The guy on the phone told me that the Taylor's always come with Elixers and that they always sound good, but could try my idea anyway.

Needless to say, I've gotten the impression from him that this is a bad idea.

I am going to to do it anyway.

However, I am curious. Have any of you tried this or any other brand of strings with Taylor Guitars? If so, what have been the results?

And does Leo Kottke use Elixers on his Taylor 12-string? For some reason, I can't explain, I can't immagine Leo using Elixers. Read somewhere a long time ago that he doesn't care what kind of strings he uses. Is this true?

Speaking of 12-strings, when I recieved my Martin (as a gift)I was also given a set of Elxers for 12-sting I like the strings that are on now and am not in a hurry to change them. Are Elixers good for Martin 12-strigs?

I think it is a matter of personnal taste, and that the debate is not Elixir vs others but coated vs uncoated strings.

To be honest, nothing sounds as good as a fresh, newly installed uncoated string.
BUT, after a few days, the uncoated string sounds as good as the coated string and maintains that not-excellent-but-very-good sound for weeks, while uncoated string go down quickly.

There are no hard and fast rules as to which strings to use - try them all and stick with the ones YOU like !

As far as I know, Elixir and D'Addario use completely different concepts for their coated strings.

Elixirs take a premade wound string and "shrink wrap" the whole thing with a layer of teflon.
This layer starts to fray and go fuzzy - eventually you find lengths of teflon tubing loose on your strings. (I know this is true for the original Elixirs - I don't know if that is still true for the later "Nano" version of the strings).

D'Addario, on the other hand, coat the (phosphor)bronze metal BEFORE it is wound around the steel core - a major difference to Elixirs. The good point is that you don't get big areas of coating coming off like a bad dose of leprosy !