Truth_David

I was following a forum thread about Variax transplanting, and eventually a company began producing these in an external rackmount enclosure, and I believe they also combined the Roland 13 pin connections, so I find that idea appealing, but they were very expensive. I know that the Roland VG type gear sounds better with their magnetic hex type p/ups, and in fact I much prefer these over the RMC and other piezo systems. But unfortunately the actual design of the Roland p/ups leaves much to be desired aesthetically - I think they look really ugly, apart from the white or transparent variety that come with their custom instruments. But those are also very expensive for what they are, and difficult to come by. Pete from the Sustainer thread also had a really aesthetically pleasing design for a hex p/up, but he never got around to marketing it. In any case, it is not only the p/up but the enclosure that needs a radical rethink in terms of aesthetics. I also think it is about time someone implemented more midi control facilities into the device. Even the first relatively primitive guitar synths had more capability for controllers than the GK type p/up systems. And of course all that is light years away from what the Synthaxe was able to achieve. But being so costly to build and maintain they went under, and no-one has since had the vision to design an instrument with similar features, but with the benefit of today's technological advances. It was a behemoth, but my God what an instrument in the right hands!!! Simply awesome......

I have neither the time nor the technical expertise.....I already spent a huge amount of time following the Sustainer thread, and never actually ended up with a working sustainer.....playing is my priority, unfortunately I am not like Allan Holdsworth who is not only an amazing virtuoso musician but also a very capable electronics engineer who frequently invents whatever he needs in the studio. I think these abilities are only for the very gifted amongst us...

Thank you Ansil, yes I would like a copy of the RMC schematics for the Brian Moore please . Do you have a Dropbox account?

I still have the RMC unit, but one of the lugs came off the 13pin DIN pcb, and although I took numerous photos and did sketches of the wiring, considerable time has passed since and I really haven't a clue where to start rewiring everything. I downloaded a circuit schematic from RMC a long time ago, but I am pretty clueless with wiring diagrams. If anyone here might be able to help I would be appreciative. Thank you. I was thinking that it might be an idea to mount the RMC unit into an enclosure mounted on the guitar, rather than having to hack it to take the 13 pin socket and battery box etc.

Thanks Elmo.......my GK2A has a mini plug coming from the pickup with 7 terminals, one of which is ground, that is what got me thinking about this possibility. There is absolutely no way I would have even considering hacking into the PCB otherwise as you suggest would be necessary. It seems though that there is an argument for building the GK-2A into a small removable enclosure, if it's worth the effort to add the FETs or whatever. It's just that I happen to have both the Ghost saddles and a set of RMC Powerbridge saddles for a Strat going spare, and this particular GK-2A also has a wiring fault which needs checking anyway, as having an intermittent fault makes it useless to me. Both the GK-2A and GK-3 seem to have the same weakness in the support that grabs the cable coming out of the wart - the screw tends to get chewed up, then the cable works itself loose and becomes vulnerable to damage. The other thing is that the RMC saddles could be easily adapted to fit the bridge of my acoustic electric guitar, whereas the GK-3 pickup is too high for that instrument, as it has a very low action for an acoustic guitar. I already tried this instrument with the VG-99 and fitted with electric strings, and was really impressed with how well it works, apart from with patches with altered tunings, but the action was uncomfortably high for single string work....

Hi all. I have a project in mind to combine the wart end of the GK-2A with either a set of Graphtec Ghost hexaphonic saddles or RMC powerbridge saddles. Is this possible, given the fact that the Roland bridge is made up of mag p/ups, whereas the Grahptec and RMC bridges are both piezo systems? The GK-2A wart has a preamp, so I would expect that to be able to cope with either the output of mag or piezo pickups - is that correct? Does anyone have a wiring diagram for the Roland GK-2 that shows which cables feed which p/up? They are colour coded, and the final one seems to be an Earth connection, but it would be helpful to know in advance which strings equate to which colour on the wiring.

Thanks to both of you for your helpful comments......I think I will have to stick to separate processing for either signal. I am also trying processing the signal via a GK-3 hex pickup into a VG-99 - with surprisingly good results for the time being. I still want to hear the passive mag p/up though...

