Use cap to remove buzz/hum ?

[kringle77]

My bass has a dimarzio will power p pup wired to a volume knob, to a redeemer circuit active buffer. Whether Im using a cable or my digital wireless I get alot of buzz and a snap when I touch the metal parts of the bass. Everyting is grounded to the output jack and I've tried everything I can to get rid of the buzz and snap.

If I wired a small cap from the pickups hot to ground, to low pass at 10khz, would this fix the problem? I've resorted to using a noise gate live because lighting makes my bass so noisy.

[line6man]

Are you trying to get rid of electrical noise, or 60Hz hum?

[DiabolusInMusic]

I am assuming you mean hum, you need to do some shielding from the sounds of it.

Look for a shielding guide, it is fairly straight forward. You can source copper foil tape locally from stained glass supply shops. Should fix your problem.

[kringle77]

I think electric noise. It sounds like a grounding problem but, I've went down the entire list and tried everything. I think that the redeemer circuit is actually bring all the frequencies up, especially the super highs and I think that may be the issue since, my passive basses with the same pickups dont' have this issue. Thats why I was wondering about using a cap to bleed those off. 10k seemed like a good spot to try.

[DiabolusInMusic]

If you have noise that gets louder when touch metal/strings/bridge you have a grounding issue.

If you have a noise that goes away when you touch metal/strings/bridge you have a shielding issue.

[kringle77]

Neither copper foil or the graphite paint helped. I even tried tin foil which seemed to work the best but is a pain to work with.

[kringle77]

I have a shielding issue.

[line6man]

Originally Posted by kringle77

I think electric noise. It sounds like a grounding problem but, I've went down the entire list and tried everything. I think that the redeemer circuit is actually bring all the frequencies up, especially the super highs and I think that may be the issue since, my passive basses with the same pickups dont' have this issue. Thats why I was wondering about using a cap to bleed those off. 10k seemed like a good spot to try.

If it is high-frequency electrical noise, and not low-frequency magnetic field noise, then you might have some luck trying to EQ it out. Just keep in mind that you're also going to be changing the tone. A passive LPF doesn't really seem like the appropriate tool for this. Most people would use a parametric EQ with a narrow bandwidth, rather than something as broad as a passive LPF. That being said, you can just try it and see what happens.

[DiabolusInMusic]

Shield the pickup surrounds, make sure you wrap the pickups in electrical tape to prevent contact. Also ensure the copper tape comes from the pickup cover around to the outside so you can solder a wire to it, attach that to ground/cavity shielding.

Also ensure you shield the pickguard, I like to bring the copper over the edge of the control cavity over the screw holes and cover the screw holes on the guard so when you attach it to the body the screw pierces both sets of foil.

Make sure you have every inch of the control cavity covered in copper foil, not a bit of body showing. Cover as much of the pickguard as necessary, the whole guard is overkill.

I have yet to to fail at removing hum from any of my basses I don't see why we cannot remove it from yours, I hate hum and have been making a personal mission to ensure everybody's bass only makes noise when you want it to.

[line6man]

Originally Posted by DiabolusInMusic

Shield the pickup surrounds, make sure you wrap the pickups in electrical tape to prevent contact. Also ensure the copper tape comes from the pickup cover around to the outside so you can solder a wire to it, attach that to ground/cavity shielding.

Also ensure you shield the pickguard, I like to bring the copper over the edge of the control cavity over the screw holes and cover the screw holes on the guard so when you attach it to the body the screw pierces both sets of foil.

Make sure you have every inch of the control cavity covered in copper foil, not a bit of body showing. Cover as much of the pickguard as necessary, the whole guard is overkill.

I have yet to to fail at removing hum from any of my basses I don't see why we cannot remove it from yours, I hate hum and have been making a personal mission to ensure everybody's bass only makes noise when you want it to.

Shielding a pickup influences the flow of Eddy currents and changes the tone.

[kringle77]

Next week I plan to gut the bass and start from scratch with the shielding and see how it goes. Thanks!