Thoughts on installing a piezo bridge (passive vs active)

[ragingplatypi]

I have a strat style guitar with a Baggs X-bridge and built in preamp. I’ve found it to be very practical when using an acoustic IR and other processing in the Helix.

Because of that, I’m thinking about installing a piezo tune-o-matic bridge in my semi-hollow (Harmony Comet). I’m wondering if I really need to have the active preamp if I’ll always be going direct into the Helix. Will the Helix be able to boost my signal enough? Are there other concerns I should be considering?

 

[metropolis_4]

I can tell you my main workhorse acoustic for live work has a passive piezo and it works great. I was in the same situation where I figured I didn’t need the onboard active preamp since I’m always running it through something like a Helix. It’s been working great, and I love that I never have to worry about batteries.

I don’t know about the exact implementation on my guitar or how that would translate over to your situation though.

EDIT:
I just looked it up, my guitar is a Yamaha CSF1M and the piezo in it is a SRT Zero Impact if that’s helpful

 

[DrewJD82]

If ya go through with it make sure ya update here with your findings! I'm curious about this as well!

 

[KHAAAAAAANNNNNNN!!!!!!!!]

I have a strat style guitar with a Baggs X-bridge and built in preamp. I’ve found it to be very practical when using an acoustic IR and other processing in the Helix.

Because of that, I’m thinking about installing a piezo tune-o-matic bridge in my semi-hollow (Harmony Comet). I’m wondering if I really need to have the active preamp if I’ll always be going direct into the Helix. Will the Helix be able to boost my signal enough? Are there other concerns I should be considering?

This is my Strat with passive GraphTech Ghost saddles direct in to an FM9.

I had an X-Bridge (also passive), but the saddles corroded and some of them stopped working.

 

[ragingplatypi]

This is my Strat with passive GraphTech Ghost saddles direct in to an FM9.

I had an X-Bridge (also passive), but the saddles corroded and some of them stopped working.

That sounds great! I’d love to know what else you have going on in that patch.

 

[Eagle]

Passive preamps are rarely enough output unless you can boost somewhere else without detrimental noise. Also a passive piezo that is any good passive is not the same as an active one without a preamp fitted. A good compromise is an active intended piezo used with an outboard preamp. This saves you from modifying your instrument much to fit it. The other thing is it will slightly alter the acoustic properties of the guitar and almost always for the worst.

 

[KHAAAAAAANNNNNNN!!!!!!!!]

I don't have access to my FM9 right now. But basically It's compressor, tube preamp, IR's I found here:

Acoustic IR

A bit of chorus, and reverb.

 

[ragingplatypi]

Passive preamps are rarely enough output unless you can boost somewhere else without detrimental noise. Also a passive piezo that is any good passive is not the same as an active one without a preamp fitted. A good compromise is an active intended piezo used with an outboard preamp. This saves you from modifying your instrument much to fit it. The other thing is it will slightly alter the acoustic properties of the guitar and almost always for the worst.

This leads to the next rabbit hole I’m going down, trying to figure out the difference between the $40 and $200 bridges.

 

[Eagle]

This leads to the next rabbit hole I’m going down, trying to figure out the difference between the $40 and $200 bridges.

Most piezo pickups are on their own terrible. Only saved by the ability of the preamp and even then don’t bring any of the attributes of the instrument beyond sustain. Then their presence is detrimental to that.
You should mostly be looking and the build quality and materials used in the rest of the tunamatic.

 

[JasonE]

I have 6 guitars with piezo systems in them. Two of them are acoustic guitars with Fishman systems in them. All of mine have batteries in them because they are active. The batteries last a really long time in them, unless you mess up and leave the cord plugged into the guitar for long periods of time. I run the piezo through either a Fishman Aura or a Fly Rig Acoustic live and they sound good. I also built a patch in my FM9 that runs it through an acoustic IR and then uses a compressor and a light reverb and a light slap back delay. This sounds great as well. I have not had the opportunity to use it in a live situation but into my DAW it sounds good. I would go with an active system.

 

[Eagle]

I have 6 guitars with piezo systems in them. Two of them are acoustic guitars with Fishman systems in them. All of mine have batteries in them because they are active. The batteries last a really long time in them, unless you mess up and leave the cord plugged into the guitar for long periods of time. I run the piezo through either a Fishman Aura or a Fly Rig Acoustic live and they sound good. I also built a patch in my FM9 that runs it through an acoustic IR and then uses a compressor and a light reverb and a light slap back delay. This sounds great as well. I have not had the opportunity to use it in a live situation but into my DAW it sounds good. I would go with an active system.

