Causes of noise!?

[Guitarist-Jonny]

Ok, I've had this going on for a while now and I want to ask what you all think. I have been getting 'noise' with my guitar (HSH setup), and it only seems to be coming when the humbuckers are selected. I've resoldered the bridge earth as it looked a bit... dodgey. All other earth connections look nice and shiny and I don't think there's any ground loops. However, The noise vanishes WHENEVER AND WHERE-EVER I EARTH THE GUITAR WITH MY HAND. I can also create a similar effect when I move the green (Ground) wire (dimarzio pickup) of the selected pickup. Is this strange? Is this noise just due to outside factors that the pickup is 'picking' up? Am I just introducing some kind of current/noise when I'm touching the green? What would you recommend I do? Is there anything else I need to know to 'diagnose' this?
Thanks, I do need help on this as I want my guitars up to scratch and I don't have faith in my local luthiers abilities tbh.
Regards
Jon

[toneboy]

Which model are the Dimarzio humbuckers?

[Guitarist-Jonny]

Air Zone (Bridge) and Air Norton (neck) Blue Velvet (middle single coil).
Thanks
Regards
Jon

[Yamadron]

Well,
There is no enough info actually for your problem..

You have checked the ground (green wires) to the Volume pot, right?! Are there any improvements?

Have you checked the ground wire on the spring claw at the back of the guitar ?

Are the bare wires of both the AZ and AN soldered properly ?

You said that you moved the green wire and it makes the noise disappears, How do you move it ? You touch the end of the wire with your hand ?

Is there any aluminum/copper shielding at the pots cavity ?

Sorry for being harsh xD.

[Guitarist-Jonny]

You're not being harsh, I really appreciate your help !

Green wires soldered to volume pot:
-No! They're soldered to the pickup selector!

Checked the ground wire on spring claw:
-Yes! Replaced it with two multi core wires and soldered to volume pot!

Bare wires of pickups soldered properly:
-They're soldered and there is a connection; as to how good it is is up for debate.

Movement of green wire:
- It's the actual insulation I move, i just push in any direction with my finger and it makes the noise.

-No shielding


Do you guys remove the pots from the cavity when soldering? Everything is so tight for space, how do you not catch other wires etc?

Thanks
Regards
Jon

[Yousef]

Originally Posted by Guitarist-Jonny

You're not being harsh, I really appreciate your help !

Green wires soldered to volume pot:
-No! They're soldered to the pickup selector!

Bingo! Green wires should be soldered to the volume pot.

Try this chart here:
http://www.seymourduncan.com/support...c=HSH_1v_1t_5w

Using this simple tip for color codes:
http://www.seymourduncan.com/support...tentiometer_v/

But just by looking at it I think that all you have to do is switch the red and black. With the diagram I provided it seems like their black is hot, while dimarzio's is red.

[Yamadron]

As yousef said, the Green wires should be soldered volume pot not the PU Selector. Both Green and Bare wires are grounding wires beside the ones to the spring claw. The Green wire are considered free wires in your case. They should be connected to Volume Pot not the the PU Selector

Solder them and come back to use with a feedback

No need to check any diagrams, I guess. your wiring is done except for the green wires (grounding wire) Recheck the wiring anyway

All you need to do is to solder 2 green wires to the Volume pot not the PU Selector.

You can go here anyway:

Ibanez H-S-H configuration wiring diagram:
hxxp://w ww.ibanez.com/support/wiring/W97044.gif

or here Dimarzio H-S-H configuration wiring diagram:
hxxp://w ww.dimarzio.com//media/diagrams/C.pdf

--REPLACE the "xx" with "tt" in the links and remove the space between "www". Posts are less than 20 -

Dimarzio should make better quality image of the wiring like SD did

Hope I helped you

[Guitarist-Jonny]

Hi all, thanks for all your help so far ! The guitar sounds much better now (seemingly much more output) but the noise issue is still there- if I just rub my finger along the volume/tone pot (knobly edges) without touching anything else metal on the guitar I get this terrible scratchy noise- I'm not actually turning the pot it's just as my finger moves across it.