What happened to this thread? Is this work still in progress? I have PM'd you.....

http://www.thetonego...a_overview.html Here is a pick from their webpage: Due to the highly innovative offering from the Tone God for the Acoustic Pickup Adapter I imagine I will not be the only one tempted to try out a passive p/up on an electro-acoustic instrument - even at the risk of rampant feedback, which I imagine is unavoidable . My guitar is an Emerald X-5 carbon fiber model, and comes pre-fitted with a B-Band AT3 system. If it were possible to mix the signal from the passive mag p/up with that of the AT3 via its on-board preamp, this would provide the advantage of volume and tone controls, but then the question would arise as to how to go about mixing the output from the two p/ups, and I imagine that would involve a blend pot and a considerable amount of adaptation to the existing system. However the Tone God website is not very clear on the subject of wiring and routing of the cables from whichever p/up is going to be installed. If I were to be able to find a way of sending a passive output from the same jack to my signal chain, then the fact that I have no on-board volume or tone control for the passive mag p/up would not pose so much of a problem, as I could control the volume at least with a volume pedal. What I am not about to do is add another output jack to the guitar, so what are my options? Thanks in advance for any help and suggestions. David

I think you have clearly overstepped the mark here Pete - if there is a moderator on this forum you should be disciplined; I thought there were supposed to be rules against public flaming! You really are a nasty piece of work, but clearly you have shown your true colours for all to see. Not only are you willing to publically humiliate other forum members, but you do so with obvious pleasure, even going so far as to talk about me on forum to another member as though I were not 'here', as may be clearly seen from the above post. And just for the record, all Juán asked of me was a roll of 0.020 wire, he made everything for me out of the kindness of his heart, a gesture way beyond you and others like you. And whatever you may think about him, that gains a measure of respect and allegiance from me, which again is something you seem incapable of understanding. Frankly I find your attitude despicable, arrogant, presumptious, conceited and spiteful, and it seems to be way beyond you to be capable of apologising for giving offense - but just remember '...as you sow, so shall you reap'. David L pete

That new setup sounds familiar.....could it be that our friend zfrittz6 actually was not so far off track after all? David L

http://www.vibesware.com/ Well it might be described like that, except that as Hank noted, it does not include a magnetic p/up, so it will only work via the guitar's electronics. I think that is a shame - a version of this technology affecting all the strings, but using an integrated p/up and with it's own psp, sold at a similar price to the e-Bow would be likely to find a good number of players willing to shell out for one. If the e-Bow affected all the strings at once, I might even be willing to sacrifice my right hand picking in order to use it from time to time..... Regarding your suspicions that the Resonator will be problematic when used high up the neck, perhaps it might be worth asking their technical support about that. Here is their e-mail address: info@vibesware.com I think it is most likely just a footswitch based harmonic switch, judging from the photos.... David L

OK, now I understand, thank you for clarifying that point..... BTW I really appreciate the work you are doing on this, and I encourage you on your midi driver quest. David L

You're welcome......one thing I don't understand, although I have yet to receive their reply on this question - is that according to them it only works with the guitar plugged in to their connection box. But as far as I am aware this sort of system should be capable of effecting the strings directly, exciting them into sustain, or am I mistaken? Why should I believe this? Because the e-Bow does this, even on an acoustic guitar with metal strings (not even necessarily steel or nickel strings), and I imagine that any of these systems will work in the same way. They themselves state that it is working as an electromagnet. Another restriction is the fact that there is only a mono output from the device, whilst I believe stereo would be far better, in order to send non-effected signals and effected signals separately to a board or outboard processors. However, where I see this technology going is hexaphonic, so that the output from each string could be individually processed. As already mentioned, an existing hex p/up via a V-guitar system such as the VG-8,88 or 99 would already process each string individually, but unless there were some sort of string detection going on before the signal got to the hex p/up, it could become difficult to control. I wonder whether one could not design some sort of movement sensor into the driver, so that it was capable of detecting which strings were actually being played. I imagine that the Moog Guitar must be employing such technology already, but here we are talking thousands of dollars as opposed to probably an nth of that going the DIY route.... Another perhaps more original idea: If it were not for the sheer impracticality of it, I would envision some sort of hand held device, possibly even in the form of a plectrum, which was capable of either sensing the string being struck or alternatively actually exciting the string(s) as they are struck. Before you laugh, remember that it is actually possible to do this to some extent with an e-Bow. It is certainly not easy, and almost impossible to achieve whilst holding a pick. In fact I got so frustrated by that that I began to experiment with actually using the e-Bow as a picking device - horribly clumsy, but after all, that is what would be the ideal application - it would concentrate the focus of the effect upon what was being picked whilst leaving the other fingers free to fingerpick or tap or whatever. Well that is what I would do anyway....except that I would ideally like to be able to do this with an acoustic guitar too. David L