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Thread: K&K twin help

  1. #1

    Default K&K twin help

    Hi, I just got my new mandolin with a K&K twin installed & playing through a Fishman LB it sounded great at home alone just clear and powerful acoustic sound although I had to really cut the mids, back off the highs & turn up the bass to get a nice tone, it blew me away how good it sounded just a different animal then playing the Godin A8. But played with the band Saturday and it didn’t seem to blend in as well as the A8. On single note stuff it sounded good, chop and closed position chords sounded good but open chords or strings seemed off kinda of harsh. I played around with the EQ on the amp but never got it right. Could it be me just not used to the set up and maybe I need to adjust pick attack ? Or maybe the K&k location needs adjusting ? The band members thought it sounded great but I think they were just being nice and didn’t notice the harshness I was hearing. Anybody playing the K&K who might have some insight I’d appreciate it.
    Thanks
    Lou

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    Registered User gspiess's Avatar
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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    When you were playing live, was the amp gain turned up higher than at home? Any chance you were overdriving the amp?
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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    Lou, how was the K&K installed, glue or tape. What kind of preamp are you using. I do find that playing with a louder setting and physically playing soft lend to a warmer sound. Are you playing thru your Fishman with the band?
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    Registered User Drew Streip's Avatar
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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    Were you listening through the monitors only, or did you get a chance to hear the house mix? Often, I think that I sound harsh onstage through the monitors, but when I hear videos of the performance, the blend is good and what I perceive as "too bright" actually comes across as "clarity."

    I guess it also depends on your style. I play a 50/50 mix of chop and open chords, so at some point you may need to evaluate what you want to emphasize. Normally, if I'm playing open chords, it's because we're ALL playing open chords, and so the individual tone of my mando doesn't matter as much as its contribution to the whole.

    Just food for thought. I don't know how your K&K is installed -- one of my piezos is affixed with sticky putty, the other with the supplied double-stick tape. So it's more mobile than one that's been super-glued in place. I've never tried to move mine.

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  6. #5

    Default Re: K&K twin help

    I think we're traveling the same road here....I've been playing a Godin A8 for about ten years through a Carvin powered mixer in a band and it's great. At home though always played my Kentucky KM1000, and got some K&K pickups installed so I could play it live. Went to play in the band with it and it was tinny, thin, feedback issues. At first I solved the nasty tinny feedback problem with a good DI box, but still wasn't satisfied with the overall tone. Did what you did on the powered mixer (increase bass, scoop mids, touch extra of high end). Still sounded a little thin, a little harsh to my ears although the other guys in the band didn't complain. Took my mando in to have someone check the pickup install and they said it was good. So, added a Boss GE-7 EQ pedal with some scooped mids, a touch of low, a touch of high, and a vast improvement to my ears and the guys in the band. Maybe not perfect yet but it certainly reinvigorated the joy of plugging in. Probably still needs some eq tweaking, and there are eq's out there with additional band adjustments which could help, or I'm like hmm, maybe the mando itself isn't beefy sounding enough and it's not an electronic issue. The never ending quest for tone. I still remember seeing a guy in John Hiatt's band play an acoustic mandolin in their full band setup and I thought it was the perfect mando tone, I wondered how they did that. Oh well, the day I end up chasing better tone is the day I'll be taking a dirt nap.
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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    If your mandolin isn't bassy sounding acoustically, don't add bass to the PA to artificially make it bassier. I found different DI's or preamps make a huge difference in sound. I typically just take a little highs off the PA for the mandolin. I never boost the bass, a brighter G string will come out in the mix better than one that is bassier. I like to keep the mandolin sound as far from the guitar sound as possible and keeping the G string on the mandolin different sounding than the G string on the guitar helps keep them separated. Trying lots of different things until you figure out your sound is part of the game of live sound. If you can try someone else's preamp on your mandolin try that.
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  8. #7

