How Does An Acoustic Guitar Amplifier Work?
Electric guitars use metal strings ( Usually nickel ) vibrating near magnets and coils to turn the sound vibrations into electrical signals. On the other hand an acoustic guitar uses metal strings but they will be bronze or phosphor bronze and won't be able to work in quite the same way. For many years people have beaten the volume problem by running their sound into the PA through a fairly standard microphone that id rigged for them. However it doesn't give the amplifier the cleanest of signals! A specialist acoustic guitar amp is what's needed. A lot of folk make the mistake of plugging their acoustic pick up feed into a typical electric guitar amp that they might have lying round at home... a big mistake for your ears!
Pick Ups For Acoustic Guitars
The biggest difference between acoustic and electric guitar amplification is the way sound is converted into electricity for processing. As previously mentioned - there are a variety of types of pickups that will convert sound to electricity to feed your acoustic amp a signal. For a normal acoustic guitar, soundhole pickups can be dropped in through the soundhole and fitted quite simply. You'll usually have to drill out or replace the end pin of the guitar so that it will accept a jack connector.
Less satisfactory contact pickups can be stuck to the guitar body, while the string saddle can be fitted with a piezo electric transducer to produce the signal. Some guitars are fitted with very high quality tiny mics that are rigged near the soundhole. Whichever basic type is chosen, they all perform the same function: transforming a sound vibration as faithfully as possible into a clear electrical signal for the amplifier to boost into enough volume to fill a venue or reach across a town square.
Amplification for Acoustic Guitars
Once the signal leaves the guitar it enters a world of circuitry which aims to reproduce the acoustic sound at a higher volume. To achieve that clean tone, these amlifiers use more powerful circuitry than might initially be imagined. This gives "headroom" so that as you wind up the volume in a larger room, the amp is never working at full capacity and is able to deliver a distortion free sound through the speakers. Having achieved that, the creativity of musicians and inventiveness of producers has seen a steady growth in the range of amplifiers which can take that clean tone and add effects such as reverb, chorus and looping; to name just a few!
In essence a good acoustic guitar amplifier allows a relatively quiet instrument to be heard in bigger venues with as much clarity as you'd get in a private performance in a back room at home.