Vintage Acoustic Pickup Instillation?

Jelly 292

Can anyone give me any advice regarding getting my 30 year old Yamaha FG340
installed with some form of pick up with the bare minamum of hacking,drilling or sawing?
I dont mind altering the guitar a bit as it is a played /working guitar but as it has nothing onboard its a hassle capturing its (great) sound live.

I was thinking some form of internal condenser/pre amp and possibly an EQ unit mounted on top although I'd maybe like to get away without cutting a big square hole in the top!
Is there any solution without an EQ panel that works well?
Id rather a proper mike than a piezo ideally.
Cheers

slavedave

Have a look at K&K pickups in the States. I bought one of their "western" piezo under soundboard systems with a pre-amp(belt mounted) and an internal mic. The installation involves no cutting - the pickups go under the bridge area internally and then feed into the jack button socket (that replaces your existing strap button). The preamp allows you to blend the mic / pickup and both channels have 3 stage eq settings. I installed my own in about an hour. It involves taking off the strings, lighting the inside of the guitar with a torch and positioning the 4 pickups between the 6 string holes with the aid of a mirror and some superglue (this will give you an idea - http://www.thepodium.com/pc-13586-161-kk-pure-western-mini-pickup.aspx). You can even use just the passive transducers with great effect if your battery pack runs out. My Martin sounds really nice through a PA or recording. No quackiness like undersaddle transducers. I haven't played at really loud levels live so I cannot comment on feedback rejection but so far so good, and the reviews back this up. The sound demos are a good place to start on the site.
There are so any after market options out there too. A chap (http://www.dougyoungguitar.com/pickuptest.htm) has a great website comparing them with each other - lots of sound files

Jelly 292

The installation involves no cutting - the pickups go under the bridge area internally and then feed into the jack button socket (that replaces your existing strap button). The preamp allows you to blend the mic / pickup and both channels have 3 stage eq settings. I installed my own in about an hour. It involves taking off the strings, lighting the inside of the guitar with a torch and positioning the 4 pickups between the 6 string holes with the aid of a mirror and some superglue

Niceone Slavedave, Never heard of em but its exactly what after

Cheers dude:)

Beanstalk

Weird, I was just about to post the same question as the OP, cool, i'll check these out....