I have just purchased a second hand fender, and I noticed the strings were very high off the fret board. I tried making it lower by adjusting it with an allen key but now it is rattling on the pick ups. i tried to lower the pick ups, but it makes it sound horrible. Help!

>> I would not expect lowered pickups to sound worse than strings hitting the pickups. If your action is too low, the strings will rattle on the frets which kills the lower harmonics (they're the ones with the biggest string vibration, so they go first if the strings vibrate against things they shouldn't). This destroys the richness and sustain, giving you a thin, weedy sound.

Unfortunately, a high action and heavy strings gives the best tone, but most players find a compromise between this and what's comfortable to play. For me, I set it so there's no audible string rattle ACOUSTICALLY when played with medium picking strength. You can get away with a lower action by setting it for no audible string rattle when played ELECTRICALLY, but this is where you start to lose tone.

If you can't get a comfortable playing action, your guitar may need a professional set up, or even some minor repair work. You would normally adjust your bridge pickup to about 1.5 -2 mm below the strings when they're fretted at the top fret, then set the other pickup(s) for roughly equal volume when played through an amp with a clean sound, using "even" tone settings.