Crafter HT-500 CE/N

TonyKgull,

Thank you for nice comments.
But I did have my doubts when I first got it home.
Yes I played in the shop a good five minutes, but I just wanted to get back home as soon as possible.
When I got it home and played it, thats the environment that I can best test and compare the guitar, it wasn't very loud, the sustain wasn't great, the overall tone/sound wasn't anything great.
Later in the evening when I had more time i checked the serial number, the guitar had been manufactured 11 months ago, I assume for all that time sat in a warehouse somewhere.
So removed the strings 12g they didn't look to bad, then wiped down the fretboard, followed by polishing the frets.
The fretboard and bridge were in real need of conditioning, so used the F1-oil, the first application was sucked up in a couple of minutes, so a second application was applied, that was a lot better, left it for 10 minutes then wiped off the excess, the fretboard and bridge now looked real good.
Polished the guitar body, then fitted a new set of 11g strings, I could tell on tuning the guitar up that it was going to sound a lot better. When the guitar was finally tuned I couldn't have been more pleased, the volume had increased, the sustain was great and the icing on the cake was the tone/sound was better than I could have expected.
One last point, I've put in a few hours of playing the guitar today and this may be hard to believe but the tone/sound quality have definitely improved today.
So will end by saying that I really like this guitar very much, and just to prove the point I've got a touch of sore fingers.

ancient1,

 Thanks for the nice comment. 

 Yes , somewhere in the past I've had about six Crafter Guitars,  slowly traded them away, but I just had to have another. 
They are not an expensive guitar but excellent value for money, well made, quality materials,  excellent tuners, nice tone what more could you ask for, yes  a Taylor Guitar.

Very nice guitar! Derick.

blues90,

My new Crafter guitar is the Orchestral Model smaller than the Grand Auditorium.

I can't find a video of the exact model of my new guitar, it's the same specification as the first video, and the same size as this video.

The first 2 or 3 days after you put new strings on -- depending on the strings and the guitar itself -- the sound will probably change a little bit each day.  This will happen until the strings "settle in."  After a few days, they sound should settle into what it's going to sound like for awhile until the strings start degrading. Then, once again, it will change but slowly over time.  How fast that happens depends on the type of strings.

Enjoy your new baby!  Over the next few years, depending on how much you play it (everything always depends on stuff!  Sheeesh! LOL ) she's just going to sound better and better too.

ancient1,

The one thing the comparison video didn't mention was.
If I came to sell my new crafter Guitar I would, get about a quarter of the price that I paid for it, the only way to get slightly more would be to trade it in for a more expensive guitar, but with a Taylor Guitar you should get about three quarters of the price back, and if kept in excellent condition after a few years, possibly more than what it was bought for.