Retrofit K&K+Lyric into Taylor ES

[joeguam]

I was in auto-pilot mode trying to get this done so quickly that I completely forgot that I'm going to leave the mid pot on the board set to unity. I'll only be relocating the bass, mid and volume pots to the 3 holes in the upper bout. So I had to remove the leads and resolder the 10k pot.



This is pretty much all the updates I'll be posting until the pots arrive. Thanks for following along.

[burndeal]

Originally Posted by rschultz

This is an interesting option. If I did this endblock upgrade to an ES 1.1, could I somehow use the 3 pots to control something? Even just the volume control. Can the pots be used without the preamp? Or can the 1.1 preamp be used with 9V?

It's still not clear to me how you are using the 3 pots. Your previous thread says you made your own pots... are you doing the same thing here? The original 3 pots are removed?

Hey rschultz, I'm pretty much doing the same thing with the ES 1.1. Just some thoughts I had..

1) I believe that the oval rout of the AA and the 9V are different, which means, I wouldn't attempt the rout unless you were a skilled woodworker. I asked 2 different authorized Taylor techs in Arizona and they said the same thing. Even the truplug pictures show the 9V a little bigger. One of these days I'll bring a ruler to the local GC and confirm this once and for all!

2) If you are using the Ultrapure preamp, it essentially renders the ES preamp useless. If you just install the pure mini by itself, you can rout it to the ES Preamp, but I think Joe tried that and found it to be suboptimal.

3) If you just want the pure mini + volume, you can do it without a battery, and I assume you could do it with the existing pots on the ES preamp. You'd just jump the output of the transducers to the volume pot and then output that to the jack.

4) I'm not an electrical engineer, but I don't think you can use a 9V with the ES 1.1. You could however use 6 AAs instead of a 9V

[rschultz]

Originally Posted by burndeal

Hey rschultz, I'm pretty much doing the same thing with the ES 1.1. Just some thoughts I had..

1) I believe that the oval rout of the AA and the 9V are different, which means, I wouldn't attempt the rout unless you were a skilled woodworker. I asked 2 different authorized Taylor techs in Arizona and they said the same thing. Even the truplug pictures show the 9V a little bigger. One of these days I'll bring a ruler to the local GC and confirm this once and for all!

2) If you are using the Ultrapure preamp, it essentially renders the ES preamp useless. If you just install the pure mini by itself, you can rout it to the ES Preamp, but I think Joe tried that and found it to be suboptimal.

3) If you just want the pure mini + volume, you can do it without a battery, and I assume you could do it with the existing pots on the ES preamp. You'd just jump the output of the transducers to the volume pot and then output that to the jack.

4) I'm not an electrical engineer, but I don't think you can use a 9V with the ES 1.1. You could however use 6 AAs instead of a 9V

I was thinking of this retrofit for a guitar I was interested in buying... had ES 1.1. However, I passed on it and bought a 2003 Taylor 714 with NO ELECTRONICS! Score! So this is a non-issue for me now. Maybe in a year or two when I sell it and am looking for something else, there will be a better option. But honestly I think the best option for ES 1.1 is $400 ES upgrade... and the sound produced simply isn't worth it in most cases. Just my opinion.

[joeguam]

Pots are delivering today, hope to have this installation/mod completed tonight. When its all done, I should post the following sound clips via soundcloud:
- Guitar only through a TASCAM DR05 condenser recorder
- Guitar through the Taylor ES and a Bose L1 compact with flat EQ, recorded with a TASCAM DR05 about 12 inches from the L1 speaker array
- Guitar through the K&K Pure Mini Passive and a Bose L1 compact with flat EQ, recorded with a TASCAM DR05 about 12 inches from the L1 speaker array
- Guitar through the Lyric and a Bose L1 compact with flat EQ, recorded with a TASCAM DR05 about 12 inches from the L1 speaker array
- Guitar through the K&K Pure Mini Ultra Preamp only and a Bose L1 compact with flat EQ, recorded with a TASCAM DR05 about 12 inches from the L1 speaker array
- Guitar through the K&K Pure Mini + Lyric blended and a Bose L1 compact with flat EQ, recorded with a TASCAM DR05 about 12 inches from the L1 speaker array

[joeguam]

So I built the circuit using a perforated circuit board (PCB).



When I completed it, here's what it looked like:



Unfortunately, after I installed the Lyric again and connected it all together, I didn't get any sound from either the Lyric nor the K&K Ultra. I'm in the process of troubleshooting, so I'll let you know how I resolve it.

