Alexander Kobel reported:

In the example below the tie positioning is not quite what I'd expect to be the favourite option (on 2.13.11). [N.B. the appearance is the same with 2.12.3 and 2.13.21. PH]

It's about chords with large intervals in between, where the tie can be fitted into the space between note heads. This looks strange when the inner ties exceed the range of the outer ties of the chord. For stem-up chords, a simple workaround is adding transparent notes to the chord, to block the empty space in between. For stem-down chords, I'd prefer the tie (between the c'') to be a mirrored version of the bottom tie (between the a'), i.e. attached to the center of the left note head instead of either the left or the right side of it; this I could not achieve with an additional note.

Would it be sensible to crop the range of interior ties to the union of the extents of the outer ties in general?

\relative c'' { <g d g,>4~ <g d g,> <g d b g>4~ <g d b g> <g d g,>4~ <g d b g> <g d g,>4~ <g d \tweak #'transparent ##t b g>

<a' c, a>4~ <a c, a> <a e c a>4~ <a e c a> <a e c a>4~ <a c, a> <a \tweak #'transparent ##t e c a>4~ <a c, a> }

Another examples from this thread: http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/lilypond-user/2011-07/msg00049.html

% ---------------8<-------------------- \version "2.14.1"

\score { \new Staff { 8. ~ 8 } } % ---------------8<--------------------

Another example:

% ---------------8<-------------------- \version "2.14.1"

\relative c'' { \time 2/4 d16 d8. ~ d8 d % both sets of ties in chords look icky d16 8. ~ 8 d \tieUp
d16 8. ~ 8 d } % ---------------8<--------------------