Hey, make sure to listen to the comparison with earbuds, headphones or decent monitors if you want to hear the differences. It's worth the trouble. :) Enjoy the video and let me know what you think! //Kris
I'm wondering, which option would you recommend for getting rid of static electricity build up on the pickguard? My tele neck pickup gets pops and such from static electricity discharge. My hand rubs on the pickguard while playing and the build up discharges, loudly, into my pickup.
I had loads of noise on a cheap tele on a high gain setting. For me, it was the control cavity. When I shielded it, 80% of the noise was gone. After doing pickup cavities it is basically perfect.
The common misunderstanding regarding shielding is that most people do it in the belief that it eliminate the natural single coils pups hum, when it isn't intended for that, that's why some think that it does nothing. The purpose of shielding is minimize/mitigate/reduce the EMI (electromagnetic interference). And the fact that pups keep unshielded it doesn't matter much, since for example in a stage situation the most EMI source tend to be upside you (lights), and shielding help to minimize those interferences directionally, which means that the interferences that could get into your signal will always come from equipment placed right in front of you (where the unshielded pups are vulnerable). Shielding works great but you need to know what's its purpose first.
Hi, I turned my back to the TV and just listened, The guitar sounded very much the same all the way through, I didn't notice any difference that the shielding made, just a small variation in volume here and there Thanks for the video!
Just make sure if you put pieces of foil on top of each other the glue is conductive. Test for continuity with a multimeter or other continuity testing device. If the glue isn't conductive you can perforate the overlapping pieces of tape with a small fork or nail.
Great advice, everyone, listen up. :) I didn't even mention this, because all the shielding copper tapes I'm working with (and what Thomann sells) have a conductive adhesive to avoid these connectivity issues. Cheers //Kris
I can hear a difference, but wouldn’t notice unless provoked. Lately I have been enjoying the “noises” of recording.. modern simulated instruments, amps, and recording equipment has become “sterile” to me… I enjoy listening to things that have errors and noise.. it makes me think it’s real, it was played, this person is the real deal.. when something is too clean I often think it’s over produced or engineered in a lab rather than emotive.. music should not be about being perfect, it’s a way of communicating, and communication isn’t always perfect
I couldn't agree more with you. I tend to listen to more and more recordings, where you can actually hear everything. Including the room, some noise, the singer breathing, etc. This tendency of making albums super clean and over produced is, well... strange and sad. //Kris
I dunno, there's plenty of ways to add that vintage feel to a clean signal through a variety of high quality, end to end simulated electronics in VST plugin form or analogue options. It's better imo to have the cleanest, high quality recording with as much fidelity as possible, so you have the maximum amount of options of how to process that signal. After all, an analog "vintage" sound is nothing but a clean signal that's been coloured by the signal chain, which is totally emulatable
I also love to hear Yoko Ono singing John Lennon entire catalogue in the key of ONO, with all the noises and flaws... Come on brother, get with the clean recording no pops scratches and crackle.
My personal motto: Imperfection creates tension, which creates expectation, which turns to joy when fulfilled. Otherwise we wouldn't be using suspendeds in composition. Same with gear...
I just finished up shielding my Ibanez GRG140, it produced an extremely annoying hum on both single coils and on the humbucker - I wasn't very optimistic due to this video but I did it anyway - full shielding - both pickups and electronics - I didn't feel like taking it apart again. And wow, I cannot describe the difference - it's insane, the hum disappeared almost entirely, you can still hear a very faint hum but it's much quieter and I'm talking MUCH quieter. There was some shielding on the pickguard but only under the potentiometers and the switch so that gave me a clue that what I'm doing might actually have an effect and I can tell you that this mod is very much worth it - you should definitely do it if you're getting annoyed by the hum.
Problems with this video: 1. Shielding the control cavity absolutely does make a difference. There are several electronic structures in the control wiring that can amplify interference. 2. There is no reference to the problem of ground loops when establishing a ground (or grounds) for the shielding. If you create a ground loop in your shielding, you are effectively installing another antenna. 3. Hitting the volume pot at "10" creates a noise that has more to do with how well the pickups are isolated from the resonance of the guitar. Maybe don't do that when checking for interference noise. 4. When you point the pickups directly at the amp, you are completely nullifying the effect of the shielding, because you haven't shielded the front of the pickups. 5. Shielding makes a much more significant difference in a high-gain rig. Testing a low-gain, clean tone isn't an effective way to exemplify the benefits of shielding.
It’s not surprising, the person who made the video believes that the guitar is grounded through the player. People will then use this video to further spread bad information. It’s frustrating.
Thanks for the comment Ezra! GCKelloch gave an awesome answer, thanks for the discussion. This makes our comment sections a good place to be and to learn from. Here's my reaction to your points: 1. In extreme conditions shielding everything makes sense, but honestly, after 25 years of playing guitar I have only encountered that once. In one single bar. 🤷♂️ Most pickup makers and guitar luthiers I talked to agree on shielding the electronic cavity not being worth the trouble for most players. 2. I didn't mention how to install the shielding because this is not a shielding tutorial video. It was mostly about the tonal aspect of it. 3. The peaks caused by hitting the volume pot shouldn't be of anyone's concern since the meter showed the current noise level all throughout the noise comparison. The peaks were not relevant and can be easily ignored. 4. Good point, you're absolutely right. 5. Also true. Even though the worst EMR noise I've ever heard were vintage spec'd guitars with cranked old-school Fender amps and such, not with modern high gain amps. Those will introduce their own noise level to the overall signal, which is an other story. Also, most high gain players will use a noise gate anyhow, because the hiss caused by the massive amount of gain + high volume makes those rigs borderline unenjoyable. I hope this makes sense to you. Cheers! //Kris
how do you make a groound loop in the guitar? has a single output, it is not possible. the fact that the top of the pickup is outside the shield does not matter, the electromagnetic waves are circles and are interrupted by the shield. The reason why these interferences are still felt is unfortunately because the part of interference that the shield manages to capture is minimal.
I think you also should have compared the noise floor when not touching the strings. While touching the strings (or any other path to ground) you have turned your body into an antennae that shields your instrument.
You are right, that would have been interesting to do as well. The reason is: I wanted to keep the video short and focus on things that matter most when playing the instrument. You would touch the strings pretty much all the time with at least one hand. First of all because that's a natural thing to do as a guitarist. Second of all, because you want to ground those strings, right? If you don't touch the strings, you have buzz anyhow, because the strings are not grounded anymore. I hope that makes sense to you. Cheers! //Kris
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses if your strings aren’t grounded (through the bridge, output jack, and through the rest of your rig) then you have a problem. The player is not a good source of ground. Unless you don’t wear shoes and always play in a concrete basement. The only reason why shielding a guitar is optional is because of the player’s body doing the same role when grounded (which usually happens by touching the strings). The noise that shielding is supposed to stop is what is produced when not touching the strings. If you get excessive noise when not touching them, it is due to insufficient shielding, or improperly grounded shielding.
