#1
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K&K Pure Mini Dilemma
Hi all, so I have several nice guitars with the basic K&K Pure Minis installed. My dilemma is that they all have a somewhat different balance of lows, mods, highs, and volume- making it difficult to swap between guitars when playing live. I’m not sure how to address the problem. My luthier installed these at separate times over the course of a couple years which is probably the source of the issue (there was no real control to judge the install by). My question is how to address the problem. Separate preamps for each guitar? (I’m only using one as of now.) Have someone reinstall the pickups to better match one another? Thanks in advance
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“One who is content with what he has, and who accepts the fact that he inevitably misses very much in life, is far better off than one who has much more but who worries about all he may be missing." -Thomas Merton |
#2
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SBTs are notorious for sounding different in different guitars, it's just the nature that type of pickup. I doubt your luthier could have done anything to dial in the tone - with K&K's there's no real way to preview the sound, you superglue them in, and the second the glue hits, you'd locked in. They're also fairly forgiving of exact placement, so unless he did something drastically divergent from the instructions, you're just seeing how SBTs vary in how they act in different guitars. I don't know how someone would reinstall them to match the sound to another guitar.
Two approaches I can think of: 1) treat it as a good thing. The reason we have multiple guitars is to have different sounds, so pick your guitar to match the song, or whatever. 2) get a programmable EQ (or learn that the manual EQ change is and make it on your amplification system) so you can tweak for each guitar.
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Music: Spotify, Bandcamp Videos: You Tube Channel Books: Hymns for Fingerstyle Guitar (std tuning), Christmas Carols for Fingerstyle Guitar (std tuning), A DADGAD Christmas, Alternate Tunings book Online Course: Alternate Tunings for Fingerstyle Guitar Last edited by Doug Young; 06-21-2019 at 02:47 PM. |
#3
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The K&K is the constant, the guitars are the variable.
Use two cables into separate channels.
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Silly Moustache, Just an old Limey acoustic guitarist, Dobrolist, mandolier and singer. I'm here to try to help and advise and I offer one to one lessons/meetings/mentoring via Zoom! |
#4
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A digital pedal where you can store separate EQ settings will cover this problem (I actually went digital for a few gigs before I discovered my installation problem with my first HFN...now I'm back to Boss pedals).
I've been intrigued by the Source Audio Programmable EQ pedal which has a none menu UI and digital memory. https://www.sourceaudio.net/programmable-eq.html
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jf45ir Free DIY Acoustic Guitar IR Generator .wav file, 30 seconds, pickup left, mic right, open position strumming best...send to direct email below I'll send you 100/0, 75/25, 50/50 & 0/100 IR/Bypass IRs IR Demo, read the description too: https://youtu.be/SELEE4yugjE My duo's website and my email... [email protected] Jon Fields |
#5
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ToneDexter would also likely fix you up, making each guitar sound like itself - which might be different, but presumably reflect why you bought each guitar.
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Music: Spotify, Bandcamp Videos: You Tube Channel Books: Hymns for Fingerstyle Guitar (std tuning), Christmas Carols for Fingerstyle Guitar (std tuning), A DADGAD Christmas, Alternate Tunings book Online Course: Alternate Tunings for Fingerstyle Guitar |
#6
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I like the fact that each guitar sounds different- that’s ultimately why I went the whole SBT route. The issue is that they’re all out of whack balance wise... the mids in my AJ are reaaally forward, the lows in my D35 are almost lacking, the highs in my 000-18 are really bright (though it’s my darkest sounding guitar). These frequencies aren’t true to the sounds that each guitar makes acoustically- they’re more like anomalies in the vibrations that result in different frequencies really jumping out. There’s also about an 8db drop in output with my D35 compared to the other two (even though acoustically it’s my loudest guitar).