    Default Re: K&K twin help

    Thanks guys ! The K&k is installed with the double side tape, we didn’t have monitors set up as we were just practicing and not playing that loud we can all hear each other in our rehearsal space. No di box as I don’t think I need one with the Fishman & I
    Had the gain at about 10 o’clock and the main about the same I never had it past 11 o’clock so I wasn’t over driving the amp the amp was set lowere than when I play the A8. The A8 has a VC on it which is great feature ! I have a little boss stomp box EQ I didn’t think of trying now I will. Probably as usual it’s not one thing and this may take some time to get right I just hope I don’t have to adjust the pick up location. In writing this I’m wondering if the A8 sound I was so used to after 2 years is because I very rarely had the VC past half to 3/4 up on the A8 & having the amp volume turned up. I know VC on instruments will affect tone but never put much thought into it. I plugged the A8 in set the amp and haven’t changed a thing in 2 years !
    Lou

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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    If you use the stomp box EQ don't put the mandolin into the EQ before the amp. It won't match and will hamper your sound. The tape is usually warmer than gluing in, but less signal coming out.
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  10. #9

    Default Re: K&K twin help

    Loudbox input impedance is 5Mohm. K&K is pretty clear that they prefer 500K to 1Mohm. This can be the source of most of the "don't sound right" issues. Check input impedance VERY carefully on any device you want to plug this into. a very well regarded pre with correct impedance: Fire-eye Red-eye model. Most of my other favorites (fishman and tonebone) have too high input impedance. K and K has their own pre. I am not a huge fan, do not like most low priced 3 band EQs like the K and K pre has, and you cannot switch it off. I have had better luck with a proper impedance piezo direct box and the EQ on the mixer or amp.

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    F5G & MD305 Astro's Avatar
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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    All good advice above here.

    I cut the bass and the highs all the way and then turn down the upper end of the mids and what is left (low mids to mid mids) sounds good out front. I agree that it is always harsh in the monitors and I usually am not given time to tweak the monitors so I just grin and bear it because finally I learned that out front it sounds right.

    Also my eq has a "Presence" which I always roll all the way off because its harsh. And I have a "smooth" knob which I do turn up and it helps. My eq impedance is 10 instead of the touted 1 which maybe is why I need to tweak so much but I dont know.

    Also I have the BJJ instead of K&K and the eq is the older Fishman platinum pro eq
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  12. #11

    Default Re: K&K twin help

    Getting a "good" sound, only to have it be not quite right under some playing conditions (softer/harder/more input gain, one string leads vs open string chords, not consistent across the full range of the instrument) is a telltale sign of an input impedance mis-match. I really would start with a properly impedance matched pre-amp. Most EQs really suck the natural tone out af an instrument. I think people underappreciated how low quality the EQs are on most equipment. The further you get from centered, the harder it is to get a good sound. Lots of people buy K&K on the strength of their reputation and are disappointing when they plug it into their current high impedance rig. I have been trying to get Radial to add an impedance switch in their tonebone PZ. They have it on their PZ direct box. Right now, the only impedance matched pre with a boost switch is the red-eye.

  13. #12

    Default Re: K&K twin help

    now I have to ask, I'm playing my K&K's through a Fire Eye Red Eye into a Carvin powered mixer. I think what you're saying is my impedance is good then? I don't really understand impedance. The Red Eye specs say:
    • Input: high-impedance, 1 million ohms, maximum 1 volt peak-to-peak level.
    • Low-impedance, balanced, XLR output, 600 ohms, will drive long cables to mix-board.

    And I have heard "less is more" with EQs, I may need to tweak. Astro, when you say you cut lows/highs all the way do you mean you put the low/high EQ levels at the lowest level possible on the EQ, or just kept them an even/flat? Then you dropped the high mids below the flat line?
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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    Quote Originally Posted by jab View Post
    now I have to ask, I'm playing my K&K's through a Fire Eye Red Eye into a Carvin powered mixer. I think what you're saying is my impedance is good then? I don't really understand impedance. The Red Eye specs say:
    • Input: high-impedance, 1 million ohms, maximum 1 volt peak-to-peak level.
    • Low-impedance, balanced, XLR output, 600 ohms, will drive long cables to mix-board.

