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Easy DIY Magnetic Coil Pickup for you CBG from a "Wallwart" Transformer.

video Easy DIY Magnetic Coil Pickup for you CBG from a "Wallwart" Transformer.

In this video, I show how you can easily make a magnetic coil pickup for your Cigar Box Guitar from the coil in an easy to find 12volt "wallwart" transformer. The tone is great, and the output is high. The process is relatively easy, but involves using sharp implements. Please be careful! I am not responsible if you hurt yourself while attempting this!

4 comments

Jan 25, 2012. 6:53 AM

crapflinger says:

do you have any pictures of a pickup with the magnets and such in place? it's kind of difficult to understand exactly where you're placing the magnets. also do you have a schematic for your mixer circuit? also, what are the values of the potentiometers you're using?

Jan 25, 2012. 10:24 AMDarwins_Deathcat (author) says:

Hi there... No, I didn't take pictures during the build process, but I'm planning to do another one soon, and I'll try to take pictures of that one. Basically, there is a coil of wire around a hollow plastic spool. You just put the magnets inside the spool

I don't have a wiring diagram, but essentially, you just connect the hot leads from both pickups, each in series with a low ohmage resitor (100 ohms or so), directly to the hot pin of the output jack, and ground everything with a star grounding on the output jack's ground pin.

I am using 100kohm audio (log) taper pots.

Hope that helps!

Jan 25, 2012. 11:14 AM

crapflinger says:

So, the magnets are towards the top of the coil? just working off my knowledge of commercially constructed pickups, the magnets tend to be on the top, and their proximity to the strings guages how sensitive the pickup is. so, in your demo unit, i'm assuming the magnets are stuck to the tape that's covering the coil?

so, from the pickups to the two pots (individually) to the jack (together)

i think you're the first person to say "ohmage".

Jan 25, 2012. 4:56 PMDarwins_Deathcat (author) says:

Yup! you got it. They are just taped right at the top. I bought some really strong neodymium magnets from mouser electronics. I don't remember the part number, but they are about half inch tall cylinders with about a quarter inch diameter. I stacked two on top of eachother, and installed two of these columns in the coil, one on each side of the hole in the coil. The hole is rectangular in shape.

Yes, output from the pickups to the pots, from the pots to the output together. This simple passive mixer is all you need.

I do hope it's me! I love coining new terms! :)