Manfred33 Posted October 24, 2014 Author Share Posted October 24, 2014 I reread your second post and you did come off as somewhat entitled and that is why i responded the way I did. If you read my post i also told you that I seconded another posters' suggestions so i was being helpful as well as letting you know that people respond to what they find interesting or what they know. Just relax, it's the internet. Nope, don't have any entitlement mentality here. Nor do I think I was even coming off as being entitled to an answer, merely thought that somebody might have had something to say. I was just rather shocked that no one had chimed in yet. And don't worry, I am relaxed about the internet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Manfred33 Posted October 24, 2014 Author Share Posted October 24, 2014 Exactly. None of us here (or very few if any) are customer support representatives and we owe other folks here nothing. We do it out of kindness. If someone wants to get entitled and sulk, please do it elsewhere. Wasn't sulking, simply was trying to figure out why nobody had had anything to say about the problem. Typically, a problem like this would probably get a lot of people thinking and I know there are a lot of smart people on this board that like to figure stuff like this out, which is why it was so puzzling that there had been no responses.... Well put Scott. Often request for help threads get lots of views but hardly any response - which tends to mean no-one knows (or is sure enough of) the answer to have anything of value to add. Sometimes threads are just of little interest so no response. Its not intended as an insult to not respond if you have no interest/knowledge of the topic raised. Hope you find a solution though as it would drive me nuts - unfortunately I don't have a clue so can't help at all. And yet, look at all the responses I have gotten since.... Didn't want responses that way, but all of a sudden everyone has an opinion about what the problem could be. Again, i'll reiterate, wasn't looking to get responses this way, but after my little rant, people are coming out of the woodwork with ideas. I realize message boards are not customer service resources and that people post on what they want to and if they have no idea, they're not going to post.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Manfred33 Posted October 24, 2014 Author Share Posted October 24, 2014 It's not about a trivial task here, and experiences seem to be scarce and accidental as well. So except for the general usefulness of clean contact surfaces, my contribution was also just a guess. I think the brainstorming attitude is the best one. Any good idea without evidence or explanation can be of help I believe. Guesses/brainstorming was all I was looking for.... Just some notion as to what could be causing it. Is it something major or something minor? Am i going to be able to/or even want to do it myself or do i need to take it to a tech? Do I even really need to bother, maybe it is just an unusual circumstance and it might change when I use a different cable, etc.... Again, thanks for all the tips. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Manfred33 Posted October 24, 2014 Author Share Posted October 24, 2014 I should have added that the copper shielding will do nothing about the 60 cycle hum you get from a single coil. Learned that with a few Strats, but it IS very effective at blocking radio and electrical interference provided it's done correctly. As I said earlier, you'd have to get copper shielding with conductive adhesive (cheaper ways to do it, but then you have to solder all the shielding pieces together), then shield the pickup cavities and the tunnels that connect them and the tunnel that runs to the control cavity.Don't forget the control cavity itself. That's key to the shielding working at all. Make sure you extend the shielding about an 1/8 inch above the lip of the control cavity. You then fold this over the top of the lip where the cover mounting screw holes are. Trim it with an X-acto knife or something similar so nothing shows once you put the cover on. You need to attach a wire to the foil somewhere out of the way and solder it to ground. Shield that back of the cavity cover with the copper tape. Trim to fit with the X-acto. Once you re-install the cover & screw it down, it becomes a part of the guitar's circuit. Essentially, you've built a Faraday cage around your electronic components and it WILL block radio and electronic noise from being picked up by your guitar. Do NOT fall for, or buy into the "star grounding" nonsense. The way your pots are wired together is fine and you will NOT create a ground loop as long as your pickups are passive. Just be sure when you re-install your pots, switches, etc. that no bare "hot" leads come in contact with the copper shielding or you'll have NO sound at all, and that's probably a bit more noise cancelling than you're looking for. Good luck... An answer like this, is certainly more than I could have hoped for flyingfrets.... It is in depth and detailed, and it certainly lets me know what I will be getting myself involved in if I were to try to undertake this task, not that it is maybe even necessary, but it is worth looking into. Thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Manfred33 Posted October 24, 2014 Author Share Posted October 24, 2014 If your amp has a switchable ground try flipping that bad boy. If it is a frequency/antenna situation like capmaster describes you might try a different length cable. This would apply to FM. If its the AM giving you the problem then shielding will help. Σß Nope, no switchable ground on my amp... Thanks for pointing out the AM/FM thing... I can't even think off the top of my head what the station is, AM or FM and would never have even thought that one could be more of an issue than the other. