MIMF

Hi.Not exactly sure where to post...

I have the idea of building a solid (or chambered) guitar with a classical neck and nylon strings since I'm trying more fingerstyle.

Would an undersaddle 'classical' guitar pickup eg lr baggs or fishman work effectivley?

I'm guessing if it's the saddle that's transmitting then it should work, but I have no experience at all with these products.

Is anyone able to advise me on this?
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\Thanks,
Rob.

Yeah, that should work.

Yes, that is basically what these guys are:

http://usa.yamaha.com/products/musical- ... ntguitars/

There were a couple of other makers as well. Basically a neck with an under saddle piezo.

Also, the Gibson made the Chet Atkins solid body nylon string (I hesitate to say "classical"). I believe they made a steel string as well. Nothing but undersaddle of some kind.

I should add that to get the sound of the yamaha you will probably need to add a modeler like the Fishman Aura Sixteen pedal ($270) or Aura Spectrum DI preamp ($350). If you really want to blow the budget you can add an RMC piezo pickup/preamp ($650) and run it through a Boss GP-10 ($400) or Roland GR-50 ($500).

I haven't played a guitar I haven't made myself in almost a decade, so its actually painful for me to suggest you buy rather than build . However, once you get into guitar that is really a synth with strings it is hard to match the purchasing power of a company like Yamaha. You can buy a nylon SLG200N used on eBay for $350. That is less than the Spectrum DI preamp alone. You can buy a Godin Multiac used for $600. I can't really build a guitar with any kind of pickups for much less than that (unless I'm building a Tele slab guitar).

I've made several electric (slight) guitars with a cheap piezo under saddle pick up (2 dollars a piece) and they sound great.
I also installed a under saddle pickup in my acoustic guitar.
The trick is to fight off the high impedance of the pickup, which I did with a very simple but effective fet-preamp: The Till-preamp.
I've soldered the electronics (Fet and resistors) to the jack input socket and use either phantom power from a mixer or from a homemade stompbox style power supply.
See also this related article.

Hans

Something you might consider: Gibson used to make a thin body classical guitar with standard classical braced top sans soundhole and hollowed slab body. Kirk Sand designed them and Chet Atkins brought the idea to Gibson. Kirk still makes them and you can take a look at his website for inspiration. It uses an under saddle piezo pickup and built in preamp. Instead of wasting wood by hollowing out a 8/4 slab of mahogany, I would slice off a piece for the back, cut out the sides and glue them together, saving the cutoff for other uses. You may want also to google "Gibson Studio Classic" for photos of the Gibson model.

Hans Bezemer wrote:I've made several electric (slight) guitars

Slight = Slide of course, pardon me.