Sustain without hash

[seedlings]

Looking for a circuit that will sustain for maybe 10 seconds or so, but not hash up the signal with white noise, for playing single note slow melodic-type stuff.  Will a Fuzz do this without noise?  I don't want something like the EHX freeze or a feedback distortion type, just overdriven and/or compressed without the "shhhhhhhh".

Simpler the better.

Current setup is a Danelectro Fish & Chips EQ > Rogue Vintage Compressor > VS J&H > Digitech Expression Factory > Biyang Tri-reverb > Digitech Jamman Looper > DIY tube amp

I kind of have everything set the way I want it, so this is an additional piece.

CHAD

[Gurner]

That's a tall order not losing your signal into white noise after 10 seconds...

I reckon the only way you'll accomplish that, is by putting some energy back into the string (acoustically or electromagnetically ...eg a sustainer)...else what you've got is likely a signal that doesn't sustain much past 4 or 6 seconds that's useable.

[seedlings]

That's a tall order not losing your signal into white noise after 10 seconds...

I reckon the only way you'll accomplish that, is by putting some energy back into the string (acoustically or electromagnetically ...eg a sustainer)...else what you've got is likely a signal that doesn't sustain much past 4 or 6 seconds that's useable.

Drat.  What gets the closest?  I have an ebow, but it practically overdrives the pickups and I'm too fumbly using it, especially switching strings.

CHAD

[Mark Hammer]

Consider the Line 6 Dr Distorto, which is a sort of digital update on the old Boss DF-2 Distortion Feedbacker.  I see in the current issue of Premier Guitar that Boss also has what appears to be a digital update on the same pedal, the FB-2: http://www.bossus.com/gear/productdetails.php?ProductId=1181

The DF-2 was intended to simulate sustained feedback, although one can blend how much of the fundamental vs the overtone/octave you want to be held.  Behringer makes a clone of this long discontinued pedal.  I don't know what the FB-2 does, so you might consider looking up the usual Youtube demo videos.

Finally, consider the EHX Freeze, which is also a digital pedal and can "hold" somethng you've played for as long as you want.  It works like a sort of "microlooper" rather than generating a synthesized note as the other pedals I've mentioned.

[Paul Marossy]

Put a "sustainiac" pickup system in your guitar. 

[seedlings]

Put a "sustainiac" pickup system in your guitar. 

Not sure I want to do that to the Fly Deluxe. 

With the freeze or the distortion sustain you have to hold the pedal each note.  I may as well practice more with the ebow.

CHAD

[artifus]

http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=93541.0

[seedlings]

http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=93541.0

Hurdy-Gurdy!

[artifus]

or try a real bow. can often be found quite cheap second hand. fun on cymbals and saws too.

[deadastronaut]

yay! another 'sustain' thread...great!.


tiny ebow's  x 6....

[Ben N]

There's always the old-fashioned way--with a singing, saturated 100 watt amp moving lots of air in close proximity to your guitar strings!

[DavenPaget]

There's always the old-fashioned way--with a singing, saturated 100 watt amp moving lots of air in close proximity to your guitar strings!

Of course what you mean is , FEEDBACK !

[Mark Hammer]

Put a "sustainiac" pickup system in your guitar.  

Not sure I want to do that to the Fly Deluxe.  

With the freeze or the distortion sustain you have to hold the pedal each note.  I may as well practice more with the ebow.

CHAD

T'wer I, I'd rather leave my hands as free as possible to do things with the strings.  If I can subcontract anything to my feet, I'm happy to do so.

[Gurner]

There's always the old-fashioned way--with a singing, saturated 100 watt amp moving lots of air in close proximity to your guitar strings!

Of course what you mean is , FEEDBACK !

As I said earlier..

I reckon the only way you'll accomplish that, is by putting some energy back into the string (acoustically....

What everyone calls feedback, I view as (normally) uncontrolled string resonance....learn to contain it & you've as much sustain as you want! (but your neighbours might not see the funny side)

[seedlings]

yay! another 'sustain' thread...great!.


tiny ebow's  x 6....

My apologies friend!  I read through some sustain-topic threads from the search, and since they were kind of old, and didn't answer my question directly... I asked directly.  And I understand why there was no clear answer via pedal.  Well, a sustain pickup may come upon my wish list (I did see a diy thread on that too).

Thanks all-
CHAD

[toneman]

Have U heard of the PAiA Infinity Plus??   

