch out spacers for angle adjustment. The contouring makes the neck feel and look great, especially up by the body. There¹s no heel, and the asymmetrical curve where it meets the body creates a smooth aesthetic line that flows into the cutaway. You never hear about people having to play a bunch of Taylor acoustics to find a good neck. They¹re all spot on. Same deal here.
Controls
Tone control is the Holy Grail for an electric player. From our five-way pickup switch to our original control knobs, we¹ve given you more tone and made it easier to tweak it on the fly.
Five-Way Pickup Switch
The switch is laid out in a familiar way, with the neck pickup position located closest to the neck humbucker and the bridge position closest to the bridge pickup. In between the full, fat neck tone and the rockin¹ bridge tone, the middle settings give the Taylor electric its own distinctive voicings.
Position 1: Full neck pickup
Position 2: Inside coils of the neck and bridge pickups in parallel (skinny, funky neck tone)
Position 3: Full neck pickup with the inside coil of the bridge pickup (adds fatness and drives the amp a little harder for extra crunch)
Position 4: Inside coil of each pickup in series (creating the effect of a super-wide humbucker and producing a truly unique tone)
Position 5: Full bridge pickup
Tone Control
Tone controls on electric guitars are often along for the ride. Not ours.
The first two-thirds of the knob rotation acts like a traditional tone control. The last third, especially when all the way at the end, starts peaking the mids, yielding a killer nasal tone that resembles playing through a semi-cocked Wah-wah pedal. It¹s ideal for slide playing, or as a different tonal color for solos or throaty rhythm parts. The tone control together with the different pickup settings give you a whole new set of flavors to play with.
Knobs
Designed in-house, the knobs had to look uniquely cool, yet more importantly, feel good to the touch, and allow smooth tone-tweaking on the fly. They have a lip on the top, which makes them easy to roll in the moment. If your hands tend to get slick when you play, slip a rubber O-ring
(included) over the knob and you¹ll never lose your grip.
Design
Our innovative building methods allowed us to revamp both the look and sound of a solid body electric. From our blend of contouring with binding, to the use of spectacular woods for tops, to our refined use of tone chambers, Taylor electrics are truly one-of-a-kind.
Contours with Binding
Most electrics either have a hard edge with binding or sleek contouring.
We're able to integrate the two in a unique way, because of the way we inset the guitar top into the body. This enables us to define an edge with binding and then contour up to that edge. Our forearm and cutaway contours are comfortable and especially beautiful with elegant binding trim.
Ultra-exotic Tops
Insetting the top also allows us to use gorgeous, exotic woods (like walnut burl used in high-end furniture design or luxury cars) that otherwise can¹t be used on electrics; it would require carving up a thick slab, which would be insanely expensive with woods of this aesthetic value. An inset top means we can cut a much thinner slice of wood.
Tone Chambers
Chambering on electric bodies has been used primarily to lighten the body weight. We¹ve applied our acoustic expertise to chambering in order to create the optimal acoustic "bloom." This enhances sustain, which is otherwise hard to create on an electric when everything is locked down.
Fused String Ground
Even reckless rock 'n' rollers have to respect the "blue spark" effect of getting shocked when grabbing the mic at a venue with improper ground. We designed a fused string ground (wired to the switch plate inside the guitar), so that in the event of faulty ground or funky wiring, the 5-milliamp fuse will fry instead of you. If the fuse blows, your guitar will still play, but it may be susceptible to more noise until you can replace it, which is easy to do, especially since you won¹t be in the hospital.
