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Permalink Reply by Paul Craig on December 9, 2015 at 10:48am

Piezo's are so strong they still hum even in parallel. They don't act just like magnetic coil pickups do. Don't know about the series wiring yet, have heard that they don't sound as good as parallel but that is always according to someone's opinion. You can get rid of some hum by covering the piezo's top with hot glue or double sided tape once you get it/them placed where they sound best. With 2 disc's, you can place one in the bridge area and one on the bass side of the strings towards the neck to mix you overall tone or wire them to a 3-way toggle/blend pot.

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Permalink Reply by Rusty Summer on December 9, 2015 at 10:54am

I am going for simple so I will probably just stick with one! I really don't care too much about the hum.

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Permalink Reply by Paul Craig on December 9, 2015 at 11:13am

Try it in a few different places to see where it sounds best first, then attach with the hot glue and cover the top or use the double sided tape and cove the top with a piece. Should be fine. If your using a volume pot, most people start out with a A500k. I ended up using a A1meg volume with the piezo half way between the bridge and neck and just to the side of the low/bass string.

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Permalink Reply by jawbone on December 9, 2015 at 11:57am

I find that two piezos in parallel made them sound much better - in my opinion it took a lot of the "harshness" out of them and it's not much harder to place two.  I would often use a rod and a disc in parallel.  

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Permalink Reply by darryl kernaghan on December 9, 2015 at 11:26am

Not my own info,but i think it came from Ted Crocker,Piezo's,in series,apparently improve their ability to be played without the need for a pre amp up to a combination of 7,i've not tried that many myself though

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Permalink Reply by The Phrygian Kid on December 9, 2015 at 6:41pm

Putting a second one in parallel halves the impedance. You may have heard/read about the impedance mismatch between piezos and coils,? Well reducing the impedance is a very good thing, especially if you're wanting to plug up to stuff (amp, fx etc) which is designed/optimised for coil pickups. The magic number (7) which darryl is talking about is (according to Ted who is quite the pickup guru) the optimal number of times to halve the impedance.

Ps putting them in series doubles the impedance. Don't do this.
ps2 piezos don't 'hum' in the sense that we use that term for pickups at all! They definitely may buzz or feedback but 'hum' or 50-60hz interference is not ever an issue for piezos.
Best :)

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Permalink Reply by Cory LeBeau on December 16, 2015 at 8:36am

Damn the Kid still has it!Hey its Bonefrost,lost my password.

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Permalink Reply by Rusty Summer on December 10, 2015 at 5:19am

Thank you all for your input.  I just scored a whole bunch of old USB cables that are shielded and have 4 wires. I am going to use them to create a double piezo. I had already bought 20 piezo elements from cb gitty.  I am stoked to give this a try. Gotta finish the 3 acoustic builds for my kids before I do though. I plan on using this technique. 

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Permalink Reply by jawbone on December 10, 2015 at 7:55am

Hey Rusty - another little trick you can try  - you can cut the disc, with a pair of sissors, basically take a bit of the crescent off each side. Do this to two discs and hot glue them into a bridge. I think it helps get rid of some of the "handling" noise.

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Permalink Reply by Rusty Summer on December 10, 2015 at 8:31am

interesting. I think potting them with hot glue is supposed to accomplish the same thing.

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Permalink Reply by Jim Saraceno on December 15, 2015 at 3:46am

The main reason that I use two piezos in parallel is I found that when I used only one, I could get a good base sound or a good treble sound but not both. I mount them on the lid on either side of the bridge (inside the box) using hot glue. This seems to have the most well rounded sound in my opinion.

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Permalink Reply by Cory LeBeau on December 16, 2015 at 8:37am

Glad I found this thread,I completely forgot why I signed up today.Used to be Bonefrost,but lost my password.

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