@@Nebvin About everything you just said. Except for " if your strings aren’t grounded (through the bridge, output jack, and through the rest of your rig) then you have a problem.".
I just heard a 1974 strat copper shielded in my Fuchs bj21 mkii in Europe. The difference is absolutely amazing. I though t he had upgraded the bridge pickup the sound was as so amazing. A must do. I will fo my strat and tele in the spring with a professional.
Noise aside, I’m actually really shocked that PU shielding alone thinned out the tone that much and that full shielding definitely seemed to open up and focus the top end. That was quite surprising, if I’m honest.
The tuner on top of your shelf doesn't recognize as many individual notes with the full shielding. You did a close-up on the pickup shielding only demo, so...?. I liked the tone better with both None and Full, but I don't understand exactly why that would be. I'm very curious to know whether the tuner picked out the least individual notes with the pickup-only, or if it clearly decreased in note recognition as the amount of shielding increased?
Only thing I ever notice is the decrease in the ambient noise. I did 2 of my guitars, an original Kramer Nightswan from 1989. Made a huge difference in knocking down the noise, I'm running a Seymour Duncan active heavy metal live wire in the bridge and a Seymour Duncan JB in the neck. Also did my Zakk Wylde epiphone Les Paul, I installed the EMG 81 and 85, full shielding and both guitars are wired for 18v. Very gainy, so the noise reduction was more noticeable for me. I still have to do my Hamer Californian and Kramer Dave Sabo signature baretta. It's time consuming, but worth it overall for me. It never wears out or ever needs attention after its done. I solder all my copper strips together and join each cavity with a wire soldered to each cavity. I go to extremes lol. I do have a background in electronics, 4 yeas electronics and did 1 year electrical. Also into HAM radio , where grounding and shielding is a huge deal. I applied those theories to the guitars and works great for me. Love these videos. Cheers!
Late to the party but... this was surprising. It sounded to me like adding shielding kept removing a tiny bit of the "slice" in the tele tone. Someone else referred to it as "fizz". That can be good or bad, depending on what tone you like. Great video!
Amazing. The full shielding is the most beneficial. Although it doesn't completely eliminate the noise, it changes its pitch - the top sizzle/hiss of the noise is completely shaved off. That's really the most noticeable part of it, and in a practical setting, this difference would be the most helpful.
For strats especially, there is some delicious detail and nuances in the high trebles, but these are also sometimes harsh and also live in the same sonic neighbourhood as noise. It doesn't come across that much in this video but in the room you can hear it clearer. Reducing the noise? Shielding works great but some treble detail is also lost. It's similar to turning the tone knob down a little. It sounds punchier and clearer but a little less sparkle. This can be a good or a bad thing. There is something special about vintage guitars despite their noise and this is one of those things. I play high gain a lot, so I prefer shielding most of the time. But if I'm listing to someone play an SRV or Eric Johnson song at gig volumes, I don't want their guitar to be shielded. Hum cancelling single coils have a similar thing going on.
Definitely heard a difference in the high end. I made an Ibanez RG with a custom body and did not shield or finish the body and it was bright as heck. I shielded the cavities and didn't notice much of a difference at first. But watching this video made me realise that actually, the harsh treble on that guitar did go away to some degree. Now I understand that it was because of the shielding. I thought that I maybe had a weird set of strings that were somehow brighter sounding than the later packs, and so never made the connection that maybe it was because of the shielding that the fizz was gone.
I think it's only really noticeable when you're not playing the guitar, and even then the difference is subtle. I think it's one of those things that is worth doing mostly because you enjoy doing it for the sheer joy of tinkering with stuff.
the more shielded, the less high frequencies or jangle. Very interesting!Just bought a 2nd hand Harley Benton for 45€ to develop my guitar tech skills. Upgraded the pickups and did a pu area shielding. Should I just ground it to the volume pot?
Yeah, if the shielding doesn't have a ground connection it doesn't shield at all. So yeah, that's a good idea connecting it with the volume pot. Cheers //Kris
I've always shielded my basses with copper conducive tape, the result: dead silent, no change in tone (if there's any change, it's for the better unless you like noise 😏). Of course, it doesn't remove the single coil hum, for that you need no install noiseless pickups. If you do both things, you can forget about noise.
I can hear a difference what I believe it is neglectible. The more shielding, the less sparcle in the sound, or to say it positive: the more shielding, the warmer the aound. It is conparable to a longer guitar cable with higher capacity. The shield is acting like a capacity.
I shield my strat today and I can say that the moment I play my guitar I feel the differences. Definitely darker and softer, the glassy sound has gone. That's why I went for this video and find out what's going on.
When I do shielding on my Basses I always put shielding on the back of the pickguard. I do this because in the winter it gets pretty dry where I live and when my fingers rubbed against the pickguard I would hear a static sound coming through my amp. Shielding the pickguard and attaching it to ground solved this problem. Took me years to find a solution.
I can hear a difference, I generally prefer unshielded guitars but if you play where they have things like neon signs (I’ll never understand why so many bars think it’s a good idea to put neon on the back wall of the stage and plug them in the same circuit as the bands use) it’s nearly necessary.
To my ears, no discernable difference in noise floor and darker sounding with the shielding. Would it not have been better to use a strat for this experiment as a tele has the metal bridge plate and neck pickup cover. I fully shielded my strat and it did reduce the noise floor and it did make it darker sounding, although I quite like it that way and that is what EQ is for
I notice no difference with the bridge pickup, but with the neck pickup I notice slight differences in the treble. The fully shielded example lacks some treble in the transients. But may also be related to inconsistency in picking. Was quite helpful video, as I fully shielded my Strat 6 years ago and recently read that shielding can negatively affect the sound. If there is a difference at all, it is negligible for me. Shielding the electromagnetic interference sources is helpful in any case. I notice this especially with neon light tubes. As soon as I turn with the pickups to the light it becomes quite annoying. Before shielding I didn't have to turn to the light, it was always bad.... A bandmate has an identical Strat without a shield. Its a lot more sensitive to the neon light tubes and basic noise. Conclusion: my shielding stays where it is, in my strat xD
THANKS a LOT for this VERY helpful Video ! It also confirms my own experiments on my Strat - even only shielding the pickguard alone made the tone darker. Shielding the pickups reduces the highs much more- clearly audible. To my ears, the shielding reduces the hum, ok, BUT it also takes away the crispy clear high end and bite I have been searching for on my strat. The effect is even more audible, if I play with the mid/high EQ on my Amp Imho shielding may fit for those who like the mellower tone - I personally prefer the original, open sound thank god the hum on my strat (which originally came with a basic layer of graphite painting in the cavities) is absolutely accepatble.
i have a 3 p90 high output stacked ceramic that hum esp with the gain up, there is no shielding this is something I will look at it I wonder about shielding paint for the cavity or is the foil better ,
Love your videos. I recently made a purchase from Thomann for my daughter. Using your maintenance videos to improve the Indonesian Squire Stratocaster affinity HSS I purchased.