The pickups themselves are not actually active on any. The only difference is the output of one’s designed to not need a preamp have more output.
This is why you can get the preamps outboard for many systems.

 

[JasonE]

The pickups themselves are not actually active on any. The only difference is the output of one’s designed to not need a preamp have more output.
This is why you can get the preamps outboard for many systems.

I don't mind having a battery in the guitar to run it. They last a long time. The guitars I have that have them that I don't play as often, I just remove it and leave it in the pocket of the case. That way when I pull that guitar into rotation I just put the battery back in it.

 

[Eagle]

I don't mind having a battery in the guitar to run it. They last a long time. The guitars I have that have them that I don't play as often, I just remove it and leave it in the pocket of the case. That way when I pull that guitar into rotation I just put the battery back in it.

That’s not the issue. It’s the modification required to accommodate the board , controls and battery.

 

[vard]

I have tons of experience with this stuff. I designed, built and sold several types of piezo and mag preamps, so here's the $1,000 question: how long do you need your guitar cable to be?

A guitar cable has capacitance (roughly 35pF/ft on a good quality guitar cable, like the Mogami brand, etc.).
The cable's capacitance interacts with passive guitar pickups, both the magnetic and the piezo type.

Piezo pickups have much higher impedance than the magnetic pickups and most of them also output lower signal levels, so a few things are going to be noticeable right away when using a longer cable with a passive piezo pickup:

- The high end of the frequency spectrum will start to roll off
- The sensitivity to external noise sources (fluorescent lights, dimmers, etc.) goes up
- On some cheap guitar cables, because the source impedance (the piezo pickup's impedance) is so high, you will start hearing noises whenever you move or touch the cable (mechanical noises will make it into the audio path)

A preamp or any active piezo system will get rid of the cable problems, but if you're using a piezo system with a good quality cable of a relatively short length and you play mostly at home or in a studio, you can get a very decent sound without the use of an active system installed in your guitar or a dedicated piezo preamp.

On the other hand, if you're playing on stage or on a venue with lots of noise sources around you (stage lighting system, etc.), I would recommend either an active system or at least a preamp on the guitar cable.

Also, note that there's a big difference from one piezo system to another. Based on my experience: cheaper bridges may or may not work well, it's always a hit and miss, but I always got better and more consistent results from brand names (Fishman, LR Baggs, RMC, Graphtech Ghost bridges, etc.).
I used to buy the cheaper ones from Aliexpress, even built my own transducers for while, etc., but in the end I gave up on doing this, not worth the effort. These days I'm only using high quality bridges and I design and build my own preamps and active systems. In my opinion, a good quality piezo bridge is well worth the money, regardless of how you're going to use it (passive or active).

 

[ragingplatypi]

I have tons of experience with this stuff. I designed, built and sold several types of piezo and mag preamps, so here's the $1,000 question: how long do you need your guitar cable to be?

A guitar cable has capacitance (roughly 35pF/ft on a good quality guitar cable, like the Mogami brand, etc.).
The cable's capacitance interacts with passive guitar pickups, both the magnetic and the piezo type.

Piezo pickups have much higher impedance than the magnetic pickups and most of them also output lower signal levels, so a few things are going to be noticeable right away when using a longer cable with a passive piezo pickup:

- The high end of the frequency spectrum will start to roll off
- The sensitivity to external noise sources (fluorescent lights, dimmers, etc.) goes up
- On some cheap guitar cables, because the source impedance (the piezo pickup's impedance) is so high, you will start hearing noises whenever you move or touch the cable (mechanical noises will make it into the audio path)

A preamp or any active piezo system will get rid of the cable problems, but if you're using a piezo system with a good quality cable of a relatively short length and you play mostly at home or in a studio, you can get a very decent sound without the use of an active system installed in your guitar or a dedicated piezo preamp.

On the other hand, if you're playing on stage or on a venue with lots of noise sources around you (stage lighting system, etc.), I would recommend either an active system or at least a preamp on the guitar cable.

Also, note that there's a big difference from one piezo system to another. Based on my experience: cheaper bridges may or may not work well, it's always a hit and miss, but I always got better and more consistent results from brand names (Fishman, LR Baggs, RMC, Graphtech Ghost bridges, etc.).
I used to buy the cheaper ones from Aliexpress, even built my own transducers for while, etc., but in the end I gave up on doing this, not worth the effort. These days I'm only using high quality bridges and I design and build my own preamps and active systems. In my opinion, a good quality piezo bridge is well worth the money, regardless of how you're going to use it (passive or active).

Thanks for the insight. Being that the piezo is all about playing out, your caveats are helpful to hear.