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Not for lack of research but definitely lacking in the electrician know-how, I'm trying to get together the parts for my next build. I haven't yet installed any pickup system into an acoustic guitar but I plan on doing it for my next build. Stewart Mac has a very promising looking kit, but it says the preamps are for use with that brands pickups. Is that just marketing and preamps are build specifically for a certain type of pickup or will a certain preamp work for a broad range of selections? After lots of thought I decided I would like to have a 3 way with the middle selection being a mix of the two pickups outputed mono instead of wiring up a stereo endjack with one of the pickups working at all times if a mono cable was plugged in and both working when a stereo cable was plugged in.
Also, am I correct that the battery is only needed for a piezo type pickup? I'm sure I've read that but what exactly is the battery's function? It seems at my current train of thought that it's to 'preamp' the signal, so if a preamp is needed for the humbucker too then the battery is also used for that pickup as well?

Any info to get me back in the right direction would be great. I've already found some good info but some of it has made me question the ease of this combo such as active and passive pickups and some other terms that lost me. Thanks guys (and girls) !!!

yikes. sounds pretty complicated. what style git is it? if it's an acoustic, you might think twice about humbuckers. it's going to feedback a lot, unless you do some serious e-queing. i think that your set-up would work better on a solid bod. i might be wrong.
i think any decent pre would work with any piezzo. i sometimes run my passive humbuckers, and single coils thru a baggs pre, and can tweak the sound a bit, robs a little tube tone though. maybe run everything you have through your pre? the battery is for the pre, not the pick-ups themselves. good luck. i was going to do what you are doing on an idea i had where the top would be very thick, for an acoustic, so the feedback wouldn't be as bad. then i started thinking about da wiring................

It'll go in an acoustic that has a lot of archtop styling. lightly braced, tailpiece bridge, the works. 3 way would be just inside the offset soundhole. I took a lot of inspiration from this ergonomic guitar that has these Craig Armstrong jazz pickups.
http://www.stewmac.com/shop/Electronics,_pickups/Pickups:_Guitar,_electric/Kent_Armstrong_Suspended_Jazz_Humbucker.html

I really like the sound of it on his youtube video! all pickup


(it's like 4 minutes in that he strums a bit on this next one, about 4:25 I think it's all pickup when he backs away from his additional mic)

But one battery can feed both preamps? I'm determined to push forward with this design!

ummm, make that Kent Armstrong pickup. Don't know what I was thinking there

hey alex, that's
pretty nice. i like your idea. i thought you wanted 2 humbuckers, but this makes sense to me now.
great jazz tone. that's a very cool git he is playing too. good luck with this, and i'll try to do a little research on the wiring as well.
if the humbucker is passive, it wouldn't need a battery, or a pre. if it's active, it will.

thanks for the reinforcement. I'll post what I've found yet so far in my research and post further questions regarding what others have recommended similar to what I'm looking for and see if I can't figure out enough to post a legit looking diagram to make up the dissimilarities.

This product is looking really promising.
http://www.stewmac.com/shop/Electronics ... es#details

Artec do a similar board for a lot less (and artec stuff is really good)

masterblender

http://www.artecsound.com/acou/images/e ... lender.pdf

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Thank you! They've got some nice diagrams and some great looking products! You're right- it is $10-20 less for a very similar product

hey alex, been thinking about this, and, the only problem i see is no tone control. so if i was doing this, i would get a pre for the piezzo, and a tone and vol control for the hummer. need a capacitor for the tone there. the hummer needs a tone control for that mellow jazz tone. stew-mac sells little pots separately fo the sound-hole. maybe there is a tone control hook-up on the pre? that link you posted is a big thing that is made for a solid bod i would think.

yeah it is relying on the 3 existing knobs and pots on a strat but I see no reason it couldn't be used for the acoustic. I pretty much see that tone knobs don't have much effect on piezos. Of course I have no idea, and I have seen some people that wire one up, but I believe I'd be just happy without it since there would be a tone for the humbucker, a volume, and a level balance between the two (referring to the L.R. Baggs Control-X Mixer/Preamp, which relys on the 3 knobs assumed existing.)

I thought I made a great diagram that I was going to post and see what others thought about it and if it would work. It was what I came up with mixing various elements of the many diagrams from artec sounds.... but when it came to the preamp part of the piezo I realized I had no clue, having never even dealt with one in real life. I was having trouble even finding sources for seperate preamps that weren't part of an endjack...and I'm not sure what's inside so I couldn't really add it to my diagram.
I'd need to add a stereo end jack (mono cable would still be used but the battery would then become active when a cable completed the circuit) and add the preamp elsewhere, before the 3 way switch and all the pots.
There seems to be a few things now that I've read citing the difficulties of mixing a piezo and a mag into mono. Many do it for stereo to hook up to two different amps but none I can find that have it set up quite like I'd like.