I noticed a big difference on high frequencies noise. Sure that the sound its much better whithout this noise . The low frequenci noise seems to be the same.
I think it would have been better if you did the test and comparison in an electronically noisier environment. In places I've lived, the noise/hum has been about 5 times louder on my Strat with single coils than in your Studio. No amount of Shielding made the output usable in my locations. I replaced all the Pickups with Noiseless or stacked Humbuckers, and that finally solved the problem. I left the Shielding in for good measure.
The noise with pickup shielding only is actually worse than without any shielding. There doesn't seem to be any appreciable change in tone between the three solutions, save a slightly more clarity of the sound on full shielding.
To me the tone sounds the same which is good. But now it sounds more focused and punctuated, more precise and clarity. And thank you Kris. You're one of the dudes that made me want to further pursue being a guitar tech. Thank you
Sounds like the more shielding you have the more you feedback. But it beefs and cleans up that tone. It also seemed like you felt the full shielding throw you off when you were playing that Hendrixish riff on the neck pickup
one very small point to make....it's nice and tidy looking using a bit of the copper tape to make the ground connection between the pickgaurd and the cavities, but don't forget...the copper tape has a GLUE surface on one side so it's not making a good connection. when using the tape to connect two areas, put the 'connector-pieces' upside-down and then tape them down with some other tape, so that you always have a copper-to-copper connection.
Tone sounded like it had a bit less treble tone with the shielding in place, definitely a bit more "muted" if that makes sense. Not as sharp of a tone, or defined. Sounded a little darker. Like if you turned the tone knob down. I just want to get my humbucker to quit feedback into the amp. If I'm too close to it, it automatically feedbacks . Thanks for the video!
Using quality studio monitors, I heard a definite difference. More shielding = less high frequency, and actually, a bit less sustain and less "attack" or "bite". More shielding resulted in an overall warmer tone, by my ears.
I know it’s not your tone perhaps, but I would have enjoyed a comparison at hi gain. Going through multiple amplifier circuits would highlight the problems you’re looking to eliminate, and show the disparity in the 3 configurations more graringly.
I’ve recently got a new tokai breezey sound ate 106 , I noticed when strumming chords my fingers rub on the scratch plate making a static sound, does. Shielding stop this occurring ?
No real difference in the noise floor. So either (1) you're in a EMR-quiet environment, or (2) shielding makes no difference to the noise floor, or (3) the fact that you didn't test for electrical continuity of each cavity's copper tape with the output jack's ground tab doesn't allow us viewers to rule out ungrounded shielding. Does the tape you used have conductive adhesive (some does, some doesn't) ?
Something that is never mentioned is that grounding your body by touching the strings also shields the guitar, and could explain the minimal difference in noise.
There must be a big difference when you arms not in strings. I mean when you touch something grounded crack sound appears, but with shealding there is no difference whether your arms on string or not
Hey Donald, the shielding is long gone. I removed it right after the video. haha! Just like you, I prefer a more lively tone and I don't really mind a little hum. I have this guitar for over 5 years, used to play a strat before that for years. I played hundreds of shows and recorded tons of videos with unshielded guitars and never felt like anything is out of control, so I don't bother. :) Especially not, if it changes the tone to the worse. Cheers //Kris
I have revealing monitors and was not expecting such a change to the high frequencies, wonder if all that shielding is changing the magnetic field in the pickups in some way? The way you had the amp set on the edge of breakup the change really robbed the tone of it's mojo, it made it sound like you had lower output pickups but this was probably just due to the decrease in upper harmonics. As far as noise if you had a guitar that was really noisy it may be a trade off you can live with, but to me this guitar was pretty quite and the shielding did not make much difference. I wonder if you did the test in reverse if you would fid the pickguard is making the biggest change? So will you keep the shielding or remove it?
Hey DC, it's interesting, isn't it. I knew this dampening effect will come with shielding but I was still surprised at how much I disliked the result in tone. To answer your question: I immediately removed all the shielding. First of all, after hundreds of live shows with single coil loaded guitars I only had one miserable show (in over 12 years) and second of all, I care way more about my tone, than some occasional hum. Cheers! //Kris
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses I used the paint on my strat years ago made very little if any difference to the hum, I even did the trem cavity lol I will have to try removing the pick guard shield and see if I can hear a change now that I know what to listen for, thanks for the content bro 👍
I shield my strats regulary after buy it until i played a completly unshielded one. Pull all that shilding shit out and that strat chime is back. Short wires nice pv 59 or cs69 without any shilding and you hear what your strat can really sound.
I think that the comparison would be better on a different guitar. The Neck PU on a tele is shielded by the cover already and the bridge PU is shielded by the plate on the bottom pf the PU and to some extent the bridge. Try this on a strat or a uncovered HB high gain guitar and you hear the difference. Plug it into a bigger amp in a normal room. I bet your studio has good wiring and lights for sound.
Kris, Wow you are brave to open up and work on your classic Tele. 😄 Extremely well done as usual. That guitar is pure gold my friend. Great show as always.
If I have to listen that hard I just can't worry about it. Yes you are correct there is an ever so slight difference but would I really hear that difference in a mix? Kill the volume in between,,,,, Nice vid you made your point for sure.
Not much difference to my ears, but l like this comparison! I'm listening in a noisy powerplant with noise canceling earbuds (both on and off mode). I do hear a slight muting of high freqs with the full shielding. I think the biggest advantage to shielding the pickup is grounding out the static pops and crackles...
Thanks a lot! The lack of noise reduction with the shielding (shown in this video) represents my experience as a guitar player. In most cases shielding just doesn't really reduce anything. Unless you're in a power wise miserable location of course. The only effect of the shielding I've heard here, was that it killed my tele's treble and I didn't like that at all. So I removed all the shielding right after we finished this video. haha! How did it sound to you? //Kris
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses I shielded some of my guitars throughout the years and noticed that the treble is still there, but the shielding prevents the loss of mid frequencies and when we hear those frequencies it sounds like the treble is lacking. It acts like an "fixed eq" device. To sum up, I removed the shielding of all my instruments, because I like more their original sound than the sound with shielding. Your Tele sound way more beautiful without shielding. :) Way to go!
