Comments on: Piezo Pickups

By: steve

steve — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 16:40:33 +0000

Hi Jack, I recently breadboarded up this one and am experimenting with SWTC and am very pleased with the sound I’m getting with a 25mm piezo disc placed just behind the bridge inline with 5th and 6th strings. When recorded into my firewire (old motu box) DAW I,m getting very musical sounding recordings with a dash of room reverb applied. when I record simultaneous tracks with a RODE mic-very nice indeed.I notice though when I use the SWTC follower a lot of gain is lost-what would be a good recovery stage. Tried a LPB1 too much gain and will try a Tillman soon. your thoughts appreciated. Thanks for the great resource

By: admin

admin — Tue, 10 May 2011 15:14:33 +0000

I don’t think that it is going to help with feedback, but it should extend bass response, which will help balance the treble.

-Jack

By: Bill

Bill — Tue, 10 May 2011 15:04:36 +0000

Would adding the buffer help tame some of the harshness and feedback problems from the piezo? I’ve added a Radio Shack piezo to my Cigar Box Guitar build, but the treble harshness and feedback are big problems.

By: admin

admin — Sun, 20 Mar 2011 22:52:24 +0000

It is best to follow a piezo pickup with a buffer that conditions the signal to better interface with the following circuits while preserving the full tonal range.

-Jack

By: UprightCowboy

UprightCowboy — Sat, 19 Mar 2011 16:41:03 +0000

I’m building a EUB, but its new to me, and i’m looking at putting a Piezo pickup on it. But I don’t know jack S~it about this side of things, Need Help. What do I need and how do I do it.
Thanks UprightCowboy

By: Dwayne

Dwayne — Mon, 31 Jan 2011 14:42:32 +0000

What is the best way to use your circuit to blend both a Shadow and Fishman piezo pickup on my upright? I want to be able to control the volume of each piezo output. I have tried the above circuit and I good results on an Acoustic Image Clarus I but not on a Polytone Mini Brute III. Thanks.

By: admin

admin — Sun, 07 Nov 2010 21:27:29 +0000

It will definitely run on a pair of CR2032 cells, and maybe on a single one, but headroom would suffer.

You could put it in a 1590A and include a power jack to run off an external power supply.

-Jack

By: Sam K. Shaw

Sam K. Shaw — Sat, 06 Nov 2010 17:47:32 +0000

I’d love to build this in as tiny an enclosure as possible — could this design run off of a pair of 3V CR2032 button cells? …what about running off of a SINGLE button cell? Would there be enough headroom? Any ideas about battery life in a design like this?

Thanks!

By: Richard Kienle

Richard Kienle — Thu, 20 May 2010 23:54:53 +0000

I just picked up a Mosfet booster board from you store. I intend to make this to buffer a piezo bridge pickup from an upright bass. I have a few questions about this application:

I intend on blending this with a fretboard piezo (I am going to build a simple jfet buffer for that as it is only for fingerboard clicks) so I do need to contol the output volume / level so can I:

1) Use both the gain pot and the output volume control or should I use just the output volume control or use the gain trim pot but route the output of the buffer to a blend pot?

2) I would like to put a phase invert switch in the signal I assume I would do this before the inputs into the board?

By: admin

admin — Tue, 11 May 2010 18:26:19 +0000

You could but that is a mosfet, and you would be better off with a jfet like a 2N5457, MPF102, 2N3819, or J201.

-Jack