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Author
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Topic: McIntyre Acoustic Feather
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Lee Baucum
Member From: McAllen, Texas (Extreme South) - The Final Frontier
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posted 26 September 2005 08:54 PM
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Do any of you guys have any experience with these? I mounted one on my Martin and it sounded great; however, if there was a television on in the same room as the guitar, it would pick up a terrible hum. I sent the pickup back to Carl and he was kind enough to replace it. It came in already soldered to the endpin jack and ready to install. I just plugged it into an amp and there is that hum again, only when a television is on in the room. I want to play this guitar in church, but there is a television monitor near where I sit (used as a monitor so we can see what is on the projector screen behind us.)I haven't installed the pickup yet. I wanted to check and see if anyone had any ideas on how to reduce the hum. Is there some way to shield the pickup, once it is attached to the bridge plate in the guitar? Lee, from South Texas |
Donny Hinson
Member From: Balto., Md. U.S.A.
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posted 27 September 2005 04:29 AM
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The best solution is to get an LCD (flat-panel) monitor. These don't have a picture tube (CRT) and all the associated HV circuitry that causes this interference. That pickup is probably a single-coil design, so there's not much you can do to reduce the interference it's picking up, other than to move the guitar or the monitor. |
Robert Parent
Member From: Savage, MN
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posted 27 September 2005 04:41 AM
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I have a feather installed in a mandolin and also a mandola and they work very well. For a setup I run the feather through a fairly short, high quality cable into a Para-DI (direct box and preamp combo), then on to the amplifier or PA. The feathers are very high impedance so are sensitive to stray electric fields similar to single coil guitar pickups as you noted. The Para-DI converts the high impedance signal into a balanced low impedance, one that can be run a fairly long distance without additional noise problems. FWIW I also use this setup in my studio which has several CRT monitors and there has never been an issue. My suggestion would be to try a setup similar and I think you will be very satisfied with the result. |
Bob Leaman
unregistered
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posted 27 September 2005 09:46 AM
I have an Acoustic Feather attached to Quarterman cone in my Model 36 Dobro. It works fine and does not pick up stray electrical fields since a Model 36 has a chrome plated bell brass body and therefore, the Feather is inherently electrically shielded. I use a Fishman preamp, attached to my trouser belt, with a very short (24 inches) shielded audio cable between the Dobro and the Fishman. Incidently, there are no coils inside an Acoustic Feather so it cannot pickup magnetic interference. However, it is sensitive to electrostatic fields which are radiated from CRT tubes. Carl McIntyre's Acoustic Feather is not a magnetically excited device. |
Lee Baucum
Member From: McAllen, Texas (Extreme South) - The Final Frontier
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posted 27 September 2005 11:02 AM
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Is there anything that can be done to shield the pickup, once it is installed? Perhaps some type of foil taped over it?Lee |
Jerry Hayes
Member From: Virginia Beach, Va.
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posted 28 September 2005 06:45 AM
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Hey Bob, where on the cone do you have it placed? I have one that I'm going to install in my Gibson Hound Dog pretty soon and I'd like to know which spot on the cone it'll work best.........JH in Va.------------------
Don't matter who's in Austin (or anywhere else) Ralph Mooney is still the king!!! |
Bryan Bradfield
Member From: Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada.
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posted 28 September 2005 06:29 PM
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Concerning the stray emissions causing noise, how about turning the cone and spider into shields, by grounding them. Couldn't you just run a ground wire to the edge of the cone ledge, or cone sound well, and allow the cone to rest on it? Then would you not have some protection against emissions coming from above? |
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