electrify my Resonator?

[Alamo]

At some occasions I have been wishing my Johnson JM-998 D had a pickup installed.
then I saw the Hot Plate mod, which looked neat & tidy. no cables hanging off it, when not in use and no modification to the instrument.
http://store.nationalguitars.com/hot-plate.aspx
the only downside is the $$$
C'mon, $395 is a lot of money and there's not much to it - or is there?

well I don't have a Lollar pup, but
1 SD Hot for Tele neck pickup and
a Dremel
2 dome knobs
1 jack
only need 2 pots (250k ?) and a capacitor for the tone roll off.

I've measured the depth from plate to cone and the SD pup would still fit if it was flush with the coverplate just so.

has anyone done this? how will it sound?
thoughts?

[Charlie Bernstein]

Cool mod, but how about a mic, instead? See also:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fcYDMHkFtt4

[Alamo]

Well I won't rule out a mic, but in a band situation that pickup could come in handy plus, using some Fx too.

thanks for the Jimmy Driftwood clip - he was a cool guy.

[stevieboy]

I wonder where the ideal pickup placement might be. Most examples I've seen have the pickup in a standard neck position, but that might be for practical reasons, especially on wood bodies.

The National piece is also a practical solution of a different sort, so the whole unit can be packaged on the cone with no altering of the body.

[TNO]

I've found the best placement is fairly close to the cone. For pickups I'd go with one of the little 1/4" thick Harmony DeArmonds or the National/Lace mag pickup.

[gmann]

K & K makes one that looks like it could be the ticket. I have a K & K in my 000 and am thinking about getting one for my National Reso Rocket.
www.kksound.com

[gitarzan]

I did this. There is also a mic on the inside.
Knobs are a blender, vol and tone.
It sound OK except for my playing.
I wish I'd gotten a Tricone instead.

[refin]

Right now I'm in the middle of installing a Fishman Resonator pickup on a spidercone resonator.It's very tricky,you have to tune the spider and cone just perfect with the tension or it will feedback horribly and be nasally thin.

[Tim Bowen]

My duo partner uses a Fishman resonator pickup in his Regal Duolian, and bumps it up with a simple little one knobber MXR Micro Amp boost ped. For the most part, it sounds like a million bucks as DI'ed to a PA. On the few occasions where we've been exceptionally loud, the low mids had a tendency to get away from him and bloom, in which case some additional outboard EQ tweaks were necessary. However, that's mostly nervous nellie talk - it sounds fantastic 99 times out of a hundred.

As I understand it, the tricone/spider thing is exceedingly challenging with a system such as the Fishman. In fact, my mate passed on a tricone instrument for these reasons alone.

I know that I've encountered all sorts of sonic horribleness and snafu with microphone approaches as to otherwise really good dobro players in the live environment. Mic'ing is cool, but unless you're Jerry Douglas (or have sound reinforcement and crew that is accordingly supportive), it's a bit tough to call the shots and predict sonic outcome over a wide variety of live scenarios if you're working in the trenches.

[Sollophonic]

I did this to mine.



It is a jazz archtop pickup designed to be fitted to the end of the fretboard, but what I did was turn it round, slightly open out the corner of the pickup so that the lead came out at less of an angle, mounted it to two of the small sieve holes in the coverplate with small locking bolts and nuts, and ran the wire through a small hole I drilled in the cone-well. The jack socket is fitted into one of the round holes in the f-holes, with felt washers to stop the scket coming loose.

Close up


I did this so that should I want to I can return the guitar to its former state, as such the only mod it has is one small hidden hole in the cone well, and the pickup lead passes under the slightly raised edge of the coverplate.

Nice warm sound through a valve amp.

Its a lovely resonator this one, got it from www.buskerguitars.co.uk

Very accurate copy of an early 1930s 14 fret Style O, and sounds glorious. Theres not a day goes by that I dont play this guitar

[Alamo]

Very nice, Sollophonic.
that must be a slim pickup... or you have more clearance to the strings than i have.
I have a fairly flat Lawrence pickup which fits into the soundhole of a standard acoustic. it's only 1 cm in height, but the strings would just touch it on the Reso.

so I guess I'll still aim at doing the Hot Plate mod.
i need to figure out which dremel bit cuts best though - don't want to mess it up.
also, what sound is there to be expected with a Seymore Duncan "Hot for Tele" pup?
the position won't be far off yours.
a harmonic flageolet node seems to be just above your pup placement, towards the neck. is that right?

[Sollophonic]

Alamo,

The pickup I fitted is about 1cm thick, so it is not that thin. However unlike a lot of lower priced resos, my Busker has a nice steep neck angle, which not only gives a good string break angle over the biscuit bridge and the ability to really dig in with your playing, but also means that the strings are quite high off the front of the body. Not high enough to fit the pickup to the fretboard end but, in the location I have put it it gives well enough clearance.

There are two other pickups that may suit. One is the FlatBucker, which is made in Germany , the other is the Lace Sensor.

Try this link
http://www.buskerguitars.co.uk/shop/...YZ&shop_param=

Also Kent Armstrong do something called a SlimBucker.

Dont know much about harmonic nodes for pickup placement, I simply put it in the best place for what I wanted to achieve with it, which was amplification, yet ability to return the guitar to its original state.

I looked into making my own hotplate, but the National one is specially designed coverplate, with a pickup slot where a set of soundhole would normally be. Also dont forget that any pickup you put into a hotplate cant be too deep, as it could get in the way of the cone. It will also be at a slight angle unless you can get a fairly flat coverplate.

