Who stole the bass?

[MexicoMike]

Pulled my GS-5-12 out of it's case today - hadn't played it in about two weeks - strummed one chord and WHOA, it was so shrill it almost made my ears bleed.  It was as if there were no bass strings on the guitar at all.

At first I wondered if the high-frequency range of my hearing had suddenly improved but, realizing that's pretty much unlikely, I then pulled out my 414ce and my HD28 and they both sounded perfectly normal.

I was using the same pick on the 12 that I always use and the strings are elixirs about 5 weeks old.  The guitar sounded fine when I last played it.  There must be some obvious answer but at this moment, it is literally unplayable sound-wise. It sounds like a cheap stereo where you turned down all the bass and cranked up all the treble. The only changeable thing is the strings (elixirs) but it's hard to imagine they have suddenly lost all the bass.  But I guess I'll change the strings and see what happens.

I have heard acoustic guitars sound different on different days due to weather/humidity changes but never anything this dramatic.  THe rel humidity is quite low - around 30% - but again, the 414 and the HD both sound like they always do.  The guitars have humidifiers in their cases and they are always in the cases when not being played.

Weird…

[stepchildusmc]

darn it mike !!! i got all excited because i thought this was gonna be a fishing thread !!!!

[MexicoMike]

Sorry for the confusion.  No members of the order Perciformes are lost, missing, or were harmed in relation to my GS-5.  Two nights ago at the sushi bar…well, that's a different story. 

Re the guitar - wife agrees it sounds "terrible."  I'm thinking now that it's humidity related though why the other two guitars sound normal and the 12 doesn't, I have no clue.

[MikeB]

Do you have a hygrometer in the case?  Although a drop in humidity should not make that drastic change in the sound, it might have other repercussions - such as the bridge lifting so that the saddle is not making good contact with the soundboard.

[MexicoMike]

The humidity is around 29% here but the guitar was in the case with a humidifier.  I don't have a hygrometer in the cases. The guitar looks perfectly OK - crown on back and soundboard, no depressions, no lifting of the bridge, etc.  IOW, it doesn't LOOK like it was exposed to low humidity for a lengthy period but I put another humidity thingie in the case so we'll see.

[mgap]

The humidity is around 29% here but the guitar was in the case with a humidifier.  I don't have a hygrometer in the cases. The guitar looks perfectly OK - crown on back and soundboard, no depressions, no lifting of the bridge, etc.  IOW, it doesn't LOOK like it was exposed to low humidity for a lengthy period but I put another humidity thingie in the case so we'll see.

I have pretty low humidity here, in the coldest months of the year it is about 23RH.  So I put two humidifiers in each case plus have a hygrometer in the case.  I have a between the string Oasis humidifier  in the sound hole, plus I have a travel soap box humidifier up by the headstock.  This has kept the RH at about 45-47RH at all times. 
Over the past years I have tried to humidify the entire room.  This was a lot of work.  On some days I would put up to 4 gallons of water in the air and it was still a struggle to keep the humidity up to a reasonable RH.  My guitars constantly needed TR tweaks and in general the guitar sound changed. 

I would strongly urge you to monitor your RH in the case and keep it up to 45%.  Since doing this with my guitars I have had no problems with fret buzz, necks that needed adjusting, and tone that has changed.  I don't have to put in nearly the effort to keep the RH correct either.  Refilling the humidifiers is done only every 5 to 7 days.  Now that is a real time saver as well.

[MexicoMike]

Thanks for the suggestion - I'll add hygrometers to the cases.  I've kept the in cases after deciding some years ago that room humidifiers were too much of a hassle.  But I had never put hygrometers in the guitar cases though my violin case has one.