    And I have heard "less is more" with EQs, I may need to tweak. Astro, when you say you cut lows/highs all the way do you mean you put the low/high EQ levels at the lowest level possible on the EQ, or just kept them an even/flat? Then you dropped the high mids below the flat line?
    Astro has a different system than you do. Impedance is like resistance, but impedance varies with frequency. So... the K&K piezo has an impedance of 1M ohms, the input to your FireEye is the same 1M ohms and it will take 1 volt peak to peak with out distorting the input. This is important for a good sound and it is called head room. The 600 ohms is the output impedance which is what your PA wants to see as an input so while we call it a preamp it is more like an impedance matching device. The RedEye is to me one of the best and needs little adjustment to sound good. Others need a lot of EQ adjustment to achieve some kind of a decent sound. The RedEye has few adjustments because they are not needed. If you have low, mid and high on the preamp and low, mid and high on the PA you have double EQ which can be a problem, in my estimation, in itself.
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    F5G & MD305 Astro's Avatar
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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    jab-- As pops said, I have a different system. But the JJB is similar to the K&K. I use an older but very good Fishman Platinum Pro EQ for my preamp/eq which is rated at 10Mohm. I asked JJB if it matters and they seemed to think 10 Mohms should work fine assuming a decent ability to eq.

    To answer your question, yes I cut the knob for bass and highs all the way down ie way below neutral. I can further seperate the mids on my eq so I even cut the upper mid range all the way down--way below neutral (ie completely off). I leave the low mids and mid mids at neutral.

    It sounds really pretty good here but my fishman eq also has a smooth knob. I dont know how it works but it does mellow out the tone even further and sounds quite good when I turn the smooth knob halfway up. BTW I tried a friends newer fancier Fishman pro eq and I did not think it sounded as good as mine BUT maybe I wasnt familiar enough with it to tweak it right. I only had 5 minutes with it. The new ones are metal and have a boost and a mute/tuner I think. Mine is plastic and no boost or tuner/mute.

    I dont think the mando has much to offer in the low frequencies anyway so mostly all you get from that is pick noise and bump noise so I figured why not cut them out. And the highs are the harsh stuff. I wouldnt boost the mids but keep them at the neutral spot. If your eq can differentiate higher mids and you can cut the high mids, try it. I cut them all the way down.

    This fishman preamp/eq does require the gain be set almost to max for this pickup to get sufficient volume. In fact the gain has to be all the way up to trip the clipping light on it with this piezo pickup. On my octave mando, the passive under saddle piezo runs much hotter and when I switch to it I have to turn the gain back way down.

    BTW, my PA has a switch for passive piezo or High Z switch so supposedly I dont need a preamp either BUT it sounds better using my pre amp and not using the High Z switch than it does using highz switch without pre amp. I leave the PA eq pretty neutral when I use the preamp but I do use the high pass filter and cut anything outside the mando range that is not needed.

    I wish I could get a red eye or a tone bone to see how much difference it might make as they are certainly talked about here as being better by people who know way more than me. But since I already have the fishman and I think I get good tone from it, I cant justify spending the money. Maybe I can demo one some day.
    Last edited by Astro; Jan-29-2018 at 10:16pm.
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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    Quote Originally Posted by vince f View Post
    Getting a "good" sound, only to have it be not quite right under some playing conditions (softer/harder/more input gain, one string leads vs open string chords, not consistent across the full range of the instrument) is a telltale sign of an input impedance mis-match. I really would start with a properly impedance matched pre-amp. Most EQs really suck the natural tone out af an instrument. I think people underappreciated how low quality the EQs are on most equipment. The further you get from centered, the harder it is to get a good sound. Lots of people buy K&K on the strength of their reputation and are disappointing when they plug it into their current high impedance rig. I have been trying to get Radial to add an impedance switch in their tonebone PZ. They have it on their PZ direct box. Right now, the only impedance matched pre with a boost switch is the red-eye.
    Thanks, looks like I'll be buying a red eye. Another weird thing I was hearing was sometimes the A string would sound out of tune but it really wasnt ?? Anyway I thought I could get away without buying pre amp kinda odd that Fishman dosn't have a switch or input that would work with low impedance pick ups as I'm sure a lot of acoustic players use K&K type pick ups.
    Lou