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scott Marlowe Posted October 24, 2014 Share Posted October 24, 2014 ... and being busy, but I am really very dismayed and annoyed that I have not ... Wasn't sulking Emphasis added. Symantics. OK so you came across as entitled. Is that better? Either way it doesn't endear you or make me want to find answers your questions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deeman Posted October 24, 2014 Share Posted October 24, 2014 Emphasis added. Symantics. OK so you came across as entitled. Is that better? Either way it doesn't endear you or make me want to find answers your questions. OH Manfred33 posted a question!!!! Let me drop everything I am doing and research and answer his question!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rct Posted October 24, 2014 Share Posted October 24, 2014 Nope, don't have any entitlement mentality here. Nor do I think I was even coming off as being entitled to an answer, merely thought that somebody might have had something to say. I was just rather shocked that no one had chimed in yet. And don't worry, I am relaxed about the internet. Well that is good. So here's a tip, from me to you, so you stay hanging around here and add your experiences and knowledge to The Borg. When you put up a post like: So i haven't checked the message board in a week due to work and being busy, but I am really very dismayed and annoyed that I have not even managed to get one single response on this.... First thing I say when I read that is "What? I'm not busy?". Just a tip bro. If no answer, usually a "Anybody? Bueller?" will do. rct Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Manfred33 Posted October 25, 2014 Author Share Posted October 25, 2014 Ok guys, call it whatever you want to, but my b!tching about not getting a response to my question certainly got all of you to post some kind of thoughts on where the problem may lie. Even Deeman dropped everything to post a reply, even if it wasn't to provide his own thoughts, but to second those of others. So you all claim I went about it wrong, which I quickly admitted in my first post after I received replies, and that you all don't sit around waiting to research or respond to posts exhibiting entitlement to answers, but you all sure were helpful in brainstorming ideas.... Some at least were just helpful and didn't bust my balls, but in the end you were all providing help, going against your later stated beliefs about not getting bullied into answering questions. Either be helpful or bust my balls, but don't appease me and then lecture me about how to get responses after you all gave me responses that apparently I shouldn't have gotten from you in the first place.... Sorta hypocritical if you ask me. I'm sure I'll not be getting anymore answers to questions that I post on here and I'm fine with that.... I am still thankful for the help that was offered even though most of my posts were not geared that way.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
capmaster Posted October 25, 2014 Share Posted October 25, 2014 Star grounding is the best way of doing it in any application. Remember that any conductive loop may act as antenna. By the way, all of my Gibsons and Fenders came star grounded stock since decades. Most of them are passive. If you're talking about "star grounding" as being all the ground leads wired to the back of the volume pot, yes, you're correct. If you look at some of the websites that purport to walk you through shielding a guitar, a lot of them instruct you to disconnect all the grounding from the back of the pot (the idea being that they'll be grounded by contact with the shielding when you re-install them), and run all the ground leads (including the one from the input jack) to a small washer and ground them to the shielding itself. That's completely un-necessary. You can safely leave your wiring harness as is (unless you're replacing it) and re-install it in the guitar. Star grounding certainly won't hurt anything, and truthfully looks much neater and makes for a tidier install, but functionally, there's no advantage to undoing your current harness and wiring all the grounds to the shield. As I said, a ground loop won't happen with passive pickups no matter how many ground points are in the cavity, so there's no need to over-complicate things if you decide to shield your guitar. I think I'll have to revise my opinion after doing some research. Reliable sources say that star grounding is best for audio applications in general but grid grounding will suppress radio frequencies more effectively. Perhaps that's why connecting pots with wire AND shielding foil works better. Here's a very peculiar experience. I did an irreproducable live recording of a classical orchestra and choir performance. I ran into despair during that since I clearly heard cell phone buzz while monitoring. Later I found that luckily there was nothing of it on the recorded tracks. Recording and monitoring were happening within one unit, a Korg D3200 recorder, without outboards. The balanced line obviously suppressed the interference but the internal unbalanced monitoring path picked it up. There have been six 30m respectively 100ft balanced mic cables, and they obviously captured the radio frequency noise of cell phones in the audience which were muted but operative. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vomer Posted October 26, 2014 Share Posted October 26, 2014 Either be helpful or bust my balls, but don't appease me and then lecture me about how to get responses after you all gave me responses that apparently I shouldn't have gotten from you in the first place.... Sorta hypocritical if you ask me. I think maybe you should have stayed quiet while you were ahead. I haven't ever felt hypocrisy to be a feature here, and comments like this aren't exactly making friends. I'm sure I'll not be getting anymore answers to questions that I post on here and I'm fine with that. That's kind of a self-defeating prophecy. Nobody's said you're not welcome, stick around and see how it goes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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