@@ErnestoGennariNeto Thats interesting. I wonder what the effect is when playing through a much louder rig? With the Fletcher-Munson curve, would that perceived loss of highs even out?
@@Hades_88 I can't say about the Fletcher-Munson curve in this specific case, but maybe it'll be affected by many variables (system, ambient, etc...). although, talking about a louder rig, I think that this shielding effect is more audible with clean tones. It's like having other pickup (or eq pedal in front, or eq setting in the amp). That's what I experienced on this issue. I hope someone can explain the technical details more accurately. :)
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses Thanks for the reply. I probably agree - I did not hear that much of a difference anyway, which is why I asked. But I'd say you are probably right about the treble loss. I say "probably" because I am still waiting for my hearing aid to arrive. 😉
Noise floor is the exact same, why would anyone do this if the noise floor is the same? It gets quieter in the middle example, then back to peaking between 40-50 db in the 3rd one with full shielding. I'm genuinely curious why no one else is bringing this up???
Well I'd say the shielding did little for the background noise, but maybe the tone was affected a little? It sounded a little fuller and warmer with the shielding, to me anyway.
I fully agree on the lack of noise reduction. What I've heard regarding the tone, is that the shielding took away a significant amount of presence/treble. That's why it sounds warmer. I didn't like that at all. If I want to reduse the treble, I use the tone knob after all... :) Cheers //Kris
Any difference is from slightly different hand position when you went back, pick angle, ect, how warm/state the amp is in as these were videod quite a time appart. in reality shielding makes no tonal difference to your guitar signal. You never play somthing, put it down mess with the guitar, strings and then pick it up and play it exactly the same/have it sound identicle.
It seems to my ears that there is a little less hum with shielding only in the high frequencies. As a result, the tone with shielding is a little darker. That might be useful with a very bright guitar... but an EQ would probably be a better solution.
Ok! But I have a paradox. There are two guitars, one is homemade, made from pine boards and cheap spare parts from Aliexpress, Open humbuckers, noise at high gain - 24 dB. And then there's the Harley Benton SC-550. The noise level on the same path is -12 dB. I replaced the pickups with open ones with the brand name - noise, bought others on Ali with covers, noise -12 dB. Bridge, strings, switch - everything shows 0 on the ground wire. It's just the cry of my soul! I do not know what else to do... Thanks!
Hey, it's hard to tell without being there with you. Did you use a tuner or anything connected to a power plug? Some pedals are very sensitive to which power supply you are using, etc. //Kris
IMO there is a clear tone Change with a more round and less treble sound, the more shielding os added. Migth be an ilusion but on both demos didn't hear any noise diference, but a tone improvement.
This kind of noise seems bearable at first. The more you add effects like compression, distortion etc. The noise will also be exaggerated and make the recording unusable. It's like the saying garbage in garbage out. My work around is to record the clean guitar without any effect then use advanced noise filters in my DAW to get rid of the noise. Then, I process the clean signal with desired effects using virtual guitar effects in my DAW. It might be inconvenient to record your guitar clean and add the distortion or effects later but if you are looking for quality it is worth it.
Does ...... (Insert Tonewood/waxing/shielding...) change your tone? Yeah, no, maybe, I don't know. You know what really changes your tone? EQ on your amp or EQ pedal, and the speaker in your amp.
Listening on a pair of Genelec 1032a monitors.. I definitely notice a difference in vibrance between the shielding configurations. More shielding sounds like you are progressively rolling the tone knob back. This makes sense, since more shielding will inherently increase the capacitance between the hot and shield conductors inside the guitar since those conductors are close in proximity. Just the same as if your guitar cable was longer, it's introducing more capacitance. A possible solution to this is a thicker jacket on the wires coming from the pickups? Not sure the science on what could help. But noticeable for sure
OK, since you are representing Thomann, tell me, do Thomann left handed guitars come fitted with reverse taper audio pots or only with standard audio tapers (as fitted to right handed guitars) but wired in reverse? Obviously the taper would work poorly in that case with a lefty guitar. Bet I don't get an answer. :)
No...didn't think I would. Lol. Mine arrived. It has ordinary A250K pots. with reverse wiring which is no use as the taper is the wrong way round. Reverse taper audio pots are marked C250K. If Thomann don't want the extra expense of proper Reverse taper audio pots in their Lefties then they should fit Linear 250K pots as they can be wired in reverse.
Great Video! Did you remove the cooper from the bottom of the pickguard after this video? When you play with no shielding there is bo cooper on the backside of the pickguard?
Hi Kris! Thank you for your video! I have a quick question. Is there any pickup on the market, which is not working properly with the copper shielding foil? For example there is a custom made pickup set, and the manufacture told me that I need to cut channels into the foil to the edge from the pickups on the pickguard, so there is no short circuit around the pickups. Is it true in your opinion? So the copper shielding foil can affect the electromagnetic field of these custom made pickups? Or just leave the foil alone on the whole pickguard with this pickup set? This is a HSH pickup set. Thanks in advance Kris!
Would have been helpful to use a lot more gain/distortion. That's when the noise coming from the guitar can make a huge difference. Using low gain the noise difference isn't very noticeable, so no need to bother with all that extra work
It's hard to tell without trying it. That being said, I never had any hum issues with active electronics, nor did I hear anyone complaining about it. Cheers //Kris
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses Thanks for the info. I'm building a bass guitar for my son and I'm trying to figure out what pickups to use, so I'm in strange waters. I was looking at a variable tone pot but not sure. could you share any ideas that might make this an odd project. He listens and plays a lot of AMAN AMARTH or Bootsy Collins. He grooves for hours with Bella Fleck. Thanks I'm an old folk music guitar player.
Great video Kris! Just finished shielding a Baja Tele tonight. I A/B'd against my unshielded Baja, definitely noticed it lost a little spank. However, the guitar was so unbearably noisy in my house for me the trade off is worth it for now.
I beg to slightly differ. Every wire may (emphasize on may) act as an antenna in certain circumstances. Depending on the connected capacity or inducitivity it may act as an antenna in a way it does in an old radio. Thats usually not the case in guitars, but its not impossible. One has to analyse the kind of reception one is getting with the guitar in order to shield it against it.
Yes, you are absolutely right about that. What I meant, is purely guitar related. Most techs will agree on shielding the electronic cavity not really having any positive effect on the noise floor. Except for extreme conditions of course. :) Cheers //Kris
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses Right. Usually its unnecessary only in rare cases it can help but that means the area is littered with interferences. Many times from heavy electric equipment like high voltage overhead wires and stuff like that.
