Humidity Issues
The #1 enemy of acoustic guitars is lack of humidity. Dry weather, especially in winter months, can often times be devastating to the wood fibers of your acoustic guitar. Dry weather can leech out moisture, leaving the wood dry and brittle. We see tons of top, side and back cracks here at our shop from November through to May. Sometimes (though it is rare), we’ll fix one in August from some ones air conditioner drying a top out.

Preventing this is very simple. Leave the guitar in its case when you are not playing it, and include a guitar humidifier, properly filled, in the guitar while in its case.

“But, I have a humidifier installed on my furnace”, you say. That will just keep you from shocking your roommate when you shuffle your feet along the carpet. Guitars need to have a relative humidity of between 40-50% at 72 degrees. That is pretty humid, and very hard to maintain in a home. Even the best of humidifiers and most diligent owners may still find their guitars dried out in a particularly bad season, so practice on keeping them wet!

Most common problems associated with lack of humidity…
Top Cracks
Side and Back Cracks
Top sinking
Frets popping out of fingerboard
Fretboard warpage
Neck twisting

Most of these problems can be corrected and repaired, but sometimes we see stuff so hammered from dryness, that we can’t do anything short of replacing the top or neck.It’s simple, it’s avoidable, so keep you guitar wet.

Taylor guitars has an awesome section on guitar humidity at
http://www.taylorguitars.com/global/pdfs/greatest_hits.pdf
http://www.taylorguitars.com/global/pdfs/dry_guitar.pdf
http://www.taylorguitars.com/global/pdfs/seasonal_changes.pdf
http://www.taylorguitars.com/global/pdfs/winter_tale.pdf