A technique for the rapid, smooth turn-on of a transducer is described. The method is based on a previously described technique [J. C. Piquette, J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 92, 1203-1213 (1992)]. In the previous method, transducer output amplitude is severely reduced compared to that obtained when driving the transducer using a standard gated sine due to the presence of a ramp component in the transient-suppressing voltage waveform. In the present work, approximate methods that eliminate the ramp component are described. Eliminating the ramp component results in significantly greater output amplitude, although the level of transient suppression that is achieved is not as good as that seen when using the exact transient-suppressing drive. Nonetheless, the smoothness (i.e., lack of spikes) in the transducer response is not compromised by the approximations.