Non-bass body question

[Yvarg]

I'm asking this question here because frankly I dislike MIMF (and I can never remember the name I made up for the account there). I have been working on and off this summer on building a hurdy gurdy which I intend to put various types of pickups on to amplify; the whole reason it is built in such a non-traditional "semi acoustic" manner. Partway through constructing the body I realized that since I have know idea what kind of pickups will sound good and where I'll place them, I better have a way to access the inner portions of the body. As far as I can tell I have a few options:

1) modify the design of the top to allow for a sort of pickguard

2) cut a hole in the back and use a control cavity cover to get inside

3) cut out the entire back and, using my large supply of birch plywood (original material of the back), make a back that can be removed with a few screws

4) don't do anything and pray I don't need to put any mics or pickups inside later on

I wish to know what others think I should do. The whole issue in question is, how will any of the options affect the sound? I am leaning more towards option three at the moment, but I figure it's much better to get the opinions of those more knowledgeable than I first. As always, here are a few pictures if it helps (go easy on the shoddy craftsmanship, it's the first "nice" instrument I've attempted to build) :




PS: If you have no idea what a hurdy gurdy is: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurdy_gurdy

Thanks in advance.

[Musiclogic]

Piezo system will work well, may be the only thing you can use

[Yvarg]

I had a few ideas about the amplification, such as piezo under the bridges and using this violin mic-thing that goes inside the body through the F hole, and if I can get steel strings to sound good on it I'll even try some electromagnetic pickups. I plan on using a number of them and blending the outputs of each accordingly to get the sound I want.

Sorry, my question was not very clear. I should have asked "Would having a thin plastic back versus thick wood one dampen the sound? What about having a only a small section of the back plastic?"

[pilotjones]

My "feeling" for it is that since the back rests on a surface, that it would vibrate little if at all. This would mean that the back is mostly serving only to enclose the volume, and so could be made out of anything.

One thing that might make your instrument sound different from a traditional one (assuming a traditional one is built like an acoustic guitar or violin) is that, with those thick sides, you have a much smaller enclosed volume.

[Yvarg]

So the back material doesn't matter much? Alright, that's good. Yes, my thick sides will definitely alter the sound and make it a lot quieter, which is where the amplification comes in. Thanks for the help!