I can still post that diagram if you're interested and I'll go back and try to make sense of the technical reasons of why i keep seeing it wouldn't work.

okay alex, here's my latest idea, ha! they change everyday. put in a piezzo pick-up undersaddle, under bridge, whatever you want.
don't put a pre in the guitar, but get either a baggs di box, or a clip on gig-pro, available from stew mac. they are off-board pre-amps that you can play other guitars thru.
kent armstrong pick-up, with tone and vol soundhole mounted pots, with the appropriate capacitor.
go stereo and blend with the pre for the piezzo, and soundhole pots for the hum. i would think you could plug it into an amps 2 inputs with a cable that had a stereo end, then the other end split into 2 monos, dig?
my reasons are 1-if you're playing electric, nothing beats a mag pick-up. ALL the piezzo pick-ups sound like, well not supposed to swear here, so," poo-poo". wire it so the hum pup is on when a mono cable is used, and no piezzo.
nice thing about off board pre is you don't have this big chunky thing in your git, with a stupid batt box in there too.
i play thru a baggs di box, for vol, tone etc, and use it for all my acoustics. cheaper and better, 1 pre, 4 gits.
post dat diagram.
a

Alan, I really appreciate you checking in on this thread and putting the time into your responses.
I've seen that, and suppose it's why most of what I see is wired stereo so the acoustic sound can be played through an acoustic amp, and electric - electric. I don't know why I was so fixed on having mono anyways. The blended sound through one amp wouldn't touch it.

This is the best conclusion to come to so far. I'd also wire a volume for the piezo. That 3 way switch would sure be a neat addition though and the tone from that humbucker would probably still sound great through an acoustic amp. It's a very clean tone for a mag.

Well its taken this long to get a response from LR Baggs. I've contacted both them and Artec Sound- which has excellent customer support- very timely.

I'm leaning towards the Control X from LRB since they have a stere/mono switch built in and just one stereo output.

The MB from Artec Sound is a great looking system but want it wired up with as many as 3 stereo jacks to get the same results possible as the control-x. amil response from them was that the stereo out needed two individual stereo jack to achieve that since the rings part of a TRS cable is what completes the battery circuit for the piezo.

Cant find a mono to stereo selector diagram anywhere but I know it's possible. And shoot, the LR Baggs system does it, but I wonder what determines the battery being on or off. Something in their board- as no matter what, if a chord is plugged into the jack it's draining the power. It will still play mag pickup of course when the battery is dead, but even if you always have a mag pickup selected it will still drain the battery- atleast that's my assumption based on reading the manual.


I wouldn't mind having a battery on off switch or wire it up when the three way was in the middle or piezo only that it started drawing power.....

anyways- both tech supports obviously rushed through the email responses and only answered a couple questions. (cont...)

(cont from above)

LR baggs doesn't answer any tech questions from hobbyist or experimental installs so I was lucky to even get this bit of info regarding using a different piezo than the X Bridge Strat replacement Bridge. It must be a high output piezo and they couldn't reccomend any or ensure it would sound good.

and the useful but of info from Artec Sound was that I couldn't- no way possible- wire stereo or mono to one output jack- as stated earlier in the thread.

Also if anyone is familiar with the Control X- the pot is built right into the board. I might need to place the board somewhere else and wire off the leads into my own pot- so both are in a location that can be reached through an acoustic soundhole- no covers to take off easily for adjustment of the Trim Pot or Phase Switch on the board.

I would pay someone to figure this out for me. It's certainly taken a lot of my time and I'm still a little bit in the dark. Any takers?

This is such a great and easy concept. The only thing its missing is a blend or switch of pickup combos from the guitar.

UPDATE:
Fishman has the simplest solution yet. Its most similar to the Control X vs. the Artec's MB.
http://www.fishman.com/uploads/products ... ts/179.pdf

The PowerChip. Designed to work with Fishmans PowerBridges. I'll get the specs from those transducers used and find a similar one. So simple!

hey alex.
i think you could blend with the two pots.
just crank each one up or down to get the balance you want.
i might be wrong though.
you got me thinkin' bout this again....
somebody gave me a fishman endpin pre, with a separate vol and tone controls, that i want to hook a mic pick-up that i cut off an old baggs pre/blender doo-hickey. no directions for the tone and vol, hmmmm. where do those wires go?
i hope it works.

Never know till you try it. I have some speculations but since you have the materials already it never hurts to try!

I do know that a buffer is needed when mixing a mag and a piezo since the impedance is totally different. I have high hopes for the latest find of the fishman product. Gleefully awaiting response from them about a good pickup to substitute from the 'PowerBridge' line that the 'Powerchip' was designed for.

hey alex, how's da pickup thing going?
i haven't done any luthierie stuff lately, except for a few repairs for friends on cheap guitars. ha!
maybe this weekend i'll solder up some stuff and hear if it works.
a

Hey Alan- little slow with the lutherie stuff myself atm. My computer died recently so I bought a new laptop instead of order some things from LMI and such. I did glue up a black limba/ziricote/black limba laminate neck the other day though for this next guitar. I'll be ordering the electronics for this build soon. It is pretty nice here though- I've had a nice little break just playing the last built acoustic and relaxing.