Members rpw003 Posted July 17, 2009 Members Share Posted July 17, 2009 Ok so after reading all that this is what I think you should do and what we need. Take a pic of your whole guitar cavity for us to see it before you unsolder things Your soldering joints in the pics look pretty bad to me and the one on the back the pot looks huge and bad lol. Sorry to be harsh. Unsolder everything and clean it up, use some steel wool or something on the back of the pots. Get the yellow crap that forms off the pot. Next all your joints when you pull the iron away should be shiny, means its a good joint. For the grounding to the pots they take a lot of heat to get a good connection if you have flux use that. Make sure it is a good connection in the pot. (You shouldn't be able to break it off after it cools) If the cavity has some foil shielding in it then that needs to be grounded too, usually when you screw the pot into the body/pickguard that connection is made. If your guitar cavity does not have shielding put some in there, aluminum foil can be used put it all in the cavity and on the cover or pickguard depending on your guitar. Make sure that shielding in the cavity touches the shielding on the pickguard or cover in some way when it is screwed on. Also make sure there is only one connection from the shielding to your central grounding point. Lastly:Just get a multimeter, you have guitars and amps your going to need it for something else one day anyways. Hope that helps some. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members solderjunkie Posted July 17, 2009 Members Share Posted July 17, 2009 If your guitar hums until you touch the strings, something is not grounded. That something is YOU. You need shielding. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Orange Jackson Posted July 17, 2009 Members Share Posted July 17, 2009 I have a similar issue and I have it down to a bad cable or ans issue with my SuperChamp XD. Hmm. My new SCXD has introduced a hum into my signal, but only when I play in stereo, the other amp is a hughes and kettner 15w and the guitar has dual humbuckers. I've been noticing that the hum goes away after about 15 minutes, been thinking it has something to do with the stock tubes warming up.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Orange Jackson Posted July 17, 2009 Members Share Posted July 17, 2009 Are you able to try it with a different pickup in the guitar, Perhaps something is off in the pickup?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Soeru Posted July 19, 2009 Author Members Share Posted July 19, 2009 Hey guys thanks for all the replies, I rewired the WHOLE thing again, using a new CTS pot I had laying around, and it seems the ground buzz is completely gone! Even with the single coil. It's very very faint now when I take my hand off the bridge. Must've been a whole lot of cold joints + lousy pot I guess. BUT I have a new problem, whenever I lower the volume on the guitar it dials in a static "shh" noise with occasional radio signals that is very audible until I put the volume back up to 100% (or 0%). It doesn't make crackling noises while I'm turning so it can't be dirty pot(it's new), it's just a static noise that doesn't go away unless I dime the knob or turn it to 0. How can I fix this? Also the static becomes less audible if I point the guitar in different directions (however this does NOT happen with my other guitars). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members crazyman123 Posted July 19, 2009 Members Share Posted July 19, 2009 If your guitar hums until you touch the strings, something is not grounded.That something is YOU.You need shielding. This might seem stupid, (I know almost nothing about electronics) but if it stops buzzing when you touch the bridge, then coulcn't you just stick a small bit of bluetack or tape or anything to stop the buzz? So that piece of something is acting as 'YOU' and you would not need to touch the bridge. Would this work? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Hard Truth Posted July 19, 2009 Members Share Posted July 19, 2009 Don't forget to make sure that the ground wires from the pickups didn't come loose at the pickup end. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members mike42 Posted July 19, 2009 Members Share Posted July 19, 2009 Sounds like what's going on now is RF type interference. You'll have to shield to solve that I suspect. Also, you may have a pickup that's just really RF sensitive. Might try hooking the cavity grounds back up, (if that doesn't cause hum to reappear), and probably need to consider shielding and grounding pickguard. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Soeru Posted July 19, 2009 Author Members Share Posted July 19, 2009 My guitar doesn't have a pickguard, and the cavity grounds are hooked up. In fact I did this whole rewiring thing because I used to have copper foil in my guitar but I never got it working correctly(gave me MORE noise, and it was grounded!). Something else has to be wrong, my other guitars aren't shielded and they don't make this much noise, and my humbucker isn't very high output... