Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Don Thompson on February 9, 2011 at 4:15pm

Magnetic pickup gets my vote.

Don

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Crimson Toad on February 9, 2011 at 5:02pm

Great discussion John...I'll be watchin this closely because i'm in the same quandry, and i take it a step further and wonder if you can mix both togeather or not...I'm thinking Don will have the answer to this as well...

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Glaze on February 9, 2011 at 5:39pm

John

 

I have mostly played electric guitar all of my life.  I have tried and use many of the high end pickups out there on the market made by Lindy Fralin, Tom Holmes, J.M. Rolph, and the Seymour Duncan custom shop.  I like vintage style magnetic pickups played through tube amps.

 

I also like the tone some of the guy's get with the piezo pickups through an amp on here, so I would have to say I like the sound of both.  Why not make your next CBG with both and wire it to work the way you want it to?

 

There is a member on here by the name of Juju who makes 3, 4 and six string pickups that sound really good in the video's he has of his builds and I mention him because they are worth checking out.    Juju's profile page is worth checking out for the pictures of his builds which are extremely impressive.  

 

You could also make your own pickup.  Jason Lollar has written the best book on making and winding pickups and you can find it on his website here(it was out of print, I do have a copy):        http://www.lollarguitars.com

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Glaze on February 9, 2011 at 6:12pm

Cameron

 

I know Suhr guitars was using the Fishman powerbridge with piezo pickups on the bridge itself.  They were using it this way on a Strat with magnetic pickups which is a complicated setup:

 

1- Neck 
2- Outside neck coil and middle 
3- Outside neck coil and outside bridge coil 
4- Inside bridge coil and middle 
5- Bridge 

Push-pull adds the bridge pickup to the 1 and 2 positions. 

Normally, position 3 would just be the middle pickup alone or it can be wired so you get both the neck and bridge humbuckers. 

The Fishman Powerbridge setup has a stereo jack and you'd need a stereo Y cable to get the piezo output and that signal can be sent to the Fishman Blender pedal for volume and EQ control.

Cameron Bleuer said:

Great discussion John...I'll be watchin this closely because i'm in the same quandry, and i take it a step further and wonder if you can mix both togeather or not...I'm thinking Don will have the answer to this as well...

 

 

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Crimson Toad on February 9, 2011 at 6:45pm

Glaze

Thanks...sounds pretty indepth for a beginner like me...I've been looking at the Lancaster pickups and thinking about trying a Swart tube amp...

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by David L. on February 9, 2011 at 11:16pm

Hi John,

I would add both using a 3 way switch so you get mag pup/ both / piezo options because if you decide to go magnetic to add the piezo will cost very little  (piezo disc and a 3 way switch).

To wire all you do is substitute the 2 piezo wires for one of the pickups in a standard diagram (check out wiring diagrams on the electronics group)

http://www.cigarboxnation.com/group/cbgwiringelectronics/forum/topi...

I like the Artec sound ones or seymour Duncan.

Depending upon how much you want to do you can leave it there or give the piezo a separate volume such as this

 

The reason is the disc will feedback at a lower volume than the magnetic so it gives you better control.  Tone pots don't do much to a piezo disc but if you preamp the piezo the preamp will give you tone control and a better piezo sound.  Again it seems hard to do but in reality you simply feed the piezo to the preamp and the preamp output to the 3 way in the above (omitting the piezo volume pot) and the mag pup is exactly the same.

CB Gitty sells a good cheap preamp https://www.cbgitty.com/cubecart/pre-amps/eq-7545r-pre-amp-unit/pro... (out of stock at the moment but for future reference) you can get them off ebay from China/HK for a bit less but you have the long delivery time. These are active and use a battery.  There are "passive" preamps which are a passive filter and do affect the tone of the piezo. At present cheapest from ebay and I am amazed at how great they are. They were discussed previously here http://www.cigarboxnation.com/group/cbgwiringelectronics/forum/topi...  I have bought several from here Ihttp://cgi.ebay.com/Acoustic-Guitar-Piezo-Pickup-Passive-Preamp-Sys... but it does take time for delivery and they no longer ship to the UK because delivery takes too long. I have just bought another 3 sets from here http://cgi.ebay.com/Small-Tone-Volume-EQ-Kit-And-Pickup-Guitar-PS90...  also  for $6.99 each. I used these on my last build (8 string CBG) if you check out my page photos. You can either install it direct or again snip off the output socket and wire it as per any diagram you want.

Also there is a video I made ages ago to demonstrate the different sounds mag/piezo/preamp/ no preamp make to try and give an idea of the differences.http://www.cigarboxnation.com/video/comparing-cbg-pickups on this one I wired it so both mag pups and piezo go via the preamp rather than have separate controls (for me I prefer separate now for the extra control)

 

Regards,

David

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Bob Harrison on February 9, 2011 at 11:28pm

I like magnetic. Buy all means get an $8.00 one off ebay. Then make a video and show us how it sounds, I bet there good.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by John Springstead on February 10, 2011 at 1:21am

Thanks everyone for all the great feedback. I think I'll order a couple and build one with each. Building one with both did look a bit difficult for this beginner, but I'll check it out more!

I see there are some members making/selling magnetic s in the $25-40 range, and it makes me wonder. I'm a pretty firm believer that you get what you pay for. Hope the cheapies from China don't give me the wrong idea of whats possible.

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by David L. on February 10, 2011 at 2:23am

CB Gitty has an excellent reputation and is USA based so you will get them quicker and hassle free. He has an advert to the right here and has some for $5.19 (not sure about shipping costs). https://www.cbgitty.com/cubecart/guitar-pickups/cat_33.html

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Glaze on February 10, 2011 at 6:35pm

John 

 

David Lloyd gave a great post with links.  I was thinking of building a CBG with a magnetic pickup and a piezo.  I could always put two output jacks on the CBG and separate the piezo and the mag pickup wiring completely.  I could also wire two piezo's and a mag pickup using a three way switch with volume and tone controls.  Position one on the three way switch could be the mag pickup by itself, position two could be one piezo by itself and position three could be two piezo's wired together.  You can wire a guitar any way you want to do it.   

John Springstead said:

Thanks everyone for all the great feedback. I think I'll order a couple and build one with each. Building one with both did look a bit difficult for this beginner, but I'll check it out more!

I see there are some members making/selling magnetic s in the $25-40 range, and it makes me wonder. I'm a pretty firm believer that you get what you pay for. Hope the cheapies from China don't give me the wrong idea of whats possible.

• ▶ Reply