i said a hip hop the hippie the hippie to the hip hip hop and you don’t stop
For some reason, Jonny and I made this wonky electro-acoustic kerjigger three weekends ago, I think. It’s called the Whackinstick and it sounds a bit like a birimbao (an Afro-Brazilian instrument used in Capoeira) and a Ehr-hu (a whiny Chinese violin-like contraption). It’s made of a piece of scrounged 2×2, some goodies from the Fastener section of the hardware store, and a high E string from a guitar. We slapped a piezo buzzer and a small speaker onto it as acoustic pickups, and they work OK, though they pick up a lot of ambient noise.
Then, a couple of days ago, for some reason (probably the same reason we made the thing in the first place), I started thinking about magnetic pickups for it. Naturally, I wanted to make them out of crap I could get for $10.
So I got some superstrong neodymium magnets at the Michael’s craft store while Carrie was looking for beads, came home, and made up a way to make guitar coils. Now, before you get excited, it’s almost 3 AM and the Whackinstick does not have a magnetic pickup yet. I made one, it’s down on my workbench, and it’s making me really think about what the fuck I’m doing up this late at night.
Apparently, you’re supposed to get between .1 v and 1 v out of the thing. I’m lucky if I get .06 v. What kind of cruel joke is this? I’ve just spent all night wrapping these things up and messing with them (testing with a powerdrill and an eyebolt to make an oscillation – there’s an instrument in there somewhere), and I get .6 of the bare minimum.
Fortunately, things are not glued together and I can retry, including just amplifying the signal and seeing what I get.
In any event, here are some websites that helped me out tonight to go from .001v to .06v.
• The guy who makes the cigar box guitars on the cover of Make Magazine that inspired the Whackinstick made these, and I wish I’d noticed that before looking everywhere else.
• Rare earth magnets are probably the best to use for this kind of project. They’re very strong for their size, and apparently you want long, skinny pickups, not short, fat ones, so neodymium is, I guess, the way to go. It’s what I was using; ceramic produced a comically small voltage.
• A Wikipedia article on the electric guitar. The image at the top of this post was very helpful.
And you know what? I’m wrapping way too little coil around the magnet. Tomorrow, more wrapping. What you hear is not a test. I’m wrappin’ to the beat.
In the image you posted here, it almost looks like the north and south on the guitar string are in the same orientation as the magnet. Is that right?
Ah, well, the orientation of the string is whatever the magnet is. That’s why nonmagnetized magnetic materials like ferrous ones are attracted to magnets.
I think.
I find it odd, though. I wondered about that myself.
Don’t know if you remember the “feedback” device Chris and I made for our NS Div I. It burned me. Feedback is hot. I’ve been thinking of redesigning it using a technique, that doesn’t burn me, or blow out my amps. I think I’d still prefer to just crank up the amp. The magnetic fields produced by nearly any device are far to large to affect a single pickup, unless of course you only turn on one pickup. To get decent, and controlled feedback, I had to have the device, nearly up at the top of the neck of the guitar. I bet it’s something that could be done decently through some simple circuitry instead, I’ve actually been thinking of going to night school to learn about chip design. I’m pretty sure there’s a market for custom designed pedals and electronics for guitars. Who knows. In my original experimentation I had the most radical Fred Wirth on my side. You should go find him, and ask him about your device. I’m sure he could give you a 30 second answer that would make you feel foolish, and in awe all at the same time.