Official Luthiers Forum!

I've seen some really interesting solutions for access ports and sound ports and was wondering if anyone is doing anything to hide the 9v battery for an acoustic pickup. I know they can be tucked inside the guitar but that seems like a lot of work for a player down the road.

I'm working on a build now that will have two types of pickups one of which will require a 9v battery and want to avoid any visible plastic while still giving the player access without removing or slacking the strings.

I am in the idea phase now and will continue to look for inspiration. This place is full of it (it = inspiration)!!!

Thanks in advance,
_Mike

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_Mike Tracz
MCT Guitars
https://www.instagram.com/mustcreatethings/
https://www.youtube.com/mustcreatethings

Phrasing, Mike!

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"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

Well played Chris! Noted and edited.

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_Mike Tracz
MCT Guitars
https://www.instagram.com/mustcreatethings/
https://www.youtube.com/mustcreatethings

I think it was right the first time

You could add an oval soundhole in the upper bout large enough to slip the battery in and velcro it to the inside of the side. You'd have to go looking for it to really notice it.

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Bryan Bear PMoMC

Take care of your feet, and your feet will take care of you.

Pickups? Pickups?
We don't need no stinkin' pickups...

Couldn't resist.....

This doesn't answer your question about hiding the battery but I had kind of the reverse problem. A guy asked me to install a device called a "Sustainiac" in an electric guitar that had an active humbucking pickup. The active pickup had a battery but it was inside a cover plate that required removing screws, the sustaining device actively powers a feedback circuit that requires its own battery. The owner said that if the sustaining battery dies during a gig the guitar will still work but just not doing what he wants, if the pickup battery dies he is dead in the water.

I won't go thru all the hassle to route out the guitar (it was a flying Vee clone) but I decided to (1) make it easy to access and change the batteries and (2) install a little digital voltmeter and switch that would let the player check the batteries before each gig and decide if they need changing. Ended up looking like this

If you don't mind an extra hole in the top you could hide it under a pickguard that is held on by small neodymium magnets. You would need to rework the bracing some, or use a pickguard that extends into the upper bout (less active) area as some of the Gibson pickguards do. If you make the battery box so the battery sits in it "end on" to the top the hole wouldn't have to be too big.

I had thought of the same issue for a previous project and was looking at putting a removable section in the tail wedge next to the back. Similar to what Clay recommended I was going to install the battery "end on" and use small neodymium magnets to hold the removable cover in place. We ended up putting a 9V power supply outside and using a phantom power setup.

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Not that I want to squelch innovation, but can I offer this caution? Other than reaming out the end pin hole to accommodate a strap jack, and drilling a hole in the saddle slot for a wire to an undersaddle transducer, every new hole you put in an acoustic guitar runs a risk that your guitar will be seen in future years as inextricably tied to a specific pickup technology, and therefore as obsolete as the pickup system it houses. Yes, loosening the strings to deal with a battery change is a hassle, but having your guitar be useless in a few years because it was custom-cut for the XYZ pickup system, which will soon be as out-of-date as a Radio Shack TRS-80 is today, is a bigger problem. Just offering the long term view of this design decision.

Unless you are playing Jimi Hendrix screech on an acoustic guitar, a dang good mic or two is the best "transducer" for acoustics.
Even Jimi never played screech on his Larson...

If technology marches on patching a hole under a pickguard, or even better, under an end wedge as Steve suggested might be a fairly undetectable repair. You could hold the wedge on place with the guitar strap button if you didn't want to mess with magnets.
But I agree with you Don, and sometimes wonder if the "soundport" craze started when people removed those side mounted pick up controls and left a big hole.

I remember reading about Ricky Skaggs back in the 1980s, cutting a big rectangular hole in a vintage Martin so he could install whatever was the hottest pickup fad at the time. I think it was a pickup from a Takamine, one of those huge control panel thingies. Do you think he regrets that decision today? Odds are he does. And these days, it is totally unnecessary. There are great pickups that only need the normal mods (strap jack and a saddle slot hole). Yep, I'm a curmudgeon. On this issue, anyway.

. . . And taking the tangent with Haans: I think acoustic instrument pickups are overused. Yes, if you are playing acoustic guitar in a group that has a full drum set and a back line with electric guitars, bass, etc., a pickup is probably needed. But if you are playing in an acoustic group with none of that stuff, or solo (just voice and guitar, or just guitar), you really will sound better using a mic and no pickup. I realize that I am fighting decades of brainwashing here, but I am committed to the endeavor of convincing folks to try going without the pickup more often.

BUT, back on the point of the thread: If a pickup is needed, I hold that drilling or cutting noticeable holes in a really nice hand made guitar is a bad long term idea. Use one of the many pickups that don’t need the extra surgery, and the instrument can serve its purpose for many decades to come. Install today’s trendy electronics via destructive means, and the guitar will have a short useful life.

Yea, just tell 'em to buy a Taylor...

Ha ha. I use a K&K which works very well, of course its not as good as a mic, but I play in the middle of a rhythm section in an orchestra and mics just don't work well with all the ambient noise. Not interested in internal batteries and all that stuff. And definitely not interested in a Taylor

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

Well then, Super 4...with big, fat, heavy strings!

Then I'd make the bass player jealous

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Steve Smith
"Music is what feelings sound like"

The Dog...with bass player Brewster Phillips playing a tele.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96weSekmeN0

OK, OK, enough of this banter...

'BUT, back on the point of the thread: If a pickup is needed, I hold that drilling or cutting noticeable holes in a really nice hand made guitar is a bad long term idea."

Willie didn't have a problem installing a pick up and making a big extra hole in his guitar

True! But Trigger is a special case, like the original Les Paul experimental guitar (acoustic body halves screwed to a 4x4). Ugly as sin, but they have character. Character goes a long way.

Thank you all for the replies!!!

I’m going to stick with double stick tape or Velcro on the inside for the 9v battery mount. That way he can take it out or switch at any time. He’ll have reachnin the body to swap the batter but already does on all of his other guitars he plays out with.

Thank you again for all of your responses. You were very helpful!!!

_________________
_Mike Tracz
MCT Guitars
https://www.instagram.com/mustcreatethings/
https://www.youtube.com/mustcreatethings