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members inkblot Posted July 19, 2009 Members Share Posted July 19, 2009 This might seem stupid, (I know almost nothing about electronics) but if it stops buzzing when you touch the bridge, then coulcn't you just stick a small bit of bluetack or tape or anything to stop the buzz?So that piece of something is acting as 'YOU' and you would not need to touch the bridge.Would this work? No. The buzzing stops because the human body is big enough to act sort of like a ground in this situation. A little piece of tape won't have the same effect at all. The bridge is already touching the guitar body, which has a better chance of reducing noise than tape. The guitar picking up different amounts of noise when oriented differently is normal. A guitar pickup only pickups up a signal traveling in the right orientation relative to the pickup's magnetic field and coil, so moving the guitar changes what it can pick up. I don't know why it would behave differently when you roll off the volume though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members ihavenofish Posted July 20, 2009 Members Share Posted July 20, 2009 The guitar picking up different amounts of noise when oriented differently is normal. A guitar pickup only pickups up a signal traveling in the right orientation relative to the pickup's magnetic field and coil, so moving the guitar changes what it can pick up. I don't know why it would behave differently when you roll off the volume though. i dont know about the volume but the tone yes.. cause the buzz is higher frequency aparently, as opposed to 60 cycle low frequency hum. i can induce this type of buzz in every one of my guitars by standing next to one of my dimmer light switches. some of my guitars are more susceptable to this under normal conditions than others, and i really dont know why. i had 2 new unmodified identical guitars, one buzzed alot, one only faintly. once i got rid of the dimmer lights and stopped sitting next to what turned out to be the buildings poorly wired core electrical shaft, i dont get any buzzing at all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members solderjunkie Posted July 20, 2009 Members Share Posted July 20, 2009 No. The buzzing stops because the human body is big enough to act sort of like a ground in this situation. no. The guitar is grounded... you are not. The guitar is grounding you:poke: Link to a bitchin' site that explains in common English how you are not, in fact, grounding the guitar... in reality, the guitar is grounding you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members mike42 Posted July 20, 2009 Members Share Posted July 20, 2009 I'm pretty much out of reasonable ideas, and it seems to me this thread has pretty much exhausted the reasonable ideas for fixes. If it were me and I wanted to stay with it, I would go back to step one, and start adding one component at a time to the jack, and see what starts the problem. Try each pickup alone to begin with, and maybe even reverse the pickup leads if you get noise, on the chance something's color coded wrong. Then add the pot,etc.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Soeru Posted July 20, 2009 Author Members Share Posted July 20, 2009 I'm pretty much out of reasonable ideas, and it seems to me this thread has pretty much exhausted the reasonable ideas for fixes. If it were me and I wanted to stay with it, I would go back to step one, and start adding one component at a time to the jack, and see what starts the problem. Try each pickup alone to begin with, and maybe even reverse the pickup leads if you get noise, on the chance something's color coded wrong. Then add the pot,etc.. I think this is what I'll have to end up doing, but I'll do it with brand new wires, high grade solder and possibly replacing the jack and switch. Might try cleaning everything with contact cleaner first though. What is the ideal wire gauge for the wires that go in between pots, switches and jacks? Are the "braided shielding" wires good? Does their braided shielding require to be soldered to ground as well? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members inkblot Posted July 20, 2009 Members Share Posted July 20, 2009 no. The guitar is grounded... you are not. The guitar is grounding you:poke: Link to a bitchin' site that explains in common English how you are not, in fact, grounding the guitar... in reality, the guitar is grounding you. I know that the guitar is (hopefully) grounded and the player is not (as well) grounded. But what is ground? The earth...just a relatively large mass. A person also has substantial mass, given that we're talking about quite small amounts of charge in an electric guitar. That website's explanation does seem pretty good though. It's interesting to me that this problem isn't consistent in my experience. I did a test just now and found this: when I plugged a bass into the my practice amp, turned the bass volume to zero and dimed the amp, there was a bit more with my holding the guitar (but not touching the strings) than if I just set it down (though I should note that perhaps the bass being laid sideways and moved a bit could have done this ). When I plug an instrument into my audio interface, there is no hum reduction at all when touching the strings in an scenario. Apparently I'm not adding any noise when it's plugged into the computer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members windmill Posted July 20, 2009 Members Share