Jazz Bass pickup noise!!!

[trjazzluva05]

My jazz bass sounds good but has one problem: my pickups have a loud noise when my finger comes in contact with the pole pieces. how do i fix this? My pickups are Fender Vintage Noiseless pickups.

[TomB]

Don't touch your pole pieces . Seriously, they're all like that.

[awall]

I was just about to ask the same question. MIM deluxe jazz. I don't remember any noise before I swapped pick ups. I switched to single coils and thought they were to noisy. I put the original noiseless back in and now they make noise until I touch the strings. If I touch a pole piece with my finger, it makes a loud buzzing noise. Maybe we can figure this out.
Al

[Stereo Joe]

You can get rid of the noise when you touch a pole piece by grounding the pole pieces themselves. Here is a Musicman style pickup with grounded polepieces:



Notice how the pole piece bottoms have a strip of copper foil which is then connected to the pickup ground.

A simpler way of avoiding this problem is to put some electrical tape over the top of your pickup.

[tjmdetroit]

Originally Posted by TomB

Don't touch your pole pieces . Seriously, they're all like that.

TomB.... "Hey doc everytime I lift my arm, it hurts bad....what should I do?" Doctor; "Don't lift your arm." RIMSHOT. YOU FORGOT THE RIMSHOT....man....
tjm

[M0ses]

What Stereo Joe said.

Awall, if you noiseless ones were noiseless before you messed with them, then you did something wrong re-wiring them.

[Medford Bassman]

I had this dreaded pickup noise when I touched them as well. I also had hum when I let go of the strings. The Audere website was a wonderful help on how to troubleshoot these problems.

A quick order to StewMac for copper shielding tape then I shielded the cavities, inside the pickup covers and also laid the tape on the bottom of the magnets and ran a wire to a body ground.

I am talking seriously dead quiet. Like scary dead quiet. I love it.

My question is why don't all basses over $1000 come like this? Honestly, how much would it cost to add this level of shielding to kill all noise? Just an observation from a simple guy who owns a couple of $1000 + basses.

[Stereo Joe]

Originally Posted by Medford Bassman

My question is why don't all basses over $1000 come like this? Honestly, how much would it cost to add this level of shielding to kill all noise? Just an observation from a simple guy who owns a couple of $1000 + basses.

I agree with you completely. If an ignorant hack like me can completely shield and re-wire a passive bass in a couple hours, why can't a pro do it before boxing up the bass?

This actually reminds me that there is a great little music store in my old home town where the (sole) proprietor not only completely shields all of his stock instruments, he also dresses the frets, does a complete set up and replaces the strings. Every instrument you pick up off a rack in this store is perfectly ready to rock! He even does this to the cheap Fender knock-offs he has....