I don't see it making enough difference to matter for the most part honestly. It seems almost insignificant but then different body guitars may get different results I imagine but I agree with the other poster who asked what harm in NOT shielding is their potentially or otherwise?
There is absolutely nothing wrong with not shielding a guitar. Proper grounding is crucial of course, that's something else. I see it this way: if your instrument works fine without shielding, just leave it as it is. If you have hum issues, shield it and see if it gets any better. If it ain't broken don't fix it. That always seems to be the best advice. //Kris
I just slammed the shielding on there to A: surround the pickup B: shield the PU wire under the pickuguard C: have an easier and faster ground connection D: because I didn't want to spend even more time with origami. haha! Cheers //Kris
Super cool video! I always wished I did a before and after when adding shielding to my strat. Random nerd question: What is the name of the font you use in the video description with the black background?
Thanks a lot! As long as you love the tones of your strat the A/B doesn't really matter. :) The font: I'm not sure exactly. It's a font Thomann purchased for visual marketing purposes. I'm just using it for the thumbs and videos. haha! Cheers //Kris
Hey Cumhur, thanks for watching the video! Here's my answer (copy/pasted from None of your Business's same question): The lack of noise reduction with the shielding (shown in this video) represents my experience as a guitar player. In most cases shielding just doesn't really reduce anything. Unless you're in a power wise miserable location of course. The only effect of the shielding I've heard here, was that it killed my tele's treble and I didn't like that at all. So I removed all the shielding right after we finished this video. haha! Cheers //Kris
Well with so many classic tunes played by unshielded guitars, there has been ne unpleasant noises for me. The unshielded PU sounded more lively for me, though. The real question should be: What felt better playing the guitar and hearing the sound unprocessed in the room?
Since the noise floor was pretty much identical (and as always with this tele, very very low) the unshielded sound was much more enjoyable. With the shielding the guitar sounded like someone put a blanket on the cab. Cheers //Kris
For easier back and forth comparing: 4:22 Bridge PU No Shielding 4:33 Bridge PU PU Shielding 4:43 Bridge PU Full Shielding 4:54 Neck PU No Shielding 5:15 Neck PU PU Shielding 5:36 Neck PU Full Shielding
I actually choose to sacrifice a barely noticeable high-end (which can be easily recovered by EQ'ing, though) than tolerate that f***ing EMI/RFI noise.
![GUITAR SHIELDING 101: A [Relatively] Quick Guide to Working with Foil Tape](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/-mLBo4y9t8Y/mqdefault.jpg)
![GUITAR SHIELDING 101: A [Relatively] Quick Guide to Working with Foil Tape](/img/tr.png)
Hey, make sure to listen to the comparison with earbuds, headphones or decent monitors if you want to hear the differences. It's worth the trouble. :)
Enjoy the video and let me know what you think! //Kris
I'd like to see how to replace single coils by stacked humbuckers on a strat
Could you plz explain and show how to do that?
@@GCKelloch yes, replacing pickups by the same kinda pickups. But what about replacing single coils by stacked humbuckers?
Don't Monitors have a dry sound just like monitor headphones?
Excellent Fahrenheit trap & playing!!!...
I'm wondering, which option would you recommend for getting rid of static electricity build up on the pickguard? My tele neck pickup gets pops and such from static electricity discharge. My hand rubs on the pickguard while playing and the build up discharges, loudly, into my pickup.
I had loads of noise on a cheap tele on a high gain setting. For me, it was the control cavity. When I shielded it, 80% of the noise was gone. After doing pickup cavities it is basically perfect.
The common misunderstanding regarding shielding is that most people do it in the belief that it eliminate the natural single coils pups hum, when it isn't intended for that, that's why some think that it does nothing. The purpose of shielding is minimize/mitigate/reduce the EMI (electromagnetic interference). And the fact that pups keep unshielded it doesn't matter much, since for example in a stage situation the most EMI source tend to be upside you (lights), and shielding help to minimize those interferences directionally, which means that the interferences that could get into your signal will always come from equipment placed right in front of you (where the unshielded pups are vulnerable). Shielding works great but you need to know what's its purpose first.
Hi, I turned my back to the TV and just listened, The guitar sounded very much the same all the way through, I didn't notice any difference that the shielding made, just a small variation in volume here and there Thanks for the video!
Just make sure if you put pieces of foil on top of each other the glue is conductive. Test for continuity with a multimeter or other continuity testing device. If the glue isn't conductive you can perforate the overlapping pieces of tape with a small fork or nail.
Great advice, everyone, listen up. :) I didn't even mention this, because all the shielding copper tapes I'm working with (and what Thomann sells) have a conductive adhesive to avoid these connectivity issues. Cheers //Kris
I can hear a difference, but wouldn’t notice unless provoked. Lately I have been enjoying the “noises” of recording.. modern simulated instruments, amps, and recording equipment has become “sterile” to me… I enjoy listening to things that have errors and noise.. it makes me think it’s real, it was played, this person is the real deal.. when something is too clean I often think it’s over produced or engineered in a lab rather than emotive.. music should not be about being perfect, it’s a way of communicating, and communication isn’t always perfect
I couldn't agree more with you. I tend to listen to more and more recordings, where you can actually hear everything. Including the room, some noise, the singer breathing, etc. This tendency of making albums super clean and over produced is, well... strange and sad. //Kris
I dunno, there's plenty of ways to add that vintage feel to a clean signal through a variety of high quality, end to end simulated electronics in VST plugin form or analogue options. It's better imo to have the cleanest, high quality recording with as much fidelity as possible, so you have the maximum amount of options of how to process that signal. After all, an analog "vintage" sound is nothing but a clean signal that's been coloured by the signal chain, which is totally emulatable
@@Big_Red_Dork if you need the most options possible, then you don’t shield your guitar
I also love to hear Yoko Ono singing John Lennon entire catalogue in the key of ONO, with all the noises and flaws...
Come on brother, get with the clean recording no pops scratches and crackle.
My personal motto: Imperfection creates tension, which creates expectation, which turns to joy when fulfilled. Otherwise we wouldn't be using suspendeds in composition. Same with gear...
I just finished up shielding my Ibanez GRG140, it produced an extremely annoying hum on both single coils and on the humbucker - I wasn't very optimistic due to this video but I did it anyway - full shielding - both pickups and electronics - I didn't feel like taking it apart again.
