Guitar triggers and metal guitar picks

[Scott Gravenhorst, Synthaholic]

With respect to a 'works all the time' guitar trigger,
Gene (gstopp) wrote: 
>
>     Here it is: make a metal guitar pick, solder a long flexible wire 

>     to it, make sure your strings are grounded to the guitar cord
>     shield, and build a trigger-when-grounded detector. Hit the
>     strings (or bridge) with the pick whenever you want a trigger.
>     The material used to fabricate the pick itself should be chosen
>     by the user for the appropriate flexibility, depending on your 
>     reference as a player.  Since I'm not a guitar player I can't be 
>     of much help here. I don't even know if this will damage the
>     strings....anyway there's my silly idea.
>     
>     - Gene

The metal should be much softer than a guitar string or it will 
score the string and eventually cause it to break.

Would any out here know of a conductive plastic with physical 
properties similar to the kinds of plastics used to make guitar picks?

The lower the resistance the better.  A rivet could be employed to 
attach a wire.

But, since there are various guitar synths out there (they must employ 
*some* kind of trigger internally), there really should be a way to do 
this with a little silicon.  Maybe using an AGC circuit, or a 
compressor in front of whatever you are designing might work ???  Also, 
MXR used to make a noise gate.  I would suspect that one could tap into 
this little box and generate a trigger or gate from it's internals.


-- 
-- Scott G., Synthaholic

There is no 12 step program for synthaholics.  Thank your Superior Being.