constant mesh
New member
Hey guys.
I got a Strat in the shop, it has a JB Jr. in the bridge with genuine mid and neck pups (the mid is obviously RW/RP). Initial issue was that the position 2 was out of phase and it needed a new output jack. Black was hot, green was ground, so I just reversed that and it sounded as it should and replaced the jack.
Now the second problem with this guitar is the annoying buzz when you are not touching the strings or any metal parts. As far as schematics go, I did a traditional SSS configuration, the stock wiring looked okay, I only touched up a few joints that were flimsy. I know Strat wiring by heart so everything was looking okay.
The buzz is gone when volume is at 0, so my ground lug on my volume pot is okay. I even replaced the pot for a new one to see if that helps. I took the tone pots completely out of the circuit to eliminate bad pots, ground loops or bad caps. Yet, nothing changed. Then I went and desoldered the pups completely (with hot and GND dangling in air) and tried them one by one. Still the buzz was there. Then I tried going directly into the volume pot ditching the 5-way switch completely. No improvements! Even a basic one pup one pot configuration does not eliminate it. Whenever I touch the tremolo, jack plate or foil on the pickguard it stops. It even buzzes if don't have anything connected to the left (hot in) lug on the pot, so basically all I have is a volume pot with the jack hooked to it. It's the same.
If it matters in any way, this guitar has no star ground lug. There is no indication that the conductive paint is underneath the finish like on most of modern Fender where they just scrape a small portion off and screw it there. But I think the star ground isn't important here right now.
There's absoluetely no issues with my power lines or my equipment. Other guitars are just fine. Googling just gives me "the nature of the beast" type of answers or suggestions about excessive shielding, altough this is not a RF-intereference problem, but a ground problem! I can induce RF interference in my shop on purpose so I can eliminate that too if I have to.
I always check for a solid ground with my DMM, I didn't find any excessive resistance. I have also replaced part of the wiring completely with fresh strands of wire (trem claw, input jack, blade switch bridges etc). I am not getting more than 0.3 Ohm of resistance on any of the two ground points.
Could be the static build-up on the pickguard? I would really appreciate some help here and believe me, I have tried and tried ...
I got a Strat in the shop, it has a JB Jr. in the bridge with genuine mid and neck pups (the mid is obviously RW/RP). Initial issue was that the position 2 was out of phase and it needed a new output jack. Black was hot, green was ground, so I just reversed that and it sounded as it should and replaced the jack.
Now the second problem with this guitar is the annoying buzz when you are not touching the strings or any metal parts. As far as schematics go, I did a traditional SSS configuration, the stock wiring looked okay, I only touched up a few joints that were flimsy. I know Strat wiring by heart so everything was looking okay.
The buzz is gone when volume is at 0, so my ground lug on my volume pot is okay. I even replaced the pot for a new one to see if that helps. I took the tone pots completely out of the circuit to eliminate bad pots, ground loops or bad caps. Yet, nothing changed. Then I went and desoldered the pups completely (with hot and GND dangling in air) and tried them one by one. Still the buzz was there. Then I tried going directly into the volume pot ditching the 5-way switch completely. No improvements! Even a basic one pup one pot configuration does not eliminate it. Whenever I touch the tremolo, jack plate or foil on the pickguard it stops. It even buzzes if don't have anything connected to the left (hot in) lug on the pot, so basically all I have is a volume pot with the jack hooked to it. It's the same.
If it matters in any way, this guitar has no star ground lug. There is no indication that the conductive paint is underneath the finish like on most of modern Fender where they just scrape a small portion off and screw it there. But I think the star ground isn't important here right now.
There's absoluetely no issues with my power lines or my equipment. Other guitars are just fine. Googling just gives me "the nature of the beast" type of answers or suggestions about excessive shielding, altough this is not a RF-intereference problem, but a ground problem! I can induce RF interference in my shop on purpose so I can eliminate that too if I have to.
I always check for a solid ground with my DMM, I didn't find any excessive resistance. I have also replaced part of the wiring completely with fresh strands of wire (trem claw, input jack, blade switch bridges etc). I am not getting more than 0.3 Ohm of resistance on any of the two ground points.
Could be the static build-up on the pickguard? I would really appreciate some help here and believe me, I have tried and tried ...