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    Registered User almeriastrings's Avatar
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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    Could be a number of things. Firstly, the 10M input impedance of the Loudbox is normally fine with K&K's (the main difference over say, 1M is that you extend the LF response curve). That is easily compensated for by simply rolling off some bass. Headroom on the Loudbox's passive input is also pretty decent. If this only happened at one venue, don't discount room effects. A hard floor, reflective ceiling, bad room nodes, resonances etc. If it sounded fine at home, it should remain fine - excluding room effects, which can be quite dramatic. The fact that you cite some weird 'tuning' effect is highly suggestive of out-of-phase reflections being involved here.

    I'd test in more than one venue before blaming the Loudbox. The input stages on these are really very good, as are the speakers they include.
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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    Quote Originally Posted by almeriastrings View Post
    Could be a number of things. Firstly, the 10M input impedance of the Loudbox is normally fine with K&K's (the main difference over say, 1M is that you extend the LF response curve). That is easily compensated for by simply rolling off some bass. Headroom on the Loudbox's passive input is also pretty decent. If this only happened at one venue, don't discount room effects. A hard floor, reflective ceiling, bad room nodes, resonances etc. If it sounded fine at home, it should remain fine - excluding room effects, which can be quite dramatic. The fact that you cite some weird 'tuning' effect is highly suggestive of out-of-phase reflections being involved here.

    I'd test in more than one venue before blaming the Loudbox. The input stages on these are really very good, as are the speakers they include.
    Interesting, the room we were in is our rehearsal space I've only played the K&K one day there and one short test run at home. I think I'll plug back in at home to make sure it does sound fine & go one more time at rehearsal space maybe set up in different spot before buying a red eye. Were not playing out again until mid March so I've got some time. On the positive side the K&K set up sounded much more like a mandolin than the A8 it really seemed to cut through the mix without being louder and when the sound was "normal" it has a real nice tone I think the Loudbox is a fantastic sounding acoustic amp.
    Lou

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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    The Loudbox range is indeed very good. I don't use one myself, but I do encounter them regularly when running sound for others.

    A 'thin' harsh sound from one of these would not be indicative of an impedance mismatch with a K&K; in fact, you'd get the opposite - too much bass and low end 'thump'. A thin, harsh sound could very well result from phase cancellation effects, however. If this happens again, try using the phase-reverse switch on the LB.. this is not merely for anti-feedback purposes but can also help counter other problems.
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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    It's hard to separate the acoustic sound of the mando from the amplifier tone when at home, unless you turn it way up. You will always be surprised how it sounds when the pickup is the main sound source. Try checking it out with headphones and speaker off, to experiment with best EQ.
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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    Every room has a natural resonance, or several. I usually find 250 cycles to be one of the common ones. This will fall in the low side and can effect the sound of the mandolin. Using headphones will eliminate this problem, I would listen to what the amp sounds like in the room and get used to getting a good sound in different rooms. If you take the good sound you get using headphones and put the amp in different rooms they may all have different sounds because of the room resonance. Making the headphone sound useless. Rooms will change resonance when you add people and knowing what to change as to what you hear your amp sounding like is important if you are playing out.
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    Registered User Gabriel Wiseman's Avatar
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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    Quote Originally Posted by pops1 View Post
    Every room has a natural resonance, or several. I usually find 250 cycles to be one of the common ones. This will fall in the low side and can effect the sound of the mandolin. Using headphones will eliminate this problem, I would listen to what the amp sounds like in the room and get used to getting a good sound in different rooms. If you take the good sound you get using headphones and put the amp in different rooms they may all have different sounds because of the room resonance. Making the headphone sound useless. Rooms will change resonance when you add people and knowing what to change as to what you hear your amp sounding like is important if you are playing out.
    Exactly! Every room is different and lots of factors come into play. You really can't set the sound how you like at home then take all the equipment out somewhere else and leave all the setting the same and expect the sound to be the same as you had dialed in at home. Just like setting a PA up in different locations, your always going to need some adjustments to get the sound you want. I will say that the Red Eye is the single best thing I've ever found for making all of this easier and also helps tremendously when you have a "sound man" trying to dial you in. They are truly awesome pieces of gear. I use a K&K in my Northfield Master Model and a Red Eye pre with a Fishman Loudbox Artist and with just a little tweeking I can get a very natural and clean acoustic sound that very closely represents my tone.

