Sure, this has nothing to do with the Ukulele, but if I put the word ukulele in this post, then I can put Ukulele in the tag line, and then it fits in with the website.
Some History: The electric guitar in its current form is the most cutting edge of its time. Advancements in pick-ups onboard wiring have come along way from the, the coal fired and steam guitars. Moreover the wood fired guitar back in the turn of the century.
Editorial: While driving this morning I was hit by something I heard on the radio…T. Boone Pickens’ turn the Great Plains into one giant wind farm. I used to drive from San Diego to Palm Springs many times a week one of the major man made land marks is the wind farm on the 10 freeway about 20 miles west or the desert resort. To me it’s an eyesore. Frankly I think I’d rather see one brick building belching Natural Gas fumes skyward than 5,000 steel structures with blades cutting through the desert landscape.
I asked myself: What can I do…a lowly guitar player, oil imports and greenhouse emissions? Then it hit me…Play guitar
Technical stuff in a nutshell: The generator is based on the principle of "electromagnetic induction" discovered in 1831 by Michael Faraday, a British scientist. Faraday discovered that if an electric conductor, like a copper wire, is moved through a magnetic field, electric current will flow (be induced) in the conductor. So the mechanical energy of the moving wire is converted into the electric energy of the current that flows in the wire.
Your Electric guitar has everything it needs to generate electricity
Pick-up basics: the electric guitar pickup is made up of the same parts that make up a generator…only on a much MUCH smaller scale. The copper coil is the…well copper coil. The magnetic poles create the magnetic field around the load, and the string (load) delivers the movement through the magnetic field that is needed to create a very small amount of electricity. That electricity goes through the guitar cable and into the amp and then amplified. The sound you here is the amplified electricity that is created by the string rather than the string itself.
Before you read on
Disclaimer: I in no way advise you to plug your guitar into a wall socket…doing so will fry most everything electronic in your guitar. It may also cause your guitar to spontaneously combust creating a form of energy called heat or fire.
Now imagine this…
If millions of guitar players all over the country, at the same time everyday plugged their guitars into the grid, and practiced for 30 minutes…we could generate enough electricity to power one 25 watt light bulb…
