Archtop Tone: Bridge Piezo vs Soundboard

[Tommy_G]

My Yamaha AE-1500 Archtop is an X brace pattern... Has a minihumbucker and a bridge Piezo.

The bridge Piezo needs significant EQ treatment to get a balanced tone... The quality of the tone is barely acceptable but better than the raw signal from an UST on a flattop... But not as good as a UST through an Aura.

It sounds a bit clunky and picks up too many weird overtones from the string length behind the bridge.

I think there is enough room via the back access panel to install a soundboard pickup.

I dont have any experience with a soundboard piezo but was wondering how the raw freq distribution curve would compare.

Right now I am pulling 3 to 9 dbs off both the mids and highs and boosting the lows by 3 to 6 dB. Probably depends on the speaker...

Also wondering about the quality of tone in comparison.

I could possibly blend those sources if there was an advantage.

What would be the optimum location for a sbt?

[Mandobart]

It bears repeated repeating - the biggest cause of poor piezo tone is the impedance mis-match between the high impedance output of the piezos and the low impedance input of your PA or amp.

I have a mag pickup and twin head piezo soundboard pu on my archtop. Wired to a TRS output jack with the mag on the tip and piezo on the ring. I either split it out and send the tip to one channel on my Carvin AG300 and the ring to another channel, OR run a TRS cable into a Baggs Mixpro preamp. That's the only way to blend these two very different signals - each signal goes to a different input of an active device (amp or preamp). You can just blend them in a passive device.

[Tommy_G]

Thanks for the input.

One note is this guitar has an onboard preamp just like a flattop piezo so it was likely i.pedance matched as factory.

However... Remain curious on your satisfaction with the dual head sbt. Also wondering how much eq treatment your sbt requires.

[Mandobart]

Originally Posted by Tommy_G

Thanks for the input.

One note is this guitar has an onboard preamp just like a flattop piezo so it was likely impedance matched as factory.

However... Remain curious on your satisfaction with the dual head sbt. Also wondering how much eq treatment your sbt requires.

I'm very happy with the JJB PPS-200. I've used this pickup in about 20 instruments now from violin to mandolin to every mandolin family instrument, banjo, upright bass and of course guitars. I'd have to contact the builder to figure out how to wire it up to an onboard preamp. As I said I use the Mixpro especially if running into a house PA. If I'm plugging into my Carvin AG300 I split the TRS output and run the mag into one channel and piezo to the other and mix at the amp. Since the Carvin is made with a HI Z selector no preamp is necessary. I keep the eq pretty flat to get the sound I like.