[joeguam]

I ditched the PCB and just built the circuit from scratch testing each connection. Used the tried-&-true method:



After I tested each pickup successfully, I wired them together and was able to hear he blended tone for the very first time...truly worth every penny and hour out into this effort. It was such a great sound, the best acoustic tone I've ever had.

Here's how I finished the circuit, did away with the PCB entirely:



I'm having a little trouble mounting the pots, but I'll resolve that hopefully by tomorrow. I'll finish this write up by the weekend.

[joeguam]

In short summary, I've completed this installation, just looking around for different options for knobs. The sound is unreal, unlike anything I've ever heard before. I still have to sit with it a bit more and tweak the settings to my liking, but I'll get the sound clips and upload them by this weekend.

Picking up where I left off, I think I mentioned that I ditched the PCB/breadboard and went back to just soldering the wires directly together. Here are some photos of how I did my connections.

First I removed the endpin jack from the Lyric preamp. BE VERY CAREFUL HERE! I discovered the hard way that these terminals are just connected using adhesive shield that melts right off as soon as you touch it with solder. If I had to do this over again, I would have just left it in place, inserted a 1/4" jack and wired it off the terminals of the jack.

[joeguam]

You have to test the jack to determine which terminals on the preamp are the tip, ring, sleeve and second ring. I inserted a TRS-XLR cable into the Lyric jack and used a continuity tester. Matching these up to where they were soldered on the Lyric preamp, here is what I got.



Excuse the chicken scratch.

[Petty1818]

To the OP, I apologize if I missed this but have you tried the K&K + Lyric before? I have been thinking about this set up for a while and would love to hear more feedback. It would be great to hear some actual live samples of this system.

[joeguam]

Originally Posted by Petty1818

To the OP, I apologize if I missed this but have you tried the K&K + Lyric before? I have been thinking about this set up for a while and would love to hear more feedback. It would be great to hear some actual live samples of this system.

I've never tried this combination before in any of my guitars. The only thing I've done successfully was this: http://www.acousticguitarforum.com/f...d.php?t=319114

I'll be posting the following sound samples via soundcloud once I get the final recording completed (hopefully by this weekend):

Originally Posted by joeguam

- Guitar only through a TASCAM DR05 condenser recorder
- Guitar through the Taylor ES and a Bose L1 compact with flat EQ, recorded with a TASCAM DR05 about 12 inches from the L1 speaker array
- Guitar through the K&K Pure Mini Passive and a Bose L1 compact with flat EQ, recorded with a TASCAM DR05 about 12 inches from the L1 speaker array
- Guitar through the Lyric and a Bose L1 compact with flat EQ, recorded with a TASCAM DR05 about 12 inches from the L1 speaker array
- Guitar through the K&K Pure Mini Ultra Preamp only and a Bose L1 compact with flat EQ, recorded with a TASCAM DR05 about 12 inches from the L1 speaker array
- Guitar through the K&K Pure Mini + Lyric blended and a Bose L1 compact with flat EQ, recorded with a TASCAM DR05 about 12 inches from the L1 speaker array

Not sure if you saw this, but Ryan started a really good thread with a lot of info of his testing and review: http://www.acousticguitarforum.com/f...d.php?t=319030

You'll also find links to Doug Young's great work and testing.

[joeguam]

Here's the layout of the ES endblock assembly plug, along with the assignment of each lead.

[joeguam]

Here is how I connected the leads back to the Lyric preamp, there's a very tiny terminal exposed and I was able to solder right to it. This solder joint is very fragile, so I was sure to be careful with it.



Used a small zip time to secure the preamp cover.

[joeguam]

Here's how I attempted to mount the original Taylor knobs to the new pots. I mixed up a bit of JB Weld to stick the new 7mm nuts to the 8mm Taylor bushings. This hack worked like a charm with my 114ce, I figured why not do it again.





Unfortunately this did not work because as I tightened the bushing on the pot, the nut just came off. I tried using JB Weld, Gorilla epoxy and CA glue...none of them held.

[joeguam]

Here are the pots all connected. You'll just have to figure out which points are the input/ouput/ground. I'm not really sure which points on the circuit board are which, I just did some testing and found the right ones. Here's a little trick I found: If you hold the preamp circuit board with the volume pot "up", the 3 points of the bass/treble pots form a triangle. Connect the single point closest to the volume slider to the middle terminal of your pot, then the left terminals together, and then the right. This might be confusing, but its the only way I can describe it.



Here's what the bushings look like when screwed on the pot using the nut that was just epoxied. Again, this did not work.

[joeguam]

From an earlier post, you now that I had problems with my PCB circuit. So I ditched it and used the very old-school method and connected/tested each join as I wired them together. This worked perfectly.



So I soldered all the wire twists and cleaned it up.