Acoustic/Electric Pickup Problem

Hi, this is my first post, and it's because I have a slight problem on my hands! I started playing acoustic guitar in February, and have since purchased my own guitar, an Acoustic/Electric Applause by Ovation. Well, after some time playing, and playing with other peoples guitars, I noticed that my action seemed really high. I am beginning to learn to fingerpick, and mostly strum with my thumb and stay away from harder picks. So I decided I would adjust my action by fileing down the little bar under the strings on the body of the guitar. So I took my strings off, and went to pull it up, and when I did, little metal plates fell to the ground! There were two metal plates that went the length of the bar, 1 plastic bar that had 6 little metal/plastic rectangle pieces in it (2 of which fell out, but I was able to put them in, thanks to the 4 that were left, I was able to tell which way they went in, as one side was a silver metal plate and the other was a copper/brass/broze metal plate) I had no idea the pickup's were located here, and I didn't know that all this stuff would come apart when I took off the bar, I figured it would be straight forward and I would be able to just file it down on a flat surface with sandpaper. Anyways, there was a U shaped metal piece that wrapped around the bottom-side of the bar, and it had a metal thin plate running down the interior of it, which was connected to a piece of wire going into the guitar. The wire was soldered in such a way that there was a gap between the U and that bar, So I figured that the plastic piece with the 6 little metal/plastic pieces inside it went between the U and the bar. My question is, how does this plastic piece lay inside there? Does the silver side of the 6 metal/plastic pieces face towards the U or the metal bar? Also, the 2 long metal bars do not fit inside the U, so I believe those are the shims which were underneath the U, which I would have had to remove to lower my action. I do not have an amplifier so I cannot plug it up to test the sound, although I have hooked it up to an amp before and it had amazing sound. Thank you for your help!

You have demonstrated, in gut-wrenching detail, how dangerous a little knowledge can be.

Ovation guitars have a special piezo pickup built into the bridge saddles (the bits that fell out of the guitar) that really should not be messed around with. :eek: Ooops!

Don't do anything more to it. Get all the pieces of it into the hands of a competent tech ASAP!

Originally posted by Lordathestrings
You have demonstrated, in gut-wrenching detail, how dangerous a little knowledge can be.

LMFDAO!!!!!!! i couldnt have put it better - there was another quote in this forum which would describe this as "the sound of the hammer, hitting the nail right on the head" LOL!!