My F-512 Gets a New Pickup for Christmas

[markus]

Chaz,
we were lucky enough to meet Chris and his wife at LMG and I remember me thinking ´wow, that’s how 12ers work!´ when I saw Chris play.
If my post reads unfriendly, impolite, sarcastic etc. I have to apologize and blame my (far from perfect) language skills.

Markus :smile:

 

[chazmo]

Oh, that's great, Markus. Seems I've lost track of who was at which event. I hope you guys are doing well.

I don't think your post was the slightest bit impolite. We're expressing opinions here, and we're all passionate about the subject. That's my take anyway.

 

[adorshki]

I'm with Harry as I like the LR Baggs quite a bit. A tad bassy but I like that. The JM/Tone Dexter was probably more balanced, and sounded nice as well. Sound is such a personal preference thing anyway. Thanks for putting this up!! :encouragement:

I'm working on a cloned universal human ear with a jack and matching implantable skull socket so when somebody says "THAT sounds AWESOME" we'll all be able to hear exactly what they heard.

 

[PittPastor]

Personally I like the just Shure mic or first one .
Second one had the added UST sound giving a more thin tone to my ears . The last one was ok but focused on mids and lacked warmth .

I'm with Ray. Liked the mic'd tone -- but we all know that is only possible in the studio, which limits it. I think the Anthem sounded second most like your Guild -- with the compromise we are all familiar with. But pretty true to the sound I thought, for a mic inside the guitar. The ToneDexter sounds very clear, and almost chime-like. It sounds a lot like my Aura Pedal, TBH. Which is a sound that I love -- but it doesn't sound as pure as the Guild straight through the mic.

I read your blog post, and completely agree with the disclaimers. For me, the quest was always: "My Guild but louder," and I failed to get it. What I got sounds good enough that I stopped the search. But it isn't the same as the Great Guild Sound. I always wondered if the ToneDexter would have got me there. Not sure it does though. Just to my ear.

Thanks for doing this, though! I love hearing the comparisons.

 

[chazmo]

I've searched for this thread many times since Christopher posted it four years ago... Many of you have been asking recently about acoustic guitar electronics, and this thread covers some new gear (well, new at the time) which most of us have had no experience with. In any case, I finally found the thread!

I've spent 10 minutes with my headphones on going over Chris' three takes, and my feeling about this (4 years fast-forwarded!) is that while the Anthem (UST + mic) certainly suffers from piezo quack, the UltraTonic pickup with the ToneDexter lacks the shimmer that I love from a 12-string, as you hear it from the microphone. It's like you're damned with excessive shimmer with the piezo, and damned without it via the ToneDexter.

As most of you guys have heard me rave like post #19 here about the Seymour Duncan Wavelength Duo (née D-TAR multi-source) system, I do wish we had a comparison of that to the Anthem system... I'm also curious what the UltraTonic sounds like without the ToneDexter.

But, in any case, this is/was really great stuff and thought I'd bump it. @Christopher Cozad do you have any updates to this?

 

[Br1ck]

If I had six guitars with six different pickups, some being undersaddle, I'd think long and hard about the Tonedexter, but it is dependent on a quality mic and your ability to record your guitar properly. As it is, all my guitars have Dazzos paired with SunnAudio pre, which is a satisfying combination. You can blend the dry with the wet. It seems like it hasn't swept the market like it might have. I'd love to play with one, but I tend to be an analoge kind of guy. You need a guitar you like, a mic and the Tonedexter. I'd want a $500 mic to get serious with.

 

[chazmo]

Copy that, Br1ck!

I guess the point for folks who are amplifying (as was really already said) is that it all depends on what you want to accomplish. The ToneDexter sound might be a perfect blend for on stage work, where all the 12-string acoustic shimmer might interfere with other voices in a band.

In any case, it's cool to know the options.

 

[Tom O]

How would the sound compare to an LR Baggs stage pro element with a Barbara in saddle pickup as Guild used on Doyle Dykes models? There are some old YouTube videos of Doyle with his 12 string plugged in.

 

[chazmo]

I have no idea how this would compare, Tom, but it's worth noting that Doyle rarely uses a dry sound. At least in my experience. You should see his pedalboard!

I know that the electronics you mentioned on the DD signature models were Doyle's actual choices; i.e., that's the gear he uses. My uneducated, hypothetical guess is that it would sound more like Christopher's Anthem soundclip than the ToneDexter... But the Anthem is a blended (condenser mic + UST piezo), so I really have no friggin' clue. How's that for a disclaimer?!

 

[fronobulax]

From https://letstalkguild.com/ltg/index...gnature-model-prototypes.175531/#post-1571988

Doyle's pedalboard circa 2013

 

[chazmo]

^ Thanks, Fro! That's less of a jumble than I remember. I guess it was a pretty long time ago!

 

[SFIV1967]

In 2009 when Doyle was still with Taylor his board was this:



The picture frono posted in post #30 was the LMG III and NAMM 2013 board (with two outputs for two different amps).

By 2015 Doyle had reduced his pedal board a bit more, the previously used T-Rex Room mate Reverb pedal and the Boss Delay DM-3 were gone and instead a TC Electronics Hall of Fame Reverb was added.



