My ES-339 has a positional (vertical/horizontal) high frequency pickup buzz

[becseattle]

New member here!

 

I have a newly acquired 2009 ES-339, which I love. It has just developed a reasonably loud high frequency pickup buzz. It's loud on either pickup alone, silent with the switch in the middle. I understand this is common an dmust have something to do with the coil configuration. It is pretty much eliminated by turning either the pickup or amp treble controls to 0.

 

What is weird is that is is totally dependent on whether the guitar is vertical (no buzz at all) or horizontal (loud buzz). Touching the strings or guitar doesn't make much difference, nor does does the horizontal orientation, both are bad.

 

Two changes this week that may have made this worse. First, I had a setup at a local shop- not too much done, mostly action lowered. Next, I retubed my Vox AC15 (which I think is irrelevant ).

 

Anyone know what I can do to fix this?

 

Bruce

[badbluesplayer]

New member here!

 

I have a newly acquired 2009 ES-339, which I love. It has just developed a reasonably loud high frequency pickup buzz. It's loud on either pickup alone, silent with the switch in the middle. I understand this is common an dmust have something to do with the coil configuration. It is pretty much eliminated by turning either the pickup or amp treble controls to 0.

 

What is weird is that is is totally dependent on whether the guitar is vertical (no buzz at all) or horizontal (loud buzz). Touching the strings or guitar doesn't make much difference, nor does does the horizontal orientation, both are bad.

 

Two changes this week that may have made this worse. First, I had a setup at a local shop- not too much done, mostly action lowered. Next, I retubed my Vox AC15 (which I think is irrelevant ).

 

Anyone know what I can do to fix this?

 

Bruce

Geez - the thing that stands out is that the buzz depends on the position of the guitar. That seems to indicate that there might be some interference at your location that is being picked up by the guitar. You could check your rig out somewhere else to see what happens - obviously not very convenient. You can also turn off all your circuit breakers in your house except for the one that you plug into and check that.

 

Might be from something with a phase problem, like a motor with bad brushes. Do you have any big pumps or other motors in your neighborhood that are hooked up to 3 phase power - the kind of power lines that have three big wires running along the tops of the poles? Like maybe a sewage pumping station or a water system booster pump. Do you have 3 phase power in your neighborhood?

[Murph]

I'm with badbluesplayer.

[CR9]

As badbluesplayer said, try your rig (guitar & amp) in another location and if it does not buzz there, then you need to trouble shoot your location. It could be a florescent light going bad or the furnace/AC motor. When you walk around with the guitar you may find the buzz gets louder or softer. Too bad the newer amps don't have the ground polarity switch that old ones had. That was a good diagnostic tool. You could very well have issues with the new tubes. Does the noise happen with other amps in your same location? You are going to have to take some time to track this thing down.

[CR9]

The horizontal/vertical thing makes me think more about a florescent light or some other RF energy. Wireless network router?

[becseattle]

I think you guys are pretty much right on.. I did an experiments this morning and its' definitely the guitar and the room and not the amp or power outlet that's doing it. When I moved amp/guitar into another room and plugged the amp in there, the buzz is gone and no positional affects at all. Next I moved the amp and guitar back to problem area, got an extension cord, and plugged the amp into the room where it was quiet.. And- buzz is back and highly positional, and still eliminated with pickup selector in middle or reducing treble to zero.

 

So it definitely results from an interaction of the pickups with the room that depends upon on their vertical/horizontal orientation. My house does have a mix of knob/tube and updated power, and I have just been using updated and grounded circuits, but I think that have eliminated the power as the source, unless there is some old wiring near the problem room.

 

I will investigate the interference source some more, since we just set this room up into a great little spot to play.

[badbluesplayer]

.... since we just set this room up into a great little spot to play.

 

Once you get the little electrical gremlins out of that room it'll be fine!!