Why shielding guitar

Sometimes it is question of where you play your guitar, and how important a clean sound is to you or your audience. If you play live music on stage, or make recordings and your guitar has single coil pickups, then shielding is necessary to reduce hum.

Shielding provides protection to the electronic components of your guitar from electromagnetic fields produced by things like mains voltage wiring and electrical devices. Without going to technical, a Faraday cage essentially blocks frequently changing magnetic fields like the invisible field around mains wiring, fluorescent and neon lighting, computer monitors, etc.

Electric guitars pick up most of the unwanted electromagnetic signal through the ground loop. This loop is formed through all the electrical equipment connected on a common circuit. In a venue there could be many devices like televisions, audio mixers, lighting dimmers, or transformers connected to the same ground loop. This will all cause the 60Hz frequency to induce a signal in guitar pickups that is then amplified through the sound system.

Guitar shielding works very well to reduce 60Hz hum or 50Hz for some countries and is effective at blocking the unwanted signal since a Faraday cage cancels an electromagnetic field for anything inside the cage.

Shielding your guitar will help reduce static in dry conditions and assist with reducing hum when you are not touching the guitar strings. There are a range of different pickups you can use, and they all have their own characteristics, with some producing more hums than others.

Single coil pickups are the worst offenders when it comes to humming noise, since these coils have a wire winding in only one direction, easily passing the 60Hz changing magnetic field through to the amp. With their opposed windings, the two magnetic fields work in opposite directions, and the 60Hz frequency is effectively cancelled between the two coils.

Above all, it will ensure that you keep all signal connections as quiet as possible and as bare as possible within the shielded cable. This arrangement is often recommended to eliminate so-called "ground rings". A ground loop occurs when two components of a circuit e. The "star" type layout gives the circuit a very tidy appearance and is absolutely recommended.

However, it should be noted that in the passive circuit of a guitar there can be no ground rings, which are to be found in more complex circuits such as tube amplifiers. In this case, I recommend the use of a two-wire cable and a sheath. A good way to shield single coils is covering the coil with adhesive copper foil by connecting the shield to ground. Took quite some time to do it right.

No difference! Still makes the same noise. Still gets the same interference. Pfeister Member. Ahess86 Member. Terry McInturff said:. Ahess86 said:. Hi Terry, This is a relatively new and interesting topic to me. I'm curious, how do you connecting your shielding paint to ground? Messages 2, I know shielding works well.. AudioWonderland Member. Messages 5, Oh Hell I went nuts and did 3 coats of stewmac paint and then applied Stew mac copper tape with the conductive adhesive over the paint on my strats.

It was everything I wanted and more. After shielding I had to locate myself so the pickups were off access from the CRT but once I did it was quiet. I later replaced the CRT with a flat screen and it got even better. I have always felt like just a tiny bit of treble is lost when the shielding is done but I also consider that a plus. Strats always seem a touch bright to me. Pscheoverdrive Member.

Pots, pickups, bridge, output jack, etc. I used to use aluminum foil and spray-glue on some of my early guitars. It actually worked pretty well and was a heck of a lot cheaper than shielding paint or tape, but looked pretty DIY. Maybe somebody should start making metal pickup cavities and control cavities that could just get dropped into the guitar, and then grounded. I'd trust something like that for a ground-to-chassis kind of wiring job.

Pscheoverdrive said:. For a number of years, Gibson fitted LP's etc with a metal can for the control and switch cavities. These worked well. Come on Terry!

Noise is an essential element in the Sonic Pantheon of Rock and Roll guitar! My current Strat is the most quiet I ever owned. It didn't start off that way. I had a full aluminum shield and everything properly grounded, but it still had some issue that would go away when I touched the strings or anything metal. So, I got a small can of that StewMac stuff and applied 2 coats to the pickup cavities, the elex compartment, even the output cavity.

After it was dry next day , I reattached my ground strap from the pickup ground cluster on the V pot to the elex cavity side wall and buttoned it up. To me, the StewMac paint was the magic touch.