And wow, I cannot describe the difference - it's insane, the hum disappeared almost entirely, you can still hear a very faint hum but it's much quieter and I'm talking MUCH quieter. There was some shielding on the pickguard but only under the potentiometers and the switch so that gave me a clue that what I'm doing might actually have an effect and I can tell you that this mod is very much worth it - you should definitely do it if you're getting annoyed by the hum.
Problems with this video:
1. Shielding the control cavity absolutely does make a difference. There are several electronic structures in the control wiring that can amplify interference.
2. There is no reference to the problem of ground loops when establishing a ground (or grounds) for the shielding. If you create a ground loop in your shielding, you are effectively installing another antenna.
3. Hitting the volume pot at "10" creates a noise that has more to do with how well the pickups are isolated from the resonance of the guitar. Maybe don't do that when checking for interference noise.
4. When you point the pickups directly at the amp, you are completely nullifying the effect of the shielding, because you haven't shielded the front of the pickups.
5. Shielding makes a much more significant difference in a high-gain rig. Testing a low-gain, clean tone isn't an effective way to exemplify the benefits of shielding.
It’s not surprising, the person who made the video believes that the guitar is grounded through the player. People will then use this video to further spread bad information. It’s frustrating.
Hej Ezra, could you please make a video about it? 😀
Nicely put! 👌
Thanks for the comment Ezra! GCKelloch gave an awesome answer, thanks for the discussion. This makes our comment sections a good place to be and to learn from.
Here's my reaction to your points:
1. In extreme conditions shielding everything makes sense, but honestly, after 25 years of playing guitar I have only encountered that once. In one single bar. 🤷♂️ Most pickup makers and guitar luthiers I talked to agree on shielding the electronic cavity not being worth the trouble for most players.
2. I didn't mention how to install the shielding because this is not a shielding tutorial video. It was mostly about the tonal aspect of it.
3. The peaks caused by hitting the volume pot shouldn't be of anyone's concern since the meter showed the current noise level all throughout the noise comparison. The peaks were not relevant and can be easily ignored.
4. Good point, you're absolutely right.
5. Also true. Even though the worst EMR noise I've ever heard were vintage spec'd guitars with cranked old-school Fender amps and such, not with modern high gain amps. Those will introduce their own noise level to the overall signal, which is an other story. Also, most high gain players will use a noise gate anyhow, because the hiss caused by the massive amount of gain + high volume makes those rigs borderline unenjoyable.
I hope this makes sense to you. Cheers! //Kris
how do you make a groound loop in the guitar? has a single output, it is not possible. the fact that the top of the pickup is outside the shield does not matter, the electromagnetic waves are circles and are interrupted by the shield. The reason why these interferences are still felt is unfortunately because the part of interference that the shield manages to capture is minimal.
I think you also should have compared the noise floor when not touching the strings. While touching the strings (or any other path to ground) you have turned your body into an antennae that shields your instrument.
You are right, that would have been interesting to do as well. The reason is: I wanted to keep the video short and focus on things that matter most when playing the instrument. You would touch the strings pretty much all the time with at least one hand. First of all because that's a natural thing to do as a guitarist. Second of all, because you want to ground those strings, right? If you don't touch the strings, you have buzz anyhow, because the strings are not grounded anymore. I hope that makes sense to you. Cheers! //Kris
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses if your strings aren’t grounded (through the bridge, output jack, and through the rest of your rig) then you have a problem. The player is not a good source of ground. Unless you don’t wear shoes and always play in a concrete basement. The only reason why shielding a guitar is optional is because of the player’s body doing the same role when grounded (which usually happens by touching the strings). The noise that shielding is supposed to stop is what is produced when not touching the strings. If you get excessive noise when not touching them, it is due to insufficient shielding, or improperly grounded shielding.
@@Nebvin Wow, you really don't know what you're talking about.
@@raytorvalds3699 what part am I wrong about?
@@Nebvin About everything you just said.
Except for " if your strings aren’t grounded (through the bridge, output jack, and through the rest of your rig) then you have a problem.".
I just heard a 1974 strat copper shielded in my Fuchs bj21 mkii in Europe. The difference is absolutely amazing. I though t he had upgraded the bridge pickup the sound was as so amazing. A must do. I will fo my strat and tele in the spring with a professional.
Noise aside, I’m actually really shocked that PU shielding alone thinned out the tone that much and that full shielding definitely seemed to open up and focus the top end. That was quite surprising, if I’m honest.
The tuner on top of your shelf doesn't recognize as many individual notes with the full shielding. You did a close-up on the pickup shielding only demo, so...?. I liked the tone better with both None and Full, but I don't understand exactly why that would be.
I'm very curious to know whether the tuner picked out the least individual notes with the pickup-only, or if it clearly decreased in note recognition as the amount of shielding increased?
Only thing I ever notice is the decrease in the ambient noise. I did 2 of my guitars, an original Kramer Nightswan from 1989. Made a huge difference in knocking down the noise, I'm running a Seymour Duncan active heavy metal live wire in the bridge and a Seymour Duncan JB in the neck. Also did my Zakk Wylde epiphone Les Paul, I installed the EMG 81 and 85, full shielding and both guitars are wired for 18v. Very gainy, so the noise reduction was more noticeable for me. I still have to do my Hamer Californian and Kramer Dave Sabo signature baretta. It's time consuming, but worth it overall for me. It never wears out or ever needs attention after its done. I solder all my copper strips together and join each cavity with a wire soldered to each cavity. I go to extremes lol. I do have a background in electronics, 4 yeas electronics and did 1 year electrical. Also into HAM radio , where grounding and shielding is a huge deal. I applied those theories to the guitars and works great for me. Love these videos.
Cheers!
Late to the party but... this was surprising. It sounded to me like adding shielding kept removing a tiny bit of the "slice" in the tele tone. Someone else referred to it as "fizz". That can be good or bad, depending on what tone you like. Great video!
Amazing. The full shielding is the most beneficial. Although it doesn't completely eliminate the noise, it changes its pitch - the top sizzle/hiss of the noise is completely shaved off. That's really the most noticeable part of it, and in a practical setting, this difference would be the most helpful.
For strats especially, there is some delicious detail and nuances in the high trebles, but these are also sometimes harsh and also live in the same sonic neighbourhood as noise. It doesn't come across that much in this video but in the room you can hear it clearer.
Reducing the noise? Shielding works great but some treble detail is also lost. It's similar to turning the tone knob down a little. It sounds punchier and clearer but a little less sparkle. This can be a good or a bad thing. There is something special about vintage guitars despite their noise and this is one of those things. I play high gain a lot, so I prefer shielding most of the time. But if I'm listing to someone play an SRV or Eric Johnson song at gig volumes, I don't want their guitar to be shielded. Hum cancelling single coils have a similar thing going on.
Is it possible to compensate that with lower capacitors ?