I also circuit tested each bit of the 'circuit' I could test, I noticed that across the pickup selector (I will add that this is some weird selector- it's relatively huge and has 24 pin-like points that you can solder wire to!) there is only about 60% strength of circuit compared to what my circuit tester would normally give (and that it did give across each soldered joint I tested).

I have a multimeter, would you say it would be an idea to check for any resistance in the selector?

Could it be the pickup selector that is calling this?

Could it be the pickups just picking up other things in my locality? But, wouldn't that be more of a permanent noise, rather than one that I can 'earth' or 'ground' away?

Thanks for your help everyone, it really is appreciated !
Regards
Jon

[Guitarist-Jonny]

Another thing- When ground/earth wires are connected 'together.' By together I mean to a volume pot, do they all have to be connected to the SAME 'blob' of solder? Because at the moment mine isn't but they're all soldered to the volume pot casing. Could this be causing a ground loop?
Thanks
Regards
Jon

[Yamadron]

Before doing anything, I will check if there is any not soldered wires or which are not soldered properly.

Does that sound appears without touching the whole guitar ? or just touching the Tone Knob ?

I can't tell you to test it, because I have no idea how are the connections in the cavity ?

24 pins to connect to ? That is somehow a lot for me

Could be yes, could be not. Such electrical circuits need a lot of testing to determine the problem. Sometimes, you couldn't = F**king Physics

Could be yes, but that is a little chance to happen. If you are playing in a florescent emitting room. (Blue Lights).. Try to change the room and sit in a place with Tungsten lamps or no place with lights (SUN)

No they don't need to be soldered within the same blob. Any place on the Volume pot is fine. My soldering is like, the bridge is alone, middle is alone, neck is alone, Volume Pot to PU selector and other things are on the same blob because they will not be changed too unless I changed the PU switcher or purchased a new potentiometer.

I hope I can help you more

[Guitarist-Jonny]

The sound appears when I don't touch anything metal on the guitar. But it is fairly quiet, intil I rub my finger across either of the pots, but if I touch anything metal whilst doing this nothing happens. I only use around 9 or ten of the connections (but both 'hots' from the humbuckers are soldered to three wires in a row.) Am i right in saying it has to be one of the Earth/Ground connections that will be faulty?
Thanks again dude
Regards
Jon

[Guitarist-Jonny]

Ok update- it ONLY makes the noise with the volume pot- I'm thinkin the volume pot earth connection is playing up?
Thanks
Regards
Jon

[6fingers]

greasy food !

[Yamadron]

Ok, You said the noise appears when the guitar is free, then when you touch the "Volume" pot, the sound disappears, and if you touched anything metal while still touching the knob, the sound is still disappearing - which is correct because the knobs are made of conducting metal. The sides of it not the top -

OK, I have a question ? is the noise too high that you when you leave the room, you can hear the noise from your guitar when volume on both amp and the guitar are on maximum?

If it is quiet and the earthing wires are soldered properly, actually that could be a manufacturing problem which I faced in my Ibanez too. That is because there is no conductivity material inside the pots cavity, therefore that earthing could not be enough.

I found an idea, and it was very simple. Try it and come back to me.

1. Get a piece of kitchen Aluminum foil.
2. Cut it and start shaping it to fit the shape of the cavity cover.
3. Stick it with anything you want. e.g: sticker tape.
4. Get a wire, preferably the same thickness as the pickups wires, but a thicker one is fine. Don't use too thin wires.
5. Solder the wire on the Volume pot from a side and on the Aluminum foil on the other side.

Waiting for a feedback

[Yousef]

Take a piece of electrical tape and put it over all the wires that are soldered to the volume pot. Then take another piece of electrical tape and place it over all the wires on the pickup selector. This usually cures the issues that you're describing.