salem Posted September 28, 2005 Posted September 28, 2005 Hi. on several of my high end guitars, Hamers and Andersons, I hear static in my amp when I remove my hand from the guitar neck. When I replace my hand, the static goes away. Do any others have this experience? What is going on here?
Luke Posted September 28, 2005 Posted September 28, 2005 If you mean when you touch the strings the noise goes away, that is classic bad ground issues.
salem Posted September 28, 2005 Author Posted September 28, 2005 If you mean when you touch the strings the noise goes away, that is classic bad ground issues. What can be done to solve this?
HAMERMAN Posted September 28, 2005 Posted September 28, 2005 Usually there is a ground wire going from a ground in the control cavity (often the body of a pot) to the bottom of the bridge. When the bridge gets screwed down the wire is trapped between the body and the bridge. If you have floyds the wire is typically soldered to the spring "claw".This is pretty standard fare except when a guitar has EMG's in which case it may have been removed.
hardheartedbill Posted September 28, 2005 Posted September 28, 2005 If you mean when you touch the strings the noise goes away, that is classic bad ground issues. What can be done to solve this? keep your hand on the strings/bridge or turn your vol off between tunes
salem Posted September 28, 2005 Author Posted September 28, 2005 If you mean when you touch the strings the noise goes away, that is classic bad ground issues. What can be done to solve this? keep your hand on the strings/bridge or turn your vol off between tunes HHB:I'm not sure if you're joking or not, but sometimes is this the only solution? The reason I ask is it seems unlikely that ALL of my guitars happen to have a loose ground wire.
anotherfreak2 Posted September 28, 2005 Posted September 28, 2005 Are you using the same amp with all the guitars?are you using a lot of gain? gain magnifies any noise, a lot
hardheartedbill Posted September 28, 2005 Posted September 28, 2005 If you mean when you touch the strings the noise goes away, that is classic bad ground issues. What can be done to solve this? keep your hand on the strings/bridge or turn your vol off between tunes HHB:I'm not sure if you're joking or not, but sometimes is this the only solution? The reason I ask is it seems unlikely that ALL of my guitars happen to have a loose ground wire. I'm not joking, YOU are the ground on all passive electric guitar pickups, some circuits and amps highlight these hum issues more than others, but you can't remove it unless you go to active pickups, all of your guitars are fine
cmatthes Posted September 28, 2005 Posted September 28, 2005 I recommend plugging in a lot of flourescent lights and neons.
md2020 Posted September 28, 2005 Posted September 28, 2005 When I replace my hand... That's gotta hurt. Hang in there!
salem Posted September 28, 2005 Author Posted September 28, 2005 Thanks for help, replies, and humor. What I'm afraid of is that there is a ground problem at the socket, the three prong plug at my socket takes a grounding screw at my house and that helps reduce the noise somwhat; I'm wondering if this is a feature of an older house, about 40 years old.Are there any comments or advice in this direction?
hardheartedbill Posted September 28, 2005 Posted September 28, 2005 it will always be there to some degree, an older house makes it worse. just play and forget about it
Jimbilly Posted September 28, 2005 Posted September 28, 2005 I was getting a very odd am radio station that was just barely audible on Monday night, then I realized my cable was not quite all the way plugged in. When I plugged it in the am went away, I don't know for sure which band it was, but it sounded AM-ish. ('80s Fender MIJ jazz bass special).
salem Posted September 28, 2005 Author Posted September 28, 2005 Okay, this afternoon when I came home from work I examined my guitar cord and found that the jack was not screwed all the way in. Could this have been the cause of the non- grounding static?I screwed the jack in and played the guitar and the amp and guitar were free of all static. I never have heard anything so pure and sweet and clear!Do you think the loose jack could have been the cause of the problem?
MCChris Posted September 28, 2005 Posted September 28, 2005 If you tightened the jack and the static went away, then yes, the loose jack could have been the cause of the problem.