A incandesent bulb compressor that sustains cleanly and for days   
I had one many many many yrs ago.....don't know what happened to it   

Can't find the original PAia manual on the web, but here's some mods with a partial schematic.

http://www.lynx.bc.ca/~jc/pedalsInfinity.html


This page talks about the Infinity Plus and the history of PAiA.

http://sonic.net/mjones/paia/paia.html


IIRC, the complete manual in PDF is over at the Paia-YahooGroups site in the "files" section.
You'll have to join the Group to view the manual.

[Mark Hammer]

The Infinity + was a respectable compressor, but no more than that, and any claims of "sustain for days" should be chalked up to bombastic ad copy not actual functioning.

[DougH]

There's always the old-fashioned way--with a singing, saturated 100 watt amp moving lots of air in close proximity to your guitar strings!

I agree. Turn it up and get some air moving. You don't even need 100 watts.;-) That's always the best way imo.

[deadastronaut]

yay! another 'sustain' thread...great!.


tiny ebow's  x 6....

My apologies friend!  I read through some sustain-topic threads from the search, and since they were kind of old, and didn't answer my question directly... I asked directly.  And I understand why there was no clear answer via pedal.  Well, a sustain pickup may come upon my wish list (I did see a diy thread on that too).

Thanks all-
CHAD

no need to apologise...i wasn't being sarcastic .........and yep that 'diy sustainer' thread is massive...with massive lengthy novel like details..but no definitive result..
by which i mean full sustain all over the fretboard on each string....but hey, it is the diy holy grail imo...

[R.G.]

Looking for a circuit that will sustain for maybe 10 seconds or so, but not hash up the signal with white noise, for playing single note slow melodic-type stuff.  Will a Fuzz do this without noise?  I don't want something like the EHX freeze or a feedback distortion type, just overdriven and/or compressed without the "shhhhhhhh".

This is another of those questions which pop up from time to time that seem like they should be simple, but are not because they run afoul of a natural law or two.

In this case, it's the law of conservation of energy. When you pluck a string, you put energy into it to make it vibrate. A string in a vacuum with perfectly rigid mountings on the ends that is made of a material which has no internal friction would be able to sustain for a long time. In the real world, every movement of the string leaks some of that initial "pluck" energy out into air friction and sound waves as it moves, heating from the internal bending friction, and energy coupled into the mounting points; also a pickup if it has a pickup, the energy being coupled out as the electrical power to move signal down into the controls, jacks and whatever else is there.

All of that put together makes for a constant fraction of the energy being drained out per unit time. It's the exact analog of a pendulum, which swings for a while but runs down. Some of the running-down products like sound waves and conversion to electrical signal are why you're doing this in the first place, so you can never make it ring forever, only longer by taking less energy out.

What that amounts to is that for a given initial "pluck" loading X energy in, Y% of the energy is lost per unit time. Engineers recognize this as an exponential decay, and can tell you from the value of Y (the percent of energy lost per time) how long it will take to delay to some percentage. This is also expressed as the time constant, that being the time to decay to 0.632 of its first value. After five time constants, it's generally conceded to be over with.

A given string/guitar/pickup *will* have a decay time constant of some value.

Compression sustainers fake a long sustain by taking in the signal and comparing it to some output level they want. They adjust the gain up or down to get the output to be the right level. So high input signals are lowered to the reference level, and as the note decays, the gain of the compressor is raised to make the level come out the same. In time, the compressor must lose, because it will spend all of its gain and the signal will still get smaller. The signal also gets hissier as the compressor gain goes up.

Distortion increases the apparent sustain by amplfying the signal up and clipping off the tops at some level. All of those flat tops are the same level, so the signal seems to sustain. But the string signal under it is not being sustained, just amplified and clipped. Again, eventually the signal decays down to where it can't be covered up by clipping, so the sustain disappears, and the noise from all that gain is still with you.

Both of these approaches are like shoveling sand against the tide. They do nothing about the string's energy leaking out. To get really long sustains without the noisy falling-off-the-cliff, you have to concoct some way to pump energy back into the vibrating string. All of these are feedback drivers of one kind or another.

The ebow and its ilk drive the string directly and electromagnetically. Standing in front of a cranked up amp drives the strings acoustically from the sheer air vibrations. You can also drive the mounting points of the string with a speaker coil or some transducer to shake the string mounts mechanically. These are the only ones which promise low hiss. They cooperate in the conservation of energy by feeding a supporting energy back into the string to make up for what it loses.