Ralf

 

[kostask]

Happy holidays to you, Markus!

Sadly, I don't think you and Sylvia were at LMG3 where we got to hear and play with Chris. Wow, is all I can say. Chris is the real deal, and it's unbelievably great that he shares this stuff with us as his internal quest for perfection continues! (Thanks, Chris!!!)

For the record, I basically agree with your description, Markus, of the tone in Chris' three recordings. The differences are striking to hear with a good pair of headphones. And, to my ears, neither system is even close to the straight mic. recording.

While feedback would certainly be an issue (compared to the ToneDexter), I would love to hear the D-TAR multi-source for comparison (not asking for it, Chris, just saying. ) At LMG4, we heard that system used on stage at Ski Sundown and it was far-and-away the best system -- as in NO COMPARISON -- that hit the stage that day. I don't know if that system was run into the acoustic amp or directly into the mixing board.

Fondest wishes, guys!

There is something that the DTAR system has that nobody seems to have paid any attention to. The DTAR system, whether it is the Wavelength, or the Multi-Source, has a pair of AA batteries that go into a DC-DC converter, and actually provides 18V power to the pre-amp board. The reason that this is important, and this is the real difference between the DTAR and all of the other USTs, is that the UST needs both a high impedance (as everybody knows) AND a high input voltage range. Rick Turner did the real investigating, and found that it ISN'T the UST that is creating the piezo "quack", it is in fact, the preamp board. The issue is that the UST, at the moment when the string is plucked/strummed, puts out a very large voltage spike (6-7V, if memory serves). This overloads the input of the preamp, creating the "quack". It is distortion, and comes from the preamp input itself clipping off the front edge of the voltage waveform coming from the UST. The 18V supply from the DC-DC converter allows for much higher headroom on the preamp input, which allows an undistorted signal to get passed along.

Think about it this: why do you get piezo quack when playing hard, yet the quack seems to be much reduced, or completely eliminated, when you play softer?

 

[chazmo]

That's really cool, Kostas. Do you have a paper or article somewhere that describes this in detail? Fascinating stuff. But, don't you get the same quack without using a pre-amp? I.e., does it get clipped by the amplifier?

 

[fronobulax]

That's really cool, Kostas. Do you have a paper or article somewhere that describes this in detail? Fascinating stuff. But, don't you get the same quack without using a pre-amp? I.e., does it get clipped by the amplifier?

https://rickturnerguitars.com/stories-father-boutique-guitars

eventually gets to an experiment about dropping a ball bearing on a piezo which confirmed the overdriven pre-amp hypothesis.

But this is a rabbit hole and i ran out of time before I ran out of things to check or had success.

 

[chazmo]

https://rickturnerguitars.com/stories-father-boutique-guitars

eventually gets to an experiment about dropping a ball bearing on a piezo which confirmed the overdriven pre-amp hypothesis.

But this is a rabbit hole and i ran out of time before I ran out of things to check or had success.

Yes! The "Back to his Roots" section of this talks about exactly what Kostas was saying, particularly with respect to the Wavelength UST system. Cool. Thanks for posting that, Fro! You learn something new every day!

 

[Br1ck]

I have a friend who has a Cole Clark with a three way system that is the best factory onbosrd pickup setup I've heard. It has a mic, a UST, a SBT and blends them how you wish. Fairly unimpressive acoustically, it shines plugged in. If I gigged in a variety of configurations, solo to band, I'd strongly consider one.

 

[kostask]

Thank you to fronobulax for finding the link to the Rick Turner piezo pickup theory. Its a good recap, but there is one inaccuracy.

The "digital modelling" that they refer to in the article is NOT in the Wavelength pre-amp. The pre-amp itself is basically just a very clean pre-amp with an 18V supply. It pretty much kills off the piezo quack by itself. The digital modelling is done with an external "box" (this is an actual box) called the Mama Bear. It handles the issue of the piezo location being between the string and the bridge, and how "quick" the sound comes out (its in the article). I haven't looked at the Seymour Duncan website to see if it is still available or not. But it does do what Rick Turner says in the article, in that it makes a guitar sound more like itself. It is a somewhat odd box in that it not only does that, but it can allow your guitar to sound like other "acoustic guitars" as in a parlor guitar, an acoustic archtop, etc. If you set it to "neutral" as in you are playing a square shouldered dread, and you set it to sound like a square shouldered dread, it sounds extremely good. I have heard it, and have seen in used in a studio session, where one of the most highly regarded recording engineers in this area also heard it for the first time. I helped a local guitar player set up, and the recording engineer asked what the funny looking box was. The guitarist, having played around with the Mama Bear at home, said it was to help his guitar sound better. The recording engineer said "where have I heard that before". The guitar player sets up the Mama Bear on neutral, and the recording starts. Recording engineer insisted on using a mic (some sort of Neumann) so the guitar mic was on one channel, the Wavelength/Mama Bear on another channel, and the voice mic was on another channel. At the end, we A/B'd the Mama Bear and the guitar mic. They were not perfect, but very, very close. And the recording engineer said "I need to get a box like that". He ended up actually using the DTAR/Mama Bear channel in the mix down.