swansong
Rookie Solder Flinger
Posts: 5
Likes: 0
|
Post by swansong on Feb 20, 2012 19:53:00 GMT -5
Hello all. I've just finished wiring my second guitar. It is having a few problems. Just to set things up, I had an old body, an old neck, and some old electronics laying around, and I decided I was going to throw something together on which to play slide. I bought a Gibson 500t for an extremely awesome price and was going to use this pickup to play through. I followed one of the free wiring diagrams from guitarelectronics.com. Here it is: www.guitarelectronics.com/product/WD1H11_00/Guitar-Wiring-Diagram-1-Humbucker1-Volume1-Tone.html. I kept to this very faithfully, except in addition, I decided to shield the pickup cavity with copper tape, I grounded this to the back of the volume pot like I had read and seen in a video. When I had finished the circuit, I still have not put strings on, I wanted see whether or not it worked smoothly, it buzzes and sometimes screams out random frequencies. When I touch the screws on the pickup it gets louder, and when I touch the jack plate it gets softer. I have often read that issues of this kind are related to grounding issues, but everything is like the diagram says. I'm not excellent with this stuff. My soldering is shaky, the parts weren't kept under the best conditions, and the control cavity is really cramp with all the stuff in there. Any Ideas? ?
|
|
|
Post by newey on Feb 20, 2012 23:22:23 GMT -5
SS- Some well-focused close-up photos might help see something, but we're sort-of flying blind at present. We're all big on shielding around here. But a single HB is probably going to be fairly quiet to begin with, shielding may not make a big difference. First thing to check is to see whether you have accidentally reversed the wiring to the output jack. It's easy to confuse the two lugs. If we're telling the truth around here, I'll bet we've all done it- I have. If that's OK, then: - Did you run a bridge ground?
- You grounded the shielding to the vol. pot shell. Is that shell then grounded to the output jack ground?
- Do all your grounds tie together at some point? Where?
|
|
swansong
Rookie Solder Flinger
Posts: 5
Likes: 0
|
Post by swansong on Feb 21, 2012 17:58:49 GMT -5
Thanks for your reply. I did not even think of photos! Firstly, okay, I'll rip out the shielding, if anything, it's one less wire to deal with. I did run a bridge ground, I put a fresh wire down the pre-existing hole, and made sure it was touching the bridge mouting piece that goes down there. I did ground everything to the back of the volume pot, but they are not all together, the black and bare wire coming from the humbucker are ground to a different spot because the way I cut the wire, it wasn't long enough. I didn't think this mattered, I'll remedy that. I did ground the jack. Lastly, that's hilarious, I was going over the diagram thinking how could I mess that up, the sleeve and the tip, but I sure did. I guess I was rushing to get this thing done. Thank you, you were on it. I'll make these changes, and If something is still amiss I'll consult this thread again. Thanks for getting me in the right direction.
|
|
|
Post by newey on Feb 21, 2012 21:03:07 GMT -5
If the jack was reversed, fix that and string it up. I wouldn't be tearing out the shielding job, it may not make a difference but it can't hurt, assuming the rewired jack solves the problem.
No -I meant to the same place, as in, to the back of the same pot, rather than some going one place and others elsewhere. If everything is soldered to the back of the volume pot, it should be fine as is. No need to change anything.
This is worrisome. "Touching" isn't the same as "soldered". Even on bridges where there's a connection by contact, it's usually underneath a bridge plate which is solidly screwed into the body, making a positive contact.
Again, the miswired jack is probably the only issue, but if it's still noisy you may want to revisit this wire. We still don't know what type of guitar this is, and I'm having trouble visualizing what you mean by "bridge mounting piece".
|
|
swansong
Rookie Solder Flinger
Posts: 5
Likes: 0
|
Post by swansong on Feb 23, 2012 8:04:33 GMT -5
YES! Incidently it's an old Epiphone Special II I had laying around. I don't know how I could have been so careless, but that was it. I plugged it in, after the switch, and it was as quiet as a mouse pissing on cotton; I put my screwdriver up to the screws on the pickup, and it popped so loud I thought it was singing. I can't believe I missed this when I was going over it. Anyway, thank you sir!!! I am going to string it up right now.
|
|