SteveB Posted September 28, 2005 Posted September 28, 2005 I was getting a very odd am radio station that was just barely audible on Monday night, then I realized my cable was not quite all the way plugged in. When I plugged it in the am went away, I don't know for sure which band it was, but it sounded AM-ish. ('80s Fender MIJ jazz bass special). my tube amps have an annoying habit of picking up Christian AM stations.
cmatthes Posted September 28, 2005 Posted September 28, 2005 If you tightened the jack and the static went away, then yes, the loose jack could have been the cause of the problem. Or in my case, just the beginning...
tombo Posted September 28, 2005 Posted September 28, 2005 Check this post out: Noise Tom even replied to the post. He's pretty tired of hearing this complaint. Basically, he says what HHB recommended - keep your hands on the neck, turn down the vol. when not using your guitar. I love TA guitars and Tom knows infinitely more about guitars than I do, however, I think there's something to the Elixir string issue (I use them, and love 'em). On **SOME** guitars, they **SEEM TO BE** the cause of some noise. I put them on my TA Hollow T Classic, and the noise appears. Switch to a normal string (D'Addario - they make Elixir....go figure) and the noise is gone.
cmatthes Posted September 28, 2005 Posted September 28, 2005 Tom: Next time, I ship you... D'ADDARIOs!!!!
doody Posted September 28, 2005 Posted September 28, 2005 I have had a problem of having Terrible sounds coming from all my amps when any guitar is plugged into them. All three of my amps do this. The terrible noise starts when I start to play and stops when I stop playing. Come to think of it, my accoustic guitar has the same problem. Must be the D'Addario strings.
salem Posted September 28, 2005 Author Posted September 28, 2005 Tombo:I read the entire thread at the TA forum. The problem with Tom's solution is twofold:1. Not everyone plays with their right hand resting on the bridge. I don't. My right hand is free from the bridge, and I have a pretty good right hand that moves freely through the air.2. The second problem with Tom's solution is that it is a constant struggle to keep your left hand on the strings while playing. Don't laugh. There are times when one's left hand lifts up completely from the strings to move to another position or chord change.
hardheartedbill Posted September 29, 2005 Posted September 29, 2005 I keep falling off my surfboard, what could cause this? dude, it's just life in the big city, if you can't deal w/ it get EMG's cause it's always there, try gigging @ loud volume all around town w/ crappy pwer and neon signs everywhere, don't believe me or TA , but were right and that's how you deal w/ it, hands on. If you ever get to really crank a big amp you'll have to do the same thing or it will feedback out of control, hands on is a must for loud, you can do it
Guest Mike Lee Posted September 29, 2005 Posted September 29, 2005 HHB is right. If the noise goes away when you touch the strings, the bridge ground is GOOD. If touching the strings has no effect then then bridge ground is probably bad.Your body shields the guitar from noise caused by electrical fields but not magnetic fields. Electrical noise sounds like static or fizz, magnetic noise sounds like a hum - usually 60 Hz because that is the freqency of AC current in the U.S.To minimize electrical noise, you can shield your guitar. Hamer already does this for you with the conductive paint they use in the control cavity. But the shield does have to be linked to ground for it to work. Usually, this is accomplished by the control pots.Really though, this should be common knowledge to any electric guitar player past beginner level.
tombo Posted September 29, 2005 Posted September 29, 2005 Tom:Next time, I ship you... D'ADDARIOs!!!! Chris, no problem!!!! I use D'Ads .10s on my cheapo MIJ Strat
tobereeno Posted September 29, 2005 Posted September 29, 2005 2. The second problem with Tom's solution is that it is a constant struggle to keep your left hand on the strings while playing. Don't laugh. There are times when one's left hand lifts up completely from the strings to move to another position or chord change. I just took a look at my technique due to this thread. If a string isn't vibrating, I'm touching/muting it with either the left or right hand. Always. Must be all those years of hi-gain to get me into that habit
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.