One Pickup Prototype

So this is the final prototype for the guitar circuit. I have tweaked ICs (some were noisier than others) resistors and capacitors until I have a loud enough circuit that doesn't clip when the guitar thrashed but has the same output as a normal guitar. 

My main concern has been to retain an authentic tone by comparing the pickups with and without circuits. The aim isn't fidelity as guitars are meant to distort, but a good tone, rich, full and chiming. Ultimately it's limited by the pickups that aren't as good as my Suhr's, but it now sounds right.

The next stage is to make up some circuit boards now, I'll use strip board to start with and a prototyping shield for the Mega. The shield will just be a place to attach connectors to the right pins and won't have any circuits on it. The transfer to circuit board should also help with noise and reliability - the capacitive circuits seem to be affected by all the extra wires and occasionally I knock a wire and it all gets very noisy again.

I'll then replicate the circuit for all three pickups and try switching. I have decided to not use relays but instead just turn volumes to zero. This will save power as I want this to be battery driven from a lithium battery pack I bought earlier.

I also plan to have the USB accessible for re-programming the guitar once it is assembled as the tuner isn't as reliable as I want. I need to work on the algorithms for matching the same point in the waveform. Currently it works by looking for the highest slope, but I think I can improve on this for better pattern matching. I'll need to record some waveforms for this and then prototype it in Java in my laptop.