12/16/2023 0 Comments Piezo electric pickups![]() So actually neither sounds exactly like an acoustic guitar. It's a sort of three steps closer, two steps further away thing… magnetic pickups produce the right type of signal but from the wrong part of the string so can't reproduce all the harmonics evenly and correctly, piezo bridge pickups produce the right harmonics but because the phase is wrong, give the wrong type of signal and are overly sensitive to the pick attack. (And are quite prone to feedback, which is why they aren't automatically the best choice, as they might at first seem to be.) Undersaddle piezo *bridge* pickups have become associated with acoustic sounds because they sense the string movement at the bridge, rather than at some point along its length, so they correspond more to *where* an acoustic guitar string drives the body and hence its harmonic content. If anything, sensing movement produces a more natural acoustic sound, because that's how the strings drive the body of an acoustic guitar! Piezo *contact* pickups do sound quite natural because they sense the movement of the body, even though they still produce the 'wrong' type of signal. These signals are actually 90º out of phase with each other. A piezo senses the string (or body movement) *pressure*, ie it produces the greatest signal when the string is at its highest (or lowest) point, at the ends of its travel. ![]() A magnetic senses the string *movement*, ie it produces the greatest signal when the string is moving fastest, in the middle of its travel. What this means is that the signal they produce as the string vibrates is totally different from a magnetic pickup. They can also be used as contact mics because the inertia of the pickup itself will produce pressure at its surface when whatever it's mounted on vibrates. Usually they're fitted between the bridge saddle and whatever supports it, so the pressure on them varies as the strings vibrate up and down. Piezo pickups don't actually sense the *movement* of the wood or even the strings, they sense pressure.
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