String ground wire on Les Paul

[Naregnemyes]

Hey Freeman,

I saw your other thread about the les paul build.

 

The answer to your question is that everything made of metal on the guitar has to be grounded. Tuners, strings, bridge, and all electronics have to connect to the ground on your jack and then through your cable to whatever ground is on your amp (it eventually goes to your power source.) This is all much less complicated than it seems, if you connect a simple wire between your bridge and the back of one of your pots, everything will be grounded. The tuners are grounded through the strings, the strings through the bridge, the bridge through the pots, and the pots through the output jack to the power source.

[wagdog]

 

Some LPs have a string ground, some don't. My 77 standard does not, but I wish it did.

 

 

My '81 les paul custom didn't, and I added one by removing the lower bridge post and drilling a small hole into the control cavity and running a small piece of magnet wire. Here is an old thread about it: http://acapella.harmony-central.com/showthread.php?1765584-Les-Paul-with-a-Hum

[wagdog]

 

Something wrong with that. All Pauls should have them.

 

 

Several years worth of les pauls came without them, including my '81 les paul custom. I know it didn't because I bought it new.

[BG76]

 

im confused by this post your first answer is, in my experience, the correct one your second, ??? from WHERE to the back of each pot? the bridge or tailpiece? all pots need to be grounded, sure, but what does that have to do with bridge grounding? your third has me totally lost, as pertains to bridge grounding pardon my confusion, i just dont get it

 

 

I'm sorry for the late reply.

 

Yes, you would want to ground all of them to the bridge, I'm sorry for the confusion. Looking back at my post I see it was confusing.

 

There are different grounding schemes on Les Pauls and I outlined them in my OP but in all cases you would want to ground to the stop tailpiece or in the case of a 53 you would want to ground to the trapeze.

 

There are several ways to wire a Les Paul. I have seen the three way wired two different ways from the factory (with jumper wire and putting terminals together) and there are also different ways to ground depending on the years. Some Les Pauls have a metal plate that all of the pots run into and some that don't have this, some run an unshielded wire to all the pots and some use a braided wire and use that to ground. All methods should work fine.

 

Elias is just so pathetic and sad that his constant trolling of my posts doesn't even deserve a reply. I'm glad I'm not him is all I can say as he must be miserable to be so obsessed with my posts.

 

Anyway, sorry for the confusion. Hope this clears it up.

 

To the guy with the 77 and no ground wire - look really close towards the top of the cavity. Sometimes they get broken but you should be able to find a tiny hole an unshielded wire would have passed through. If not, consider putting one in if the guitar buzzes a lot.