Acoustic Guitar modding?

[Tommygunn]

Sorry about it being about guitar....

But my favorite acoustic guitar brand doesn't seem to sell acousto-electrics. And my uncle has the little SD acoustic guitar pickup in his acoustic, and it really doesn't have what I'm looking for. So how dangerous would it be to put some magnetic pups, pots, etc., into an acoustic, ala Kurt Cobain, and replace the bottom strap knob (or what ever its called) with one of the ones that has like the output jack built in? I would get someone else to do the woodwork, but would it kill the acoustics of the guitar?

Thanks much guys!
-Tommy

 

[Electricblue]

Should be fine, I did it. Just don't cut any of the braces or anything that looks important.

You could mount a normal strat-style guitar pickup in the soundhole with various screws and plates.

Anything's possible.

 

[T-Bird]

Hi.

At least Seymour Duncan had (has?) a soundhole pickup.

Fishman does as well.

Since You probably want to have some feedback prevention as well, a soundhole cover with a pickup cut-out would allow You to use any PU you'd wish.

Drilling a hole to the top will ruin Your instrument, that's for sure, but every decent acoustic I know about or have, has the controls on the side.

BTW, how wild is that acoustic/its bridge, that a standard piezo PU can't be installed?

Regards
Sam

 

[Tommygunn]

Hi.

(1)At least Seymour Duncan had (has?) a soundhole pickup.

(2)Fishman does as well.

(3)Since You probably want to have some feedback prevention as well, a soundhole cover with a pickup cut-out would allow You to use any PU you'd wish.

(4)Drilling a hole to the top will ruin Your instrument, that's for sure, but every decent acoustic I know about or have, has the controls on the side.

(5)BTW, how wild is that acoustic/its bridge, that a standard piezo PU can't be installed?

Regards
Sam

1) It's still in production, but I don't really like it.

2) I'll have to look into that one too, prolly about the same effect.

3) Feedback is a huge issue, thats why I'm not mic'ing it. Thanks for the heads up.

4) Only acousto-electrics have the controls, its normally volume and EQ control for the piezo.

5) I was mainly just looking for magnetic pups.

This whole battle is cause I can't seem to find an electric guitar that I really like. I'm into 90s rock, hince the Nirvana insipration with this guitar, and nothing can get what I'm looking for except a few and I don't like how any of those play. The Nashville Tele w/TexMex pups was the only guitar I liked, and it was over 9lbs (10-12lbs prolly!), and kinda out of my price range. The only guitar I've ever felt comfortable with are the Art & Lutherie guitars, my sister gave me her old one and my brother owns one. So I'd like to buy another one and put magnetic pups in it but I'm feeling a little worried about doing so.

 

[Tommygunn]

Should be fine, I did it. Just don't cut any of the braces or anything that looks important.

You could mount a normal strat-style guitar pickup in the soundhole with various screws and plates.

Anything's possible.

It didn't kill the acoustics? Feedback? Pics? Thanks

 

[Jason_A]

...so are you trying to get an acoustic guitar that sounds like an acoustic guitar, or an acoustic guitar that sounds like an electric guitar... or an acoustic guitar that sounds like something other than an acoustic or electric guitar?

If you want to sounds like an acoustic guitar, there are lots of piezo options out there that are OK. I also like the K&K soundboard transducers (they're pretty easy to install, and the only real modification you need to make is to drill a larger hole at the end pin for the output jack). I tend to like their sound better than piezos. Grizzly is clearing out some B-band pickups systems that are a good price (and I also prefer these to the piezo options): Grizzly.com® -- Outlet Categories

Not sure what to tell you if you really want a magnetic pickup. My first recommendation would probably be to install a single coil pickup in the soundhole right at the end of the fretboard. There's the classic Epiphone John Lennon that has a magnetic pickup and controls on the face of the guitar: Invalid Link Removed

 

[Omnipharious]

I literally just finished work on exactly what you're talking about. I wanted my old crappy $80 acoustic to have something unique to it, so I took my old (also crappy) Precision pickups, and tried putting them in. I found a way to mount them, just screwing them in to the sound hole, but being as smart as I am, I forgot to test the string-to-string pickup before installing it that way, and my high, and low E's barely picked up. I ended up taking the magnet from one of the two parts of the pickup, and putting it on the top of the magnetic poles, increasing the surface area, and mounting it in an elaborate plastic case I found, and blah blah blah.

The end result was a week of work to mount the pickups wrong, months of pondering what to do with it, then 12 hours of cutting, soldering, and screwing to get a really bluesy, fat sounding acoustic-electric (that I forgot to ground, which I will do when I can be arsed). The lesson is to think everything out, have a solid plan before trying anything, make sure you know exactly where the bracing is before drilling, and don't do anything permanent before testing it's feasibility.

My camera is charging right now, so I'll put up pictures in an hour or two.