Taylor’s new Grand Pacific body shape unleashes a whole new sound in this amazing round shoulder dreadnought. Based on the award winning architecture of the V Class Bracing, this new guitar design redefines the tonal qualities one might normally associate with a Taylor guitar.
Inspired by traditional country and bluegrass recordings, master guitar builder Andy Powers set out to create a guitar with the warm and seasoned notes he’d grown accustomed to on the recordings. Based on the success of the V class bracing system, Andy wanted to create a guitar that appealed to variety of players that captured a sound that was new and familiar at the same time.
The waist of the guitar is slightly wider, making notes more round and whole and the guitar embraces lush, sonic overtones with a rich fidelity. Notes have longer sustain and more projection, while sounding more in tune. Whether you’re a strummer, a fingerstyle player, or jamming with others, the Grand Pacific will appeal to players of all styles.
Sapele back and sides complement the Sitka spruce top and evoke a sound that’s a nice, dry blend of mahogany with a touch of sparkle commonly found in rosewood. Black binding and Gemstone inlays round out this understated beauty with solid West African ebony fingerboard and bridge. The 317e comes equipped with stage ready Expression System 2 onboard, active electronics, and ships in a Taylor Deluxe Hardshell case.
How V-Class Works
A new platform to solve an age-old problem. While traditional X-bracing has stood the test of time for over 100 years, it creates an inherent trade-off between two key elements of an acoustic guitar's sound: volume and sustain. A guitar's top (the soundboard) contributes to both. Volume comes from the flexibility of the top while sustain comes from stiffness. The trade-off is that when you make something stiffer, you reduce its flexibility and vice versa. With an X-braced guitar top, increasing one comes at the expense of the other. V-Class bracing changes that. Now an acoustic guitar top can be both stiff and flexible in ways that produce more volume and sustain. And as it turns out, this innovative bracing design also improves the intonation of the guitar. Discover how Taylor broke away from tradition and reinvented what the acoustic guitar can do.
More Volume
V-Class guitar bracing controls the top's flexibility, creating a more orderly rocking motion across both sides of the top. The controlled flexing movement produces greater volume.
Longer Sustain
V-Class bracing maintains stiffness along the middle of the guitar, in the direction of the strings. That rigidity keeps the strings in motion, producing notes that resonate longer before fading out.
Better Intonation
V-Class bracing makes the top more in tune with the vibrating strings. This eliminates much of the interference that causes some notes to waer and sound slightly out of tune. As a result, notes and chords played anywhere on the neck are more consistent and in tune with each other.
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