This whole project actually started with making a Cigar Box Guitar, but veered towards more elaborate designs before I actually put it together. Since I am taking a bit of a pause to write this blog and think up what may be coming next, I figured I should really finish the original cigar box project.
So I glued the neck to the cigar box, glued the rod pickup in place where the bridge is going to rest, connected it to the preamp. I also glued the magnetic pickup in place about 3" up from the bridge (sort of a compromise between a bridge pickup and a neck pickup), and added a separate jack for it.
I just placed the lid on the box and strung up the guitar with the 3 middle strings(1 plain and two nickel wound) using a section of a 3/8" brass threaded rod as the nut, and an old wooden screw as the bridge. There is no need for a hole in the lid. The ruler fretboard is not attached yet. I have some half round 16 gauge brass jewelry wire, so I plan to slightly notch the sides of the stick where the frets would go, and then simply wind it as tight as possible around the yardstick all the way down to create basic very lot "frets/markers". The dots will be the big heads of copper roofing nails attaching the yardstick to the neck.
Let's test it!
Whao! This thing sounds amazing, and is really loud! I particularly like the sound of the piezo pickup under the bridge. In fact, I am amazed at how effective it is with this little preamp and equalizer that control both volume and tone... The tone is really rich, much more complex and interesting than the tone of the magnetic pickup...
Actually, that is leading me to completely revise my original concept. I was planning to use multiple magnetic pickups for the "Polyphonic Music Making Machine". It now seems to me that it would actually sound better, and also be a lot cheaper to build using piezo pickups instead of magnetic pickups. I would, of course, need to build a real soundboard for the instrument, but that merely means using thinner wood for the top of the box.
As a preliminary test to explore possibilities, I had ordered a "zither kit" from Amazon, that I roughly put together yesterday. No attempt at Art or even Design here! But I did use aluminum and brass, and the aluminum soundboard is slightly raised above the wood. I had also ordered several cheap magnetic 6 strings guitar pickups, and stuck one under the strings.
Again, I was amazed by this little setup. The pickup clearly picks up the four strings it is closest to, but also the others. Actually, the strings on the other side of the bridge sound too. It does not seem to matter much that there are 6 magnets, since there is only one coil, and the magnetic field seems to be strong enough to pick up vibrations far beyond the nearest strings.
I will try next to wire two of the same pickups in series, to make it more or less like a long single pickup going across my 7 strings. I also want to test groups of strings tuned as chords. So I ordered a pack of 50 tuning pins to add two heavier strings between each of the existing 7 strings. I will also need a good assortment of string sizes, so I also ordered a bunch of violin strings and a set of cello strings.
However, the impressive result of the Cigar Box piezo pickup test makes me want to test some of these with this simple zither, by placing two of the stick piezosunder the aluminum soundboard, right under the bridge. I will have to try wiring them both in parallel and in series to see what works best. And I will need another one of these little preamps.
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