DIY Sustainer
Introduction
Sustainer is cool little device originally designed by Fernandes®. It works opposite from "normal" guitar pickup. Basically, active circuit amplifies signal from bridge pickup and sends it to driver which generates magnetic field causing strings to vibrate infinitely. Driver replaces neck pickup on guitar which limits guitar tonal variations in one way but gives completely new possibilities.
This photo shows Fernandes Sustainer kit which is cool but very expensive (above 200$). Fortunately, great guys from Project Guitar Forum (most of all Pete/psw and Col) developed DIY friendly project that costs much less than original but still sounds good. Also, I’d like to thank PSW Pete for sending me 0.2mm wire all the way from Australia at no cost.
Cost to build
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Bill of materials
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0.2mm wire
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1€
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Plastic pickup cover
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2€
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LM386 power amp
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0.5€
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DIL8 IC socket
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0.2€
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2x 100K trimmer
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0.5€
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1K trimmer
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0.25€
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Resistors: 1M, 1.5K, 68K
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0.1€
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Caps: 22n, 100nF, 22uF, 100uF, 220uF
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0.5€
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JFET J201
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0.2€
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SPST toggle switch
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0.5€
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DPDT toggle switch
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0.5€
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Board material, wire, battery clip
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1€
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Total
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7.25€
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If you do not have some old pickup to use for about 10€ you can order single coil pickup kit and pickup cover, StewMac carries both items.
Pictorial
Click on an image to see more details.
Useful links
Project Guitar "Sustainer Ideas" thread (very large)
Project Guitar tutorial on building driver
Program for calculating turns count for given core dimensions
Official Fernandes Sustainer page
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