It seems like I should just get a separate preamp for each to dial in the EQ and output needs of each. The real guitar is somewhere in the sound presented, but major EQ is sometimes necessary to coax it out
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“One who is content with what he has, and who accepts the fact that he inevitably misses very much in life, is far better off than one who has much more but who worries about all he may be missing." -Thomas Merton Last edited by garyboy2024; 06-21-2019 at 04:30 PM. |
#7
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With a line 6 helix stomp you can pre eq
each guitar and save them as presets. then at a gig a simple footswitch will toggle between presets. Its only money.. I have one and toggle between guitar mandolin and bass. Now there is three extremes. |
#8
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Quote:
But in general, no one's pickups are "true to the sounds of the guitar", and assuming there's no technical problem, what you're just reporting is just that you have multiple guitars where that's the case, which won't surprise anyone who's struggled to get a good amplified sound (which is everybody :-). You hear the sound of the guitar from outside, the pickup "hears" the vibration of the bridge plate. They can be very different. Assuming there's no install or functional issues, the thing that does the best job of making your pickup sound like your guitar is ToneDexter. It's like a super-EQ that can learn what your guitar sounds like from the outside and make your pickup match. It won't fix a broken pickup, or string balance problems, but otherwise it will hands down beat anything you can do with an EQ.
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Music: Spotify, Bandcamp Videos: You Tube Channel Books: Hymns for Fingerstyle Guitar (std tuning), Christmas Carols for Fingerstyle Guitar (std tuning), A DADGAD Christmas, Alternate Tunings book Online Course: Alternate Tunings for Fingerstyle Guitar Last edited by Doug Young; 06-21-2019 at 11:06 PM. |
#9
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One inexpensive way to help this out - use an external small diaphragm condenser for about 60-70 percent of your signal and just use the K&k to fill in (mostly with the low end) This will give you a lot more of the true sound of each instrument and may help with the imbalances you've noted in your pickups.
You will learn the best sounding placements on each guitar and by moving slightly you may get added help with the way you would like them to sound. Just a thought (and what I've been doing for over 15 years now!
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"One small heart, and a great big soul that's driving" Last edited by fitness1; 06-24-2019 at 05:09 AM. |
#10
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Depends on how much effort you want to put in. A good EQ box (such as a Grace Design Alix - I use a Felix with all my guitars and they all have a variety of K&K’s installed) and spend time (in advance) figuring out the settings for each and then write each up on a card or take a picture of the settings and whenever you change instruments you know exactly what retro change, I use a Felix ($$$) which has 2 channels so both of my instruments are preset when I play
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Custom Breedlove 12 string guitar Breedlove Deschutes 6 string guitar Deering 12 string banjo Custom Emerald X20-12 guitar |
#11
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I like Doug's idea of the ToneDexter. If that is too much of an investment, just add a small mixer and set each guitar up on a separate channel. The mixer should have at least 3 band eq.
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#12
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I've just started using the Elite Acoustics EAE StompMix X6 digital mixer. Very easy way to preamp/EQ up to 10 different guitars. Plus up to six inputs. Great piece of kit.
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#13
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Quote:
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#14
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Thanks!!! I've been trying to convince my partner to drop that one from our rep since it needs weekly practice to not forget it. Mark Knopfler is playing most of those licks across the strings and I have to go down the neck to stick with the high E and B. BTW, that was a CO-DR1100N2 with a K&K Pure Mini and no equalization more or less straight to the board (house PA at that gig).
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jf45ir Free DIY Acoustic Guitar IR Generator .wav file, 30 seconds, pickup left, mic right, open position strumming best...send to direct email below I'll send you 100/0, 75/25, 50/50 & 0/100 IR/Bypass IRs IR Demo, read the description too: https://youtu.be/SELEE4yugjE My duo's website and my email... [email protected] Jon Fields |
#15
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+2 on the Tonedexter. I perform with four guitars and I have a Tonedexter wavemap for each one. I just change from channel 2 to channel 3 on the dial (or whatever) and there I am. And all the guitars have K&K's in them.
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