Baby Taylor vs Little Martin

[Sweetpea44]

I'm thinking of getting a 3/4 used guitar and restringing to CGDAEE to create a tenor. Looks like the popular acoustic mini guitars are Baby Taylor and Little Martin. Ive read several reviews on both and they seem to have their own pros/cons:

BT- wood top, but people have problems keeping in tune
LM- no wood (laminate), but people say it sounds better and good quality

Both appear to have the same used price on local Craigslist ads. Does anyone out there have experience with either? Thanks!

[the_polish_mandolinist]

Ive owned both. I never liked playing the Baby Taylor because the tone was not too great. Luckily, the Taylor was stolen out of our truck, so we bought a Baby Martin, which sounds a LOT better. It is laminate, but perhaps this gives a better sound for a guitar of such small size. Its the perfect size for travelling and fits in overhead storage on a plane.

[bratsche]

Can't speak for the Little Martin, but I converted a Baby Taylor to an octave mandolin and think it has great tone (I got one of the early US made mahogany ones). Also, I've had no problems at all keeping it in tune, but I put really good tuners on it. (Perhaps the originals aren't that great?)

bratsche

[Steve Lavelle]

I had a BT for about 6 years. The tuners were not that good, but I finally figured out that the secret to getting better tone out of it was to use heavier strings. I ended up using a set with 14s on the high E string. My brother has the LM and uses lighter strings, and it has better overall balance of tone.

[Sweetpea44]

Can't speak for the Little Martin, but I converted a Baby Taylor to an octave mandolin and think it has great tone (I got one of the early US made mahogany ones). Also, I've had no problems at all keeping it in tune, but I put really good tuners on it. (Perhaps the originals aren't that great?)

bratsche

I saw your thread with this conversation - beautifully done!

[Sweetpea44]

I think with the tuning I want to do, I would need something similar with the E. I didn't really know what to do with the sixth slot, hence the double E's. I figured that would be less tension than NST with a G there.

[bruce.b]

I've thought about getting a Taylor GS Mini to convert to a tenor guitar. My brother has one (not converted) and it's really nice. The neck is a bolt on so you could go all the way and have a new neck made for it. Various people have asked Taylor if they'd consider making a GS Mini tenor and they said no, it's not a big enough market for them to do it.

[Paul Kotapish]

FWIW, I recently compared a Baby Taylor and a Little Martin at local guitar shop and was favorably impressed with both. Each was well made, played well, and had a pleasant sound. I would characterize the Taylor tone as more silvery/brilliant and the Martin as more mellow/woody. I'm sure there is a lot of variance between individual guitars within each model, but the consensus among the group was that the Taylor was the "punchier" guitar. In fact, one of the guys went back in the morning and bought it for his son to learn on. I'm guessing that with a solid top, the Taylor is one more likely to develop more overtones and a bigger sound as it is played, but that discussion is a whole other can of worms.

[multidon]

Remember that the LM is not made of traditional laminate as in plywood but their HPL high pressure laminate which is really kind ol like chopped up wood mixed with resin then laminated to a plastic picture of wood similar to masonite or your typical kitchen countertop. They are the only manufacturer I am aware of using such a material to make a guitar. And they are made in two different versions with a solid wood top or all HPL. That being said I own one that is all HPL and it sounds way better thsn it has a right to. I use it for a knock around no worries travel guitar and it excels at that.

[MarkF786]

I have my Taylor GS Mini tuned to NST (CGDAEG) and it sounds great. I'm tempted to see if I can get the G tuned up to an A or B buy using an alternate string.

I'm currently using either the Pearse NST strings or the "official" NST strings; both sound great. I've also ordered custom sets of Elixir strings for NST, which I've used on other guitars.

[mandobassman]

Can't speak for the Little Martin, but I converted a Baby Taylor to an octave mandolin and think it has great tone (I got one of the early US made mahogany ones). Also, I've had no problems at all keeping it in tune, but I put really good tuners on it. (Perhaps the originals aren't that great?)

bratsche

I once read that it is hard to make a bad sounding octave mandolin. After I read that, I went about turning a really bad sound small guitar into a octave and, even to my surprise, it sounds wonderful. Having said that, I owned a Baby Taylor for a short time and it was a terrible sounding guitar. I put a couple different sets of good strings on it and it sounded thin, flat and lifeless. Not to mention the intonation was terrible. I saw that conversion you did and it sounded very good. Maybe my Taylor was just a bad one, and it was really bad, but if I was looking for a small guitar to convert to a tenor, I'd go with the Martin.

[Beanzy]

I've no idea about the taylor but the Little Martin tenor I bought is excellent, as long as I stick to the CGDA tuning or BF#C#G# for some tunes.

Rather than bothering with the conversion could you not just get a Tenor version 2nd hand?
Some people have bought them thinking they'd be ok for tuning like an octave mandolin and they report them as souding a bit dead. So you could have a potential source of 2nd hand ones there.
If you go for guitar spacing between strings rather than tenor guitar spacing you may have issues trying to cleanly fret while doing the longer stretches for some of those 7th's. (I've got fat fingers so my perspective may be a little different).

[icuker]

I'm curious, so you would tune it in fifths across all six strings? Would that make it difficult to play chords or does it become a melody instrument mainly at that point?

[Sweetpea44]

I didn't realize Martin made a tenor .... I mainly hear people discuss the Blueridge models.

[Beanzy]

Yep its the LXM T but they also do a beautiful "Seth Lakeman" signature series tenor which is all mahogany.

Like I say some people wanted to use octave mandolin tuning on the HPL one like I have, and the reports were it doesn't seem to have had good results, however in the CGDA tuning it's really good to play.

[mikeyes]

Martin made an LXM Tres for a while too. It is possible to convert one of those and I suspect that if you find one you'll get it very cheaply (as they were cheaper than the guitar or tenor guitar to begin with) but be aware very few were sold.

The Martin LX1 "Little Martin" has a solid top and is $300 at musicians friend. (http://www.musiciansfriend.com/guita...coustic-guitar)

[MarkF786]

I'm curious, so you would tune it in fifths across all six strings? Would that make it difficult to play chords or does it become a melody instrument mainly at that point?

I've since done some experimenting and have found CGDAEA (a fourth between the 1st and 2nd) is best for chords. It feels very natural for playing chords - more so than NST - and it sounds wonderful. I think this is how I'll keep the guitar tuned.

[mmcadory]

http://www.smallguitars.com looks like it might have some candidates in the price/size/quality range I'd be comfortable experimenting on.