peterman acoustic guitar piezo pickup system demonstration DIY

[petermanohw]

The pickup you are describing is a piezo wire that runs the length of your bridge. These pickups rely on physical contact with the bridge to generate sound, it is extremely important that there is contact all along the wire. If there is any part that is uneven and doesn't have full contact you will loose the sound!!!!!!

You must somehow ensure that the entire length of the bridge is contacting evenly!

(this is not easy) you could try cutting some slots in the bottom of the bridge seperating eac

[baronsting]

I have a dean markley 12 string which has the elan piezo pickup and I have the high b string which does not sound. And I wondered how can a pickup which runs under the entire bridge sound all but two strings. Do you think it could be a fracture? I am a woodworker and can replace it but I just wondered your opinion on this matter. I have a special show in december that I need this guitar working (friends coming out of state to play with me). Thanks so very much. Mark

[booksbrown]

nice demonstration. you do a great job of showing the different potentials of the pickup. thanks

[mrfickystingers]

hi peter,watched your video,great stuff,i actually fitted a passive dual transducer to one of my acoustic guitars with great results,but now i want to fit a pre amp to another one,i'm pretty sure how to do it apart from the wire that goes along the top of the bridge under the bridge saddle,i think i would have to glue it then reduce the bridge saddle to compensate and glue that but i'm not sure what the best glue would be to use,any ideas?.

[petermanohw]

@mrfickystingers Hi , This sound a lot like a "under saddle pickup to me!!!! Gluing is a good idea, however these coaxial piezo wires that they use for these pickups are tricky. Unless you can get perfectly even pressure all the way under the bridge, you will get dead strings.. There are many different ways that people have tried to overcome this problem, some more successful than others.

[petermanohw]

@petermanohw continued: I would probably try and semi cut the saddle into six sections (not all the way through but enough to equalise the pressure, so that each string is pressing down onto the piezo wire. Tricky........

Peter

[TheLeerain]

@petermanohw hi great video and great product what amp are you going through as the pickup sounds really acoustic when i add a piezo or like yours proberbly not as good as yours but souns really electric which i dont like but i think could be my amp even though it is a acoustic amp so what amp do you go through cheers

[570RY73113R]

Great vid.

[20drummer09]

Would I be able to mount something like this on the inside of an acoustic guitar and get a good sound for permanent use? Possibly using a multi-pickup harness? Thanks.

[kike419]

tanks man

[billm90]

I have one of these from mean markley

[forestfairness]

aloha,have you ever heard of one of those pickups being used on a flute or recorder or wind instrument????...where would it be mounted....mahalo, forest

[cossatotfalls]

my guitar got balls lol

[DiHaRa94]

Great video! but i have 1 question.....is the pickup connected to a computer??(u said something like that)

[petermanohw]

Only to record the sound as the camera does'nt have an audio input!!

[puddingkatapult]

good intro to piezo pickups :-)

i noticed that piezos differ strongly in price, but where are the differences in quality?

does it make sense to install a piezo on a solid body guitar? if so, where should it be placed?

[petermanohw]

Thanks, well the price difference is because the Dual pickup uses two pickups, but the sound isn't necessarily twice as good, it just adds that extra bottom end.

Not really suited for a solid body as it has no sound board. all you would get is a bit like the sound it makes unplugged, useless for live work. could be interesting for recording capturing some of those Ghost tones from the timber...

I haven't really tried it!!

Peter

[arthur84]

@puddingkatapult Bridge piezos are best for solid body acoustics, since there is much less resonance at any distance from the bridge. Sticking it directly to the bridge should work well. Most solid body acousic guitars aren't really solid anyway, they have resonance chambers machined into the body, under the soundboard.

[LemmyJonez]

EXCELLENT SIR!.. i've learned a lot from this thanx a lot! yeaaaah!

[aaronentresz]

Just bought one for my old archtop yay!

[BoxCubeSquare]

Sounds good.

[lazrpo1nt3r]

Wow, the strap piece was a very good idea! I was wondering how this would have worked, and it sounds great.