No. The Open airy Sound IS Just to get by completly kick that shilding crap Out of your strat.
Definitely heard a difference in the high end. I made an Ibanez RG with a custom body and did not shield or finish the body and it was bright as heck. I shielded the cavities and didn't notice much of a difference at first. But watching this video made me realise that actually, the harsh treble on that guitar did go away to some degree. Now I understand that it was because of the shielding. I thought that I maybe had a weird set of strings that were somehow brighter sounding than the later packs, and so never made the connection that maybe it was because of the shielding that the fizz was gone.
I think it's only really noticeable when you're not playing the guitar, and even then the difference is subtle. I think it's one of those things that is worth doing mostly because you enjoy doing it for the sheer joy of tinkering with stuff.
the more shielded, the less high frequencies or jangle. Very interesting!Just bought a 2nd hand Harley Benton for 45€ to develop my guitar tech skills. Upgraded the pickups and did a pu area shielding. Should I just ground it to the volume pot?
Yeah, if the shielding doesn't have a ground connection it doesn't shield at all. So yeah, that's a good idea connecting it with the volume pot. Cheers //Kris
I've always shielded my basses with copper conducive tape, the result: dead silent, no change in tone (if there's any change, it's for the better unless you like noise 😏). Of course, it doesn't remove the single coil hum, for that you need no install noiseless pickups. If you do both things, you can forget about noise.
I did that on my PJ, and there is no hum for sure. However, I also lost all of the treble. Any fix for this?
500k pots
I can hear a difference what I believe it is neglectible.
The more shielding, the less sparcle in the sound, or to say it positive: the more shielding, the warmer the aound.
It is conparable to a longer guitar cable with higher capacity. The shield is acting like a capacity.
I shield my strat today and I can say that the moment I play my guitar I feel the differences. Definitely darker and softer, the glassy sound has gone. That's why I went for this video and find out what's going on.
Thank you so much for this video. Not what I was expecting.
When I do shielding on my Basses I always put shielding on the back of the pickguard. I do this because in the winter it gets pretty dry where I live and when my fingers rubbed against the pickguard I would hear a static sound coming through my amp. Shielding the pickguard and attaching it to ground solved this problem. Took me years to find a solution.
Rubbing the pick guard with a dryer sheet works too, takes the static crunching noise out.
@@TheBoomtown4 tried that. The shielding was the only thing that worked
@@TheBoomtown4this just happened on my 3 year old tele and rubbing a dryer sheet on the outside of the pickguard worked in seconds.
@@Dice1138 oh really? That sucks, it worked for me and hasn’t done it since. That was years ago too.
@@brianrollins7275 nice! Cheap fix and you’re not spending tons of time and energy chasing it now!
I can hear a difference, I generally prefer unshielded guitars but if you play where they have things like neon signs (I’ll never understand why so many bars think it’s a good idea to put neon on the back wall of the stage and plug them in the same circuit as the bands use) it’s nearly necessary.
Agreed! Neon lights are miserable for hum. //Kris
To my ears, no discernable difference in noise floor and darker sounding with the shielding.
Would it not have been better to use a strat for this experiment as a tele has the metal bridge plate and neck pickup cover.
I fully shielded my strat and it did reduce the noise floor and it did make it darker sounding, although I quite like it that way and that is what EQ is for
I notice no difference with the bridge pickup, but with the neck pickup I notice slight differences in the treble. The fully shielded example lacks some treble in the transients. But may also be related to inconsistency in picking. Was quite helpful video, as I fully shielded my Strat 6 years ago and recently read that shielding can negatively affect the sound.
If there is a difference at all, it is negligible for me. Shielding the electromagnetic interference sources is helpful in any case. I notice this especially with neon light tubes. As soon as I turn with the pickups to the light it becomes quite annoying. Before shielding I didn't have to turn to the light, it was always bad.... A bandmate has an identical Strat without a shield. Its a lot more sensitive to the neon light tubes and basic noise.
Conclusion: my shielding stays where it is, in my strat xD
THANKS a LOT for this VERY helpful Video ! It also confirms my own experiments on my Strat - even only shielding the pickguard alone made the tone darker. Shielding the pickups reduces the highs much more- clearly audible.
To my ears, the shielding reduces the hum, ok, BUT it also takes away the crispy clear high end and bite I have been searching for on my strat. The effect is even more audible, if I play with the mid/high EQ on my Amp
Imho shielding may fit for those who like the mellower tone - I personally prefer the original, open sound thank god the hum on my strat (which originally came with a basic layer of graphite painting in the cavities) is absolutely accepatble.
This is a topic that I find interesting and reading the comments always make me wonder why do I not have this problem.
i have a 3 p90 high output stacked ceramic that hum esp with the gain up, there is no shielding this is something I will look at it I wonder about shielding paint for the cavity or is the foil better ,
Love your videos. I recently made a purchase from Thomann for my daughter. Using your maintenance videos to improve the Indonesian Squire Stratocaster affinity HSS I purchased.
I noticed a big difference on high frequencies noise. Sure that the sound its much better whithout this noise . The low frequenci noise seems to be the same.
I think it would have been better if you did the test and comparison in an electronically noisier environment. In places I've lived, the noise/hum has been about 5 times louder on my Strat with single coils than in your Studio. No amount of Shielding made the output usable in my locations. I replaced all the Pickups with Noiseless or stacked Humbuckers, and that finally solved the problem. I left the Shielding in for good measure.
The noise with pickup shielding only is actually worse than without any shielding. There doesn't seem to be any appreciable change in tone between the three solutions, save a slightly more clarity of the sound on full shielding.
Thanks.
I remember shielding my single coils guitars the wrong way. Forgot the ground.
🤦🏽
@@PooNinja 😀
To me the tone sounds the same which is good. But now it sounds more focused and punctuated, more precise and clarity.
And thank you Kris. You're one of the dudes that made me want to further pursue being a guitar tech. Thank you
Cheers man, that's so cool! //Kris
I'm not sure but it seems the bridge pickup cavity's shielding is not connected to the other shieldings. So this shield isn't working properly.
Thank you will try this on my bass, has a strong static sound I want to fix. Personally I think your guitar sounds better with no interference
Sounds like the more shielding you have the more you feedback. But it beefs and cleans up that tone. It also seemed like you felt the full shielding throw you off when you were playing that Hendrixish riff on the neck pickup
one very small point to make....it's nice and tidy looking using a bit of the copper tape to make the ground connection between the pickgaurd and the cavities, but don't forget...the copper tape has a GLUE surface on one side so it's not making a good connection. when using the tape to connect two areas, put the 'connector-pieces' upside-down and then tape them down with some other tape, so that you always have a copper-to-copper connection.
