Question about noisy pickups.

[ElectricGuitard]

I'm a humbucker user with a few different guitars. One guitar with Duncan Distortions has absolutely no noise whatsoever, no matter the position of the guitar. Another guitar, with Dimarzio SD/PAF Pro has some noise, that changes with the position on the guitar, and another guitar with Dimarzio Tone Zone/Air Norton that is very noisy, with varying degrees of noise depending on how the guitar is positioned. All used with the same high gain setting. I took the guitar with TZ/AN to the shop because that was one of my guitars that I wired myself and I figured something was wrong with the way I wired it, but the tech said everything seemed to be working fine and saw or heard nothing wrong (of course). Back in my apartment...still noisy. My question is....is this a dimarzio problem, or an issue with the frequency response that those particular pickups have....or something else? Thanks for your help in advance guys.

 

[Funkfingers]

Re: Question about noisy pickups.

Obviously, your guitars are sensing something. Your high gain amplification boosts the interference to irritating levels.

Popular sources for such noises include the mains electricity supply, refrigerators, light dimmer controls, televisions and computer monitors - especially those with cathode ray tubes.

Since your guitars are acting as interference detectors, use this. Move around the room whilst wearing the offending guitar. Wherever the noise is most obtrusive is probably the source of the problem.

REMEMBER - Many items of musical equipment contain microprocessors and electronic displays. Your own gear could be the problem. Got any "wall wart" power supplies driving your effects? Check them by A/B substitution.

 

[Jason_The_Angry]

Re: Question about noisy pickups.

Random note: when I had a Tone Zone installed in my SG years ago, I found it would pick up interference from the TV remote if I held it close enough. Some pretty interesting noises...

How's the shielding in the cavities? I've seen some pretty shoddy shielding paint work. The paint also has to be thick enough to make a connection to the guitar's ground circuit to be effective. If it looks good, well.... noise gate time? Funkfingers has the right approach to find the source of the noise, though.

 

[uOpt]

Re: Question about noisy pickups.

Does the noise get better when you touch the strings (while holding the guitar in playing position)?

You might be in a noisy environment and the guitar with Duncans is shielded. That doesn't explain why one guitar with Dimarzio humbuckers makes more noise than the other, even if neither is shielded. Possible explanations include lack of string grounding (see above) and use of unshielded wire. Even if you don't shield the electronics cavity the wires to the pickups and switches need to be shielded.

A third explanation is that the shield in the 4-conductor pickup wire (which really is 5 conductors, 4 leads plus shield+barewire) is not grounded. That is a common mistake, people just connect the 4 leads but leave the bare wire alone. It needs to be grounded along with one of the leads.

 

[rts99]

Re: Question about noisy pickups.

I pick up noise from my cell in both my amps. Both my amps are solid state but I don't think it matters. The amps just aren't shielded in the frequency range of the cell phone. In time I expect amp designs will address this noise but for now I have to turn of my cell whenever I want to play.