sympathetic strings

[Beej]

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well none of these strings are playable, i'm using the guitar as a resonator. so there are 7 sympathetics with a very wide tuning range. i'd be using this with my fretless guitar, so...technically i have 6 playable strings

Conceptually, this whole deal is right ****ing cool.

What little I know about you from this site alone has painted a picture of you as a very interesting person. I doubt I'm wrong...

 

[anechoic]

After reading this thread, I'm really tempted to buy one of the Dayton exciters and clamp it to the headstock of a bass as sort of a low budget Sustainiac Model C. They're certainly cheap enough to try it.

 

[Taylor Livingston]

Keep in mind you'll still need an amp just for the sustainer, besides the amp you use to hear your bass.

I actually have a real Sustainiac on my bass, but I've been thinking about building another bass with a quadraphonic pickup system with quad sustainer, to be able to sustain chords better. There are some pretty interesting features in the Moog guitar, and I've figured out how to achieve most of them with analog circuitry.

 

[uethanian]

yea while the sound exciters are really cool to play around with, i don't know how well they'd function as a sustainer...i tried pressing one to my guitar while playing (a complicated operation) and i didn't notice much. then again, i am using the output of a bass amp to drive them, which probably isn't the best. that's the big hurdle after i finish the guitar, how to design an amp circuit so i don't have to carry around my bass combo

 

[uethanian]

well i got the biggest part of it done today

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doesn't look great, but i wasn't expecting it to. what's not in the picture is a sort of heel behind the board (probably unnecessary, but w/e) and an input jack i drilled in the side of the body. i tested it out with a single string whilst moving the bridge around, and i actually got a convincing buzz...but i can tell it's going to be tricky getting the bridge shaped and positioned correctly

 

[anechoic]

yea while the sound exciters are really cool to play around with, i don't know how well they'd function as a sustainer...i tried pressing one to my guitar while playing (a complicated operation) and i didn't notice much. then again, i am using the output of a bass amp to drive them, which probably isn't the best. that's the big hurdle after i finish the guitar, how to design an amp circuit so i don't have to carry around my bass combo

So my Dayton exciters finally came the other day (Parts "Express" my ass). Much to my delight, they actually DO work as a sustainer. So far, the tricky part is attaching one to the headstock. There just isn't a whole lot of space on my Ibanez SR305. I also found that it's actually better not to clamp it down to tightly (I'm not using the self stick adhesive that's on there). So far I've had the best results just taping it on there, although it eventually slips off. I think I may play around with mounting the exciter to a small piece of wood and clamping that to the headstock.

Mounting it on the body doesn't do much of anything. I assume the people who designed the Sustainiac Model C discovered this a long time ago, otherwise they wouldn't have a cable hanging off the headstock.

Right now I'm driving it from the speaker out on an old 25 W Crate bass amp. Seems to be plenty of power. Amazon had a small 2 channel 15 W amp that they were promoting along with the exciters, which I think I may try.

The sound is similar to what you'd get from an eBow. It will sustain the low B easily. So far I haven't been able to get it to sustain the G. May need to mount it better.

If I can get this all sorted out, I should have something comparable to a Model C for well under $100.

 

[pilotjones]

Won't sustain the G string at all, or just certain notes?

Have you tried reversing the phase of the signal to see what the effect is?

 

[anechoic]

Won't sustain the G string at all, or just certain notes?

Have you tried reversing the phase of the signal to see what the effect is?

It doesn't seem to sustain any of the notes on the G. I really need to sort out the mounting situation - I think a large part of the problem is the fact that I usually have to hold the transducer in place with one hand while I fret a note and mute the open strings with the other (otherwise one of the open strings usually takes off).

I've tried flipping the polarity on the transducer, although it's hard to say if one way is better. It should make a difference (I'm pretty sure that's how the Sustainiac and the newer eBows implement their harmonic mode), but I need to get the slop out of the setup first.

 

[RVT]

Sorry to bump an old thread, but I must've missed it while it was active.

I had the idea to build a sympathetic string unit such as this a while back, but couldn't find the time (or ability). My idea was to have the guitar output go into circuit where it was split so that it still reached the amp, but was also sent into a preamp/amp circuit which drove a sustainer driver which in turn excited 12 strings across the top of a box/board which were picked up by a seperate pickup. You've inspired me to revisit that project, and yours is looking good btw!