    I have like the red eye products so much I actualy have a Red Eye Twin on my pedal board and Keep a single channel red eye in my bag I carry. If I had to chose only one piece of equipment to keep or take with me it would be a Red Eye. And the guys who builds them is just a super nice fellow to boot.
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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    Quote Originally Posted by vince f View Post
    I have been trying to get Radial to add an impedance switch in their tonebone PZ. They have it on their PZ direct box. Right now, the only impedance matched pre with a boost switch is the red-eye.
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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    Quote Originally Posted by jab View Post
    now I have to ask, I'm playing my K&K's through a Fire Eye Red Eye into a Carvin powered mixer. I think what you're saying is my impedance is good then? I don't really understand impedance. The Red Eye specs say:
    • Input: high-impedance, 1 million ohms, maximum 1 volt peak-to-peak level.
    • Low-impedance, balanced, XLR output, 600 ohms, will drive long cables to mix-board.

    And I have heard "less is more" with EQs, I may need to tweak. Astro, when you say you cut lows/highs all the way do you mean you put the low/high EQ levels at the lowest level possible on the EQ, or just kept them an even/flat? Then you dropped the high mids below the flat line?
    FWIW, I have played an OM with a K&K Twin, as well as a Rigel with their homegrown single piezo spot, through a Red Eye Twin for a few years and have had a great experience. Sometimes I run it into a Loudbox Mini, but most often right into the board, and it always sounds great. I think it is a great combination.

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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    Thanks everyone for all the tips and info. I was going through my stuff and found a passive DI box the spec sheet on says 600 ohm output. I tried it and didn’t notice much of a difference here’s spec on it http://artproaudio.com/passive_di/product/zdirect/
    What’s the difference from Redeye and this DI ? I don’t want to spend a few hundred on a DI if I’m only trying to match impedance it seems like this passive one does that ?? I set up both channels on amp exactly the same one played through the DI other straight in and the DI sound was maybe slightly warmer with but it was so close it could be the EQ on amp was slightly off or my ears. But in tweaking the EQ, main & gain volumes I was getting a pretty decent sound had bass up mids off treble about neutral. I’m curious about the powered pre amps VS passive.
    Lou

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    Default Re: K&K twin help

    Most preamps are powered, via a battery or phantom. A DI may be just a transformer based unit that uses no power. The difference the FireEye has is it matches perfectly and has a lot of headroom. Most Pizeos are hot and can really overdrive a preamp. The term preamp would seem to indicate you are boosting a weak signal to the PA for the pickup to work better. That is totally false and maybe a better term could be used. The pickup is actually hot and you are really matching impedance and taming down the pickup for the PA. I have at least 4 different preamps and the FireEye is by far the best, easiest to use. Folks there are great to work with.

    Also if you turn your bass off your highs will be harsher and brighter. There may not be much in the 80 cycles most bass controls are shelved at, but 250 cycles makes a serious difference in the sound of the mandolin. Taking the bass all the way down effects this range, and your over all sound, and you would be much better tweaking other things and leaving EQ controls as flat as possible to get a good sound. I have tried the bass and usually it's not just the mandolin, but the room and I slightly lower the 250 slider on the PA so it helps everyone and don't have to bottom the bass control on the mandolin.
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