I bought an old Kay Guitar off of ebay:
I took it to a luthier and got it converted to lefty (it's a curse). I've recently been toying with the idea of putting a pickup in. Now, I'm not sure that I want an acoustic pickup. I want to throw an electric pickup in. Does anybody have any suggestions for the type of pickup I should put in? I'm thinking about putting in one of http://store.guitarfetish.com/Nashville-Minitron-Humbucker--Chrome-Neck-position-_p_1950.html <- those in, but I'm not sure how it would sound.
I'm also worried that drilling holes in my guitar might affect the sound.
Sorry this isn't really the most technical question, but I'd love some input.
-Nick
One chord is fine.
Two you're pushing it.
Three and you're into jazz.
Just my two cents, but that pickup is going to cause you some serious problems if you try to do it yourself.
For starters, it's designed to be mounted on the top - and the top of an arch top is pretty thin. You're not going to have much structural support. On top of that, mounting hardware directly on the top plate causes major changes in the Chladni vibrations (how the top generates sound), and it's going to dramatically change the guitar's tone. And on top of that, you're going to be prone to feedback - as the magnets in the pickup are attracted to the strings, the pickup tends to move (and move the top along with it) when the strings vibrate - since this is in exact sympathy with the string vibration, it keeps reinforcing itself, and a screech starts. Arch top guitars designed from scratch to have electromagnetic pickups have a solid block of wood inside that connects the top to the back, which serves to keep the top from 'floating' in response to string movement.
If you've absolutely got to plug the thing in, I figure you've got three options that make sense:
1. Install a piezo pickup under the saddle. I don't know if your bridge is glued on, or if it's held in place with string tension - and my money would be on the latter - which makes this a little tougher, but do-able. You'd wire the input jack to the endpin.
2. Install a pair of transducer pickups (essentially microphones) by the F-holes. Here's one option along those lines.
3. Install a floating pickup. Floating pickups don't mount on the top - they attach to the side of the pickguard, and simply hang there in space above the top. That's the traditional (since the 1930s) way to amplify an arch top. If you Google floating pickup you'll find at least a dozen folks who make them. You'll have to drill a couple holes in the pickguard, but that's probably the quickest and cleanest way to get it done. You'll probably want to mount the controls on the pickguard too - look at this page (scroll about 1/2 way down to the section on control and wiring kits and you'll see how it could be done
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