Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

Hi,
I realize a little hum comes with the territory when you've got single coils.. and I realize it's a small price to pay for such a great sound.. but that all said, could any of you give me some suggestions on what I can do to reduce the hum a little (both live and in the studio)? Is there something more I can do besides just facing in a particular direction?

Always face East. Another thing is to keep the guitar at a 90 degree angle to the Sun.

Rick Turner suggests shielding as much of the guitar cavities and pickups as possible to minimize EM and RF interference. Roger Sadowsky is also a good source for info on shielding instruments.

Embrace the hum, my son. Become one with the hum.

I shielded 2 Rics, both the cavities and the pickguards including the bass pickup cavity and the channel that linked the two and they were almost as quiet as humbuckers, I had to actually aim the basses at hum sources such as neon lights etc. I used sticky copper tape and soldiered it all together with little pieces of wire and grounded it all, was a PIA but worked like a charm. If you don't want to do that or pay someone to do it, I suggest you take Dave's advice. Kneeling towards Mecca at midday may help also.

I shielded two Rics one time, I used sticky copper tape, shileded the cavities and pickguards, every available space including the bass pickup cavity and treble pickup cavity to not allow electromagnetic waves into the wiring or back or sides of the pickups. I soldiered the stuff together with little wires because I found the tape did not have continuity when stuck together like it was supposed to and grounded it all, was a PIA but when done I actually had to aim the basses at noise sources to get any noise at all, they were extremely quiet. If you don't want to do that or pay someone to do it I suggest you take Dave's advice. I have also heard that kneeling toward Mecca at midday may help.

possible solutions ...

1 - sheilding helps a little depending on how well you do it ...

2 - noise gate ... guitarists have been using these for years ...

3 - humbuckers ... this can be a bad soultion because most humbuckers are wired parallel and have no growl ...

4 - put a reverse wound (neck) jazz pickup in the mute cavity and wire it into the neck pickup volume control ...

5 - get a 4004 ...

6 - just live with it ...

It helped a lot on mine, the difference was like night and day, I was running stereo at the time and in some clubs the noise from the lights was so severe I had to run mono and still got noise. After I completely shielded them and I mean completely they were almost totally silent in all conditions running in stereo.

Bob ... you should take some pics showing how you did it point by point and post them here ...

I can't get my scanner working that's why I haven't posted any pictures for a while and I'm too broke to get a good digital camera. (done with school in one month, yeah!!) All I did was stick the stuff sheet by sheet into the cavities, sides, under the pickguard (didn't soldier that) etc. and check them with a continuity tester and there was none from sheet to sheet, so I just soldiered the littler wires from one to the other. I went right up the channel with it to the bass pickup also, and got it all connected electrically. The sticky stuff prevented the connection, and the connection to the pickguard was complete when it was screwed down as it was shiny side to shiny side, it worked great, so in the end it was all grounded. I haven't seen that copper stuff for a while though although I'm sure it's still available, it was a lot better than the aluminum stuff which I also tried. If some sheets are not connected electrically (grounded) they will actually make your bass or guitar more noisy as they will act like little antennas and transfer the noise into your circuitry.

'Hum'? Of what speakest thou?

Depends on the source. Shielding works if theres a lot of RF.

Stewmac has shielding paint-which is WAY easier that the foil method. Use this and copper or aluminium tape for the scratchplate.

Did 4 basses and said scr_w it.

I don't play enough to warrant the effort...

How did it work with the paint Jared? For me the difference with the foil was dramatic but I was really fussy and shielded everything including the bridge pickup cavity. I also wouldn't want to paint my basses. Any sound a magnetic pickup picks up is RF I believe.

Thanks for all the replies everyone. I'm especially intrigued by the Jazz p/u in the mute idea. Will that work for a 4 string as well as a 5 ?

yep ... you have to remove the mute and remove the plastic cover on the jazz pickup and trim the jazz pickup down in size a little and it fits in ... I wire it into the same volume control and the neck pickup ... then when you flip the toggle up you get the neck pickup and jazz mute pickup at the same time ... it sounds a little like a 4005 ... if you run all 3 pickups at 10 it pretty much cancels the hum ... you can also wire it so it is always on and it bypasses the volume control or put another toggle to turn it on and off ... with just the bridge high gain and the mute jazz together you get an aggressive biting sound ... and this mod is 100% reversable ...