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Posted (edited)

ok i was reading the wacky transformer thread and this popped in to my head so would it be possible?

wind a pick up with two windings we will call them a output and input, though they would most likely be identical.

the output would be split and run in ot a preamp (that would go to your amp) I think the out put on this would be fairly weak so it would need some kind of op amp. the other sid of the out put would run in to anther amplifier that would be run in to the input coil im thinking (and i get in to a lot of trouble trying to think) that the pick up would act like a transformer allowing you to to have a controlled feedback loop.

well does it sound like it would work?

by the way sorry for my horrible spelling and grammer never my strong point.

Edited by Tim37
Posted

I'm sure Pete will chime in here pretty soon, but what you're basically trying to describe is a sustainer (see the massive pinned thread in this forum). Your design wouldn't work for a couple of reasons, but, if you read up in the sustainer thread, it is possible to make a working device like this.

Posted

Thanks fook...so it's down to me again!!!! :D

First, don't read the whole thread...but yes you are talking about a sustainer...

As soon as you try it, you will find there are some limitations and a lot of subtleties. Hence a thread that has been going five years, over three thousand posts, 250+ pages and over 150,000 visits!!!! Scary!!!

Ok...so basically...the idea is ok but you will get a squeal exactly like putting a mic up against a speaker and turning it up...I assume this is not the kind of feedback that you would be desiring from your proposition. You need some distance between the driver and the pickup and each coil is different in construct too, optimized for function. A pickup coil is sensitive to changes in it's magnetic field, even by a string vibrating through it. A driver puts out a magnetic field, strong enough to move a thin high tensioned string at audible frequencies. The two do not mix well and one will feedback directly into the other by magnetic coupling as if they were wired together.

Hence, typically you have a driver up near the neck, and the sound coming from the bridge pickup in all conventional and commercial sustainers. An eBow is perhaps the only exception, but this has significant difference and has a different function and sound.

Still...such ideas have merit and obviously interest but ideas are one thing, having the courage to keep at it and overcome the problems of actually doing it...a completely different story. If you want to do something like this, join in at the end of the sustainer thread...

enough?

pete

Posted

well thanks for the replies. i kinda thought it was too easy to not have been done already and didn't really think it out like i said it popped in my head after reading the other transformer thread.

thanks guys

oh btw i have looked at the sustainer thread before yall are way above my head on that one and i went to school (be it 10 years ago) for electronics.

Posted

Well, not to worry Tim, you seemed to have reinvented the idea and I am sure the inventors of the devices thought just as you did. In fact, the eBow is pretty much just like that in a smaller single string like package...two coils are in the base, one a pickup and the other a driver and there is a little LM386 amp to drive it. While there are magnets, they can feed off the guitar's pickups too. The reason that the ebow can get away with closer coils is that it only need drive one string at a time and is virtually touching it, plus the eBow's system is self contained...it is not part of the guitars signal chain, nor do you really "hear" it.

Good thinking though...the transformer thread was interesting and did make one think... pete

PS...the sustainer thing is not as hard as you might think from that thread and most of that should be avoided...check out the tutorial and stuff linked below for a more sensible and much shorter version...

cheers, pete

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