Coil Hum

[PeterLevine]

I just bought my first single coil telecaster. In the past, I have only played with humbuckers. I love the tone but that damn hum......

Are there any simple solutions to reduce the hum?

 

[dvs]

I've used two approaches on my single-coil guitars. Both met with good success. The first:
o Make sure every ground connection is good excellent perfect;
o Twist paired pickup wires together, keep them as short as possible;
o Shield everything - line cavities and back of pickguard with conductive paint and/or tape.

The second approach:
o Replace single-coil pickups with Vintage Noiseless.

 

[Rancid Rumpboogie]

The very best noiseless "single coils" are Zexcoil pickups ... even more silent than big humbuckers. Your biggest "problem" for them is deciding what flavor of them you want.
https://lawingmusicalproducts.com/zexcoil-strat

Right next in line and very nearly as good if not as good are Kinman Noiseless pickups out of Australia ... and same "problem" there ... many different flavors.
https://kinman.com/model-products.php?pid=4&products=Stratocaster&modelid=83&model=Overview&group=Named Sets

This is the set I have in my MIM Strat and dearly LOVE them!

And I have five different flavors of these in my Warmoth Strat and dearly love them as well. (Yes 5). Without getting long-winded about the guitar here's a pic.

 

[sdbrit68]

I've used two approaches on my single-coil guitars. Both met with good success. The first:
o Make sure every ground connection is good excellent perfect;
o Twist paired pickup wires together, keep them as short as possible;
o Shield everything - line cavities and back of pickguard with conductive paint and/or tape.

The second approach:
o Replace single-coil pickups with Vintage Noiseless.

what he said

 

[PapaRaptor]

I just bought my first single coil telecaster. In the past, I have only played with humbuckers. I love the tone but that damn hum......
Are there any simple solutions to reduce the hum?

@dvs advice is right on the money. I have several single coil guitars (mainly Strats, Telecasters and Danelectros with SC lipstick pickups) and they have all have best practice wiring, either from the factory or from me. I also have used several rolls of copper shielding tape in the pickup cavities and on the back of the pickguards so that just about everything that can pick up noise is shielded from the outside world of EMF. However, the pickups themselves are still vulnerable to noise pickup. I do most of my practicing right in front of a rather large conglomeration of computers and LCD monitors. The monitors are electrically very noisy beasts, so I try to get the guitar as close to perpendicular to the screens as possible. Just spinning 90 degrees in my desk chair makes a huge difference in noise levels. Having said that, unless you get into noiseless pickups, a certiain amount of hum on single coils is just a fact of life. You either learn to live with it or it drives you crazy.

 

[JPsuff]

I have noiseless pups on my Strat and there are two things I love about them.

1. They are indeed noiseless.
2. They sound great!

 

[Mickey Duane]

Well

If you play really really loud you won't be able to hear the hum so much

just a thought



Peace

 

[Al Holloway]

Mickey has pretty much nailed it. You shouldn't hear the hum when playing. If you can there is a serious issue with the guitar. When you stop roll off the volume and you shouldn't hear the hum. If blues is your thing (which it should be if you are here) about half the most famous records in the electric era where made with humming vintage single coils and it didn't seem to affect them much. I have herd an opinion expressed that shielding can adversly affect the tone but that sounds like I'm treading back on to thin ice

cheers

Al.

 

[JPsuff]

Well

If you play really really loud you won't be able to hear the hum so much

just a thought



Peace

True.

And if you want to play authentic SRV, Hendrix or Gary Moore covers (to name a few), that noise is an essential part of the authenticity.

 

[dvs]

Right, I left out my zero-th approach, which is: turn off the volume when I'm not playing.

 

[JPsuff]

Right, I left out my zero-th approach, which is: turn off the volume when I'm not playing.

Occam's razor.

 

[PeterLevine]

Let me add some background. I have only been playing guitar for about a year. This is my first Tele with single coils. I use a Fender Mustang V2 amp without any pedals.
I don't play loud and use minimal gain. I am finding a hum when I am not playing but the hum vanishes when I keep my hand on the strings, I love the tone of the coil, and while I can handle the hum now.......
I was thinking about the Fender Gen 4 Noiseless Telecaster. This is about $160 but I would also need to pay for installation. I have no idea how much this would be but assuming the entire process would cost around $200, this seems high.

 

[dvs]

That the hum goes away when you put your hands on the strings is a good indication that the hum can be reduced quite a bit with better grounding and shielding.

 

[PeterLevine]

That the hum goes away when you put your hands on the strings is a good indication that the hum can be reduced quite a bit with better grounding and shielding.

Considering it's a brand new guitar, maybe Fender has added this process into manufacturing. I was also thinking about just buying a Donner Noise Killer Pedal on Amazon for under $40. This might be cheaper than bring the guitar in for service.

 

[sdbrit68]

Considering it's a brand new guitar, maybe Fender has added this process into manufacturing. I was also thinking about just buying a Donner Noise Killer Pedal on Amazon for under $40. This might be cheaper than bring the guitar in for service.

my only issue with that personally.............and, its just me

those pedals cover up an issue, not fix it, so if you go somewhere like a jam and dont have the pedal, now you have an issue. Being a new guitar, is there an option to go where you bought it and have them check it out ?

of if you bought it online, maybe go to a local store and see if the ones on the wall have the same issue

 

[brent]

I would say get used to playing with your palm lightly touching the strings. This allows you to get that cool muted sound when you want, let off when you want the notes to ring out, and immediately place your palm back on the strings to mute the guitar when you are not actively playing or there is a rest between notes. This is good playing technique anyway. You should be practicing muting any strings that you are not playing anyway. Also, if you watch professional guitarists play live, especially if they are playing single coil guitars, they turn the volume all the way down between songs and turn it back up when starting the next song. The reason for this is because nobody wants to listen to the hum between songs.

 

[aleclee]

Your biggest "problem" for them is deciding what flavor of them you want.
https://lawingmusicalproducts.com/zexcoil-strat

That and budgeting for them.

 

[PeterLevine]

After doing much research, it seems that because the hum vanishes once I place my hand on the strings the problem might be bad ground. This is a one-week old guitar, so I'll bring it back to the store before my next step.

 

[Rancid Rumpboogie]

That and budgeting for them.

Yes, there is that. But this is one case where you get what you pay for.
The Kinman pickups are about the same price. FYI, Fender stole Kinman's ideas for their noiseless pickups, but in order to get around patent infringement, they had to change a few things ... result ... inferior pickups.

 

[blackcoffeeblues]

I had had a guitar that the pickups only hummed when there were flouresent lites in the room. It was a Strat.