Dead Hohner mics fixed

[JerryPH]

Some may recall a post where I mentioned that I thought that the mics in my 43 year old Hohner Morino VI N were not working right, well, I got the accordion back a few days ago from having some repairs to it and confirmed that both my mics were pretty much gone.

I did manage to find a couple of elecret dynamic mics from a local electronics dealer for an incredible $2.50 each, but though they worked, they were just not sensitive enough. Setting the mixer attenuator and fader to its maximum and the sound was just barely heard. That was ok, because it got me thinking and I recalled that I had a few voice microphones that I could test and play with.

Well, long story short, the experiment turned out pretty successfully. I took a $20 microphone, removed the capsule, cut it down and it fit nicely into the rubber isolators from my accordion. Not only did it work, but the sound is pretty darn nice for the money invested. It has a nice warm sound, a touch warmer than the factory original.

I accomplished almost all the goals that are important to me:

- mics are internal, keeping the original look of the accordion
- it requires no batteries
- it used all the original cables and plugs
-it was affordable (for $20... are you kidding? Accordion mic prices go from $200 to $1000!)

But wait, I said almost all my goals... if I wanted a setup that was even more sensitive and offered more dynamic range, I could go to SHURE and purchase one of their higher end dynamic mic capsules for well under $75 each and I could accomplish the last of my goals for a reasonable amount without sacrificing any of my other goals. Thats something that is going to come later, once I have had the time to improve my playing to the point that I want to record myself. For now, it works well, sounds good and lets the accordion look like it did the day it left the Hohner factory.

For those interested, I made a blog post on my personal site that shows a bunch of pics and explains the process I took in a good amount of detail HERE.

Great bang for the buck!

 

[debra]

Great to hear that worked!
Now for the best sound the mics do need to be external, or at least as much as possible which in many case means they are then placed right under the grille.
The more mics you use there the more evenly the sound pickup will be. You don't want the volume to depend on how close the note being played is to the mic.
When mics are really inside they do not pick up the sound that comes out of the accordion. This is most frequently done with basson accordions and the result is generally awful.
Commercial accordion microphones are indeed much more expensive than what you tried, but maybe you can try your setup with a few more mics and place them under the grille. (I use the Microvox system which is not that expensive and place the mics about 3cm outside the grille for the most evenly spread sound pickup. This system does not require any intervention to the inside of the instrument.)