One thought I had for a hotplate idea, was to use a tele bridge pickup instead of a tele neck one. Then you have three point adjustment and probably better tone as well. Just my opinion.

[brandt]

My main guitars are Nationals and I use a mic. I have played a guitar with the HotPlate and it is an elegant solution. I had a Style O for a while that had a Lace pup that was placed at the end of the fret board on the metal body and it sounded FANTASTIC.

see guitar on left - Lace

[jim_pridx]

I installed the Hot-Plate, and so far I'm quite happy with it. BTW, for those who are concerned about the price of these things, you can get them directly through Mike Dowling for 20% less. It's a considerable savings.

Link to Mike's site: http://www.mikedowling.com/natRes.html

[Alamo]

Originally Posted by jim_pridx

I installed the Hot-Plate, and so far I'm quite happy with it. BTW, for those who are concerned about the price of these things, you can get them directly through Mike Dowling for 20% less. It's a considerable savings.

Link to Mike's site: http://www.mikedowling.com/natRes.html

Thanks for the perfect picture, jim_pridx. it will be very usefull as a template.
by any chance, did you take any pics of the backside of the Hot Plate, before installing it?
so that will be a Lollar pickup, right? are they the same size as a Tele pickup?
it really looks perfect - neat & tidy ...and functional.
I hope to be at it when the weather gets back to normal (heatwave & thunderstorms ain't my thing )

and yes, I've seen that link to Mike Dowling - that's more like it.
but still, I'll be wincing when buying only the pots. yeah, it's that bad.

thanks all around.

[jim_pridx]

Hey Alamo,

Yeah, the Lollar is a "Special T," and it's exactly the same pickup as I have in one of my Teles. I'm not quite sure why National and Mike Dowling settled on this particular model, but I've found it to be quite clean when needed, and it can get pretty growly and nasty if you want it to as well. I would imagine that any standard Tele pickup that isn't too deep would fit easily.

It is indeed neat and tidy. It only took me about 10 or 15 minutes to switch cover plates and I was done. Just plug in and go. Sorry to say, though, I didn't take any photos of the back side of the Hot-Plate. In general, it has two mini pots (volume & tone), the Lollar pup, and a 1/4" jack that's elevated above the plate as you can see in the front photo. I'm sure these components were chosen and installed so that they wouldn't penetrate too far into the cone area. Obviously a standard 1/4" jack or double-stacked humbucking pickup wouldn't work on the Hot-Plate. Standard Tele pots might be questionable as well.

All in all, I think it's a unit that's definitely worth considering. It doesn't capture the instrument 100% in an acoustical sense, but it's not bad, either.

Jim

[PeteMac]

G'day, Alamo.

It seems like you've decided on the HotPlate type solution to your problem, and I can see that it's a pretty good all-round solution to electrifying a Reso.
I was looking to amp up my Regal metal body biscuit cone a while back and was looking at all the magnetic pick-up ideas. I finally decided I wanted to get as close to the "real" sound of the guitar as possible, so I went for a Schatten cone transducer (after hearing sound-clips.)
The only mod to the body was replacing the end strap pin to the one supplied ( for the plug jack ) and it's a winner !
I run it through my regular pedalboard ( using my clean boost pedal as a pre-amp ) - and straight into my DRRI. I can add dirt or trem as I please and it still sounds like a "real" reso when clean.

I suppose it depends on whether you need the option of sounding like a "natural, clean" acoustic reso or not.

Good luck.

[Alamo]

Hi folks, just wanted to say I finally got 'round to do the Hot Plate mod - today.
my friends gig coming up on Friday helped to get it done.
they want me to sit in for a couple o' songs with the Reso. I don't know if it's mics or amps or acoustic - so I thought I'd better be prepared and get it done NOW!

anyone familiar with projects getting postponed? hehe

I haven't played over the amp much, but so far it's jolly good.
some rehearsals tomorrow and pics.
later.

[Alamo]

I plugged the Reso into the keyboarders active monitor at rehearsal today.
all band members agreed that it kept it's natural sound quite good when it's clean.
great options to use stomp boxes, electronic tuners and monitors though.

a small problem is a buzzing wire when I play the D-string.
hope to sort that out with some aluminum adhesive.

btw, the pick-up is a Seymour Duncan STR-2, Hot Rhythm for Telecaster.
...and oh, it's 5-string open G, if yer wondering where the E-string went
some pics:

[jim_pridx]

Dang.....that appears to be a pretty clean mod! Good job! And it has the chicken claw cover, too! Do the electronics clear the cone ok? I noticed that the Hot-Plate has an elevated 1/4" jack so that the male cable jack clears the cone.

Regarding sound, mine doesn't exactly replicate the sound of it acoustically, but I find it very acceptable for what I do. The band guys I play with would like to see me use it more often.

[Alamo]

Well the first 1/4" jack I had was a good quality one - but it was a hair too tall.
so I had to use a flimsy one out of my parts bin. you know the ones that get bent when you just look at them ;)
but it is shorter and works so far....(knock on wood)
the screws that came with the pup were too long to clear the cone also. no biggie though. the mini pots fitted snuggly into the chicken claw cover, no drilling required and just a little reaming for the jack.
the hardest part was the free hand dremeling (gremling ) for the pickup. not my best job, in fact it's not 100% straight

regarding the sound, I just played over my all tube SF Champ - now that's a coloured sound, not natural at all - opposed to the keyboard active monitor.
totally different thing altogether.
I'm still trying to figure out if I should do the gig with a parametric EQ into the DI box then PA & monitors or if should take a small amp
...and it's only going to be 2 songs....decision, decisions

[jim_pridx]

Well, it looks pretty cool to me! Have fun!