Posted July 20, 2009 On another thread someone suggested the wires themselves may be of poor quality. Hope this helps Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Firebrand Posted July 20, 2009 Members Share Posted July 20, 2009 PICS! PICS! PICS!we need pictures Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members rpw003 Posted July 20, 2009 Members Share Posted July 20, 2009 If using the copper shielding gave you more noise then you did it wrong. I am going to guess and say the copper stuff came in strips and has a sticky back. The copper shielding that they typically sell on guitar websites does not have the sticky side that conducts. If you had a multimeter you could have checked for continuity. When you install that stuff you need to fold over the pieces at the ends so that copper touches on all pieces or put a solder joint on the edges. Its a pretty common mistake, I am betting you just grounded one piece and the others where not electrically connected to that piece. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members ihavenofish Posted July 20, 2009 Members Share Posted July 20, 2009 I know that the guitar is (hopefully) grounded and the player is not (as well) grounded. But what is ground? The earth...just a relatively large mass. A person also has substantial mass, given that we're talking about quite small amounts of charge in an electric guitar. That website's explanation does seem pretty good though. in this case a person is an collector of external fields which induces current in the pickups. when you touch the bridge, the current is pushed to ground in the guitar. you can also touch another object thats grounded and it will also work but if its not the same common ground, you can actually get shocked because the guitar/amp might decide it likes you better for grounding. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Soeru Posted July 20, 2009 Author Members Share Posted July 20, 2009 If using the copper shielding gave you more noise then you did it wrong.I am going to guess and say the copper stuff came in strips and has a sticky back. The copper shielding that they typically sell on guitar websites does not have the sticky side that conducts. If you had a multimeter you could have checked for continuity. When you install that stuff you need to fold over the pieces at the ends so that copper touches on all pieces or put a solder joint on the edges.Its a pretty common mistake, I am betting you just grounded one piece and the others where not electrically connected to that piece. Holy crap, that was exactly the case. I thought the smooth side of the copper tape was conductive, I had it soldered(but with a lousy joint, as the solder barely flowed) to the ground on the back of the pot. Looks like I might have another go at the Faraday cage then (with some new wires while I'm at it, what's the ideal gauge?). Thanks a lot for the help! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members inkblot Posted July 20, 2009 Members Share Posted July 20, 2009 in this case a person is an collector of external fields which induces current in the pickups. when you touch the bridge, the current is pushed to ground in the guitar. you can also touch another object thats grounded and it will also work but if its not the same common ground, you can actually get shocked because the guitar/amp might decide it likes you better for grounding. Yes, that's what the guitarnuts website said. I'm not sure what mic shock or similar phenomena have to do with this discussion. I still want to know why plugging into my audio interface instead of an amp seems to work around this issue. You can use pretty much any gauge wire you find convenient for wiring a guitar. I've seen high end guitars that used very thin wire (quite hard to work with actually) because the electronics cavity was packed with an active equalizer, and it sounded great. I have heard claims that thicker wire, having slightly less resistance, will make for a brighter sounding guitar. Given that the current flowing in a guitar is very small, I would be surprised if there were a substantial difference, but I haven't tested it myself. Something around 24 or 26 gauge would be the easiest to work with IMO. Note that larger gauge = thinner wire. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members solderjunkie Posted July 21, 2009 Members Share Posted July 21, 2009 You can use pretty much any gauge wire you find convenient for wiring a guitar. I've seen high end guitars that used very thin wire (quite hard to work with actually) because the electronics cavity was packed with an active equalizer, and it sounded great. I have heard claims that thicker wire, having slightly less resistance, will make for a brighter sounding guitar. Given that the current flowing in a guitar is very small, I would be surprised if there were a substantial difference, but I haven't tested it myself. Something around 24 or 26 gauge would be the easiest to work with IMO. Note that larger gauge = thinner wire. Your guitar internal-wiring needs to be no smaller than the pickup-windings (since current only flows as well as the smallest conductor allows). In other words, if your connecting wires are thicker than a few strands of hair... they will work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.