Any of you guys shield your hollowbody?

Heady Jam Fan · May 08, 2012, 10:34:51 AM

I've been loving my guitar and simplifying my rig, which is great, but I have a bit of hum - nothing terrible - just would like to minimize it.

It pretty much only occurs when my guitar is at full volume (diminishes when I roll back the volume knob) and when I am about 2-10" from my amp, especially when the amp is facing me (and tilted back) - if I turn so my body is between the amp and guitar and the guitar is facing away from the amp, the hum goes down quite a bit. If I am standing over the amp, there is no hum and if I stand all the way across my room, the hum is minimal.

It is not a grounding thing, I figured it was the pups interacting with the speaker and that maybe shielding the pups (and/or electronics) might help. If it is an easy fix, it would be worth it, but getting inside the guitar and shielding more than just the pups might be pretty tricky. The hum is also worse when I am in the single coil setting (not surprisingly), which I don't use too often anyway.

Do you guys think it would help and be worthwhile to toss some shielding material behind the pups?

Happyorange27 · May 08, 2012, 12:59:36 PM

I'm not going to be much help here but I did hear that every piece of metal on your guitar (minus hot signal contacts) should all be connected to make one huge continuous ground. Take a volt meter, set it on ohms and start touching all the metal to see if you indeed get damn near zero ohms. If for some reason you find a piece that is not connected to the ground grid, then you are inducing a loop.
I know you don't think it's a ground thing. This will help you ensure that is true.

Heady Jam Fan · May 08, 2012, 01:39:48 PM

You might be right, I know everything is grounded though, including the bridge. I should get a volt meter, but I haven't thus far. I don't notice a huge difference when I am touching vs not touching the strings or anything like that.

Happyorange27 · May 08, 2012, 02:12:08 PM

You are probably fine then as far as grounding.

Heady Jam Fan · May 10, 2012, 04:31:20 PM

I might try to check into that Happy - I was hoping for a magical easy answer that didn't require me taking apart the electronics in my guitar since it is not easy to access.

Any other thoughts?

Happyorange27 · May 10, 2012, 04:43:49 PM

You don't HAVE to get into all the electronics to see if you can do a surface check on the metal outside. Good luck.

Heady Jam Fan · May 10, 2012, 04:46:55 PM

So like the metal on each pot to the jack?

Happyorange27 · May 10, 2012, 04:59:56 PM

Yeah and even the tuning posts while connected to strings. It's all one big ground.

Heady Jam Fan · May 10, 2012, 06:47:47 PM

Would a CAE ISO1 do the trick for this?