They sell tape now with conductive adhesive, so assuming that is conductive enough, you shouldn't need to do that.
Sorry, did you connect all the shielding to the wire that goes to the jack's ground ?
I used Quieting the beast mod for guitar. Works very good.
Tone sounded like it had a bit less treble tone with the shielding in place, definitely a bit more "muted" if that makes sense. Not as sharp of a tone, or defined. Sounded a little darker. Like if you turned the tone knob down. I just want to get my humbucker to quit feedback into the amp. If I'm too close to it, it automatically feedbacks . Thanks for the video!
If the back side of the pickguard is not shielded, is it done properly?
Using quality studio monitors, I heard a definite difference. More shielding = less high frequency, and actually, a bit less sustain and less "attack" or "bite". More shielding resulted in an overall warmer tone, by my ears.
Exactly. Thank you for listening to it with this attention to details. You honour me. :) Cheers Mike! //Kris
@@GCKelloch We don't; but honestly, does it matter? :)
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses "Exactly"? If that is what you heard, why didn't you tell us, too? Confused...
I definitely felt the full shielding was darker. Wouldn't use on humbuckers or noiseless single coils for sure. Sounds amazing on that Tele though.
@@MichaelMakowski2006i
I know it’s not your tone perhaps, but I would have enjoyed a comparison at hi gain. Going through multiple amplifier circuits would highlight the problems you’re looking to eliminate, and show the disparity in the 3 configurations more graringly.
I’ve recently got a new tokai breezey sound ate 106 , I noticed when strumming chords my fingers rub on the scratch plate making a static sound, does. Shielding stop this occurring ?
How do you explain the perceived change in tone?
No real difference in the noise floor. So either (1) you're in a EMR-quiet environment, or (2) shielding makes no difference to the noise floor, or (3) the fact that you didn't test for electrical continuity of each cavity's copper tape with the output jack's ground tab doesn't allow us viewers to rule out ungrounded shielding. Does the tape you used have conductive adhesive (some does, some doesn't) ?
Something that is never mentioned is that grounding your body by touching the strings also shields the guitar, and could explain the minimal difference in noise.
There must be a big difference when you arms not in strings. I mean when you touch something grounded crack sound appears, but with shealding there is no difference whether your arms on string or not
I like the unshielded sound better. Brighter. More life. I'm curious - are you leaving the shield in your lovely Tele or removing it?
Hey Donald, the shielding is long gone. I removed it right after the video. haha! Just like you, I prefer a more lively tone and I don't really mind a little hum. I have this guitar for over 5 years, used to play a strat before that for years. I played hundreds of shows and recorded tons of videos with unshielded guitars and never felt like anything is out of control, so I don't bother. :) Especially not, if it changes the tone to the worse. Cheers //Kris
I have revealing monitors and was not expecting such a change to the high frequencies, wonder if all that shielding is changing the magnetic field in the pickups in some way? The way you had the amp set on the edge of breakup the change really robbed the tone of it's mojo, it made it sound like you had lower output pickups but this was probably just due to the decrease in upper harmonics. As far as noise if you had a guitar that was really noisy it may be a trade off you can live with, but to me this guitar was pretty quite and the shielding did not make much difference. I wonder if you did the test in reverse if you would fid the pickguard is making the biggest change? So will you keep the shielding or remove it?
Hey DC, it's interesting, isn't it. I knew this dampening effect will come with shielding but I was still surprised at how much I disliked the result in tone. To answer your question: I immediately removed all the shielding. First of all, after hundreds of live shows with single coil loaded guitars I only had one miserable show (in over 12 years) and second of all, I care way more about my tone, than some occasional hum. Cheers! //Kris
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses I used the paint on my strat years ago made very little if any difference to the hum, I even did the trem cavity lol I will have to try removing the pick guard shield and see if I can hear a change now that I know what to listen for, thanks for the content bro 👍
Kris , nice try but the shielding appears not to have made any difference in the hum . Now what ? Could it be the single coils ?
for the pickguard do you have to put copper tape on the whole underside or just a portion of it?
I shield my strats regulary after buy it until i played a completly unshielded one. Pull all that shilding shit out and that strat chime is back. Short wires nice pv 59 or cs69 without any shilding and you hear what your strat can really sound.
I think that the comparison would be better on a different guitar. The Neck PU on a tele is shielded by the cover already and the bridge PU is shielded by the plate on the bottom pf the PU and to some extent the bridge. Try this on a strat or a uncovered HB high gain guitar and you hear the difference. Plug it into a bigger amp in a normal room. I bet your studio has good wiring and lights for sound.
Kris,
Wow you are brave to open up and work on your classic Tele. 😄 Extremely well done as usual. That guitar is pure gold my friend. Great show as always.
Thanks Joseph!! Don't worry about the tele, I took the shielding out right after finishing this video. haha! Everything is back to original. 👍 //Kris
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses
Kris,
That was a smart move. 😄 She's a classic.
@@josephhughes9490 its a reissue, not a vintage. While he surely spent some bank on it, it definitely isn't vintage money!
If I have to listen that hard I just can't worry about it. Yes you are correct there is an ever so slight difference but would I really hear that difference in a mix? Kill the volume in between,,,,, Nice vid you made your point for sure.
Not much difference to my ears, but l like this comparison! I'm listening in a noisy powerplant with noise canceling earbuds (both on and off mode). I do hear a slight muting of high freqs with the full shielding. I think the biggest advantage to shielding the pickup is grounding out the static pops and crackles...
Shielding is definitely awesome against static issues with the pickguard. Thanks for the comment! //Kris
Your videos are super helpful, guys. Thank u very much
I have a annoying crackling on neck pickup when touching the pickguard.
@ThomannsGuitarsBasses would it help, hurt, or not matter to shield the inside of the pickup covers?
Do you mean the metal covers of humbuckers? You shouldn't shield them, those covers are the shielding. Cheers //Kris
Great demonstration, but what is _your_ conclusion??
Thanks a lot! The lack of noise reduction with the shielding (shown in this video) represents my experience as a guitar player. In most cases shielding just doesn't really reduce anything. Unless you're in a power wise miserable location of course.
The only effect of the shielding I've heard here, was that it killed my tele's treble and I didn't like that at all. So I removed all the shielding right after we finished this video. haha! How did it sound to you? //Kris
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses I shielded some of my guitars throughout the years and noticed that the treble is still there, but the shielding prevents the loss of mid frequencies and when we hear those frequencies it sounds like the treble is lacking. It acts like an "fixed eq" device. To sum up, I removed the shielding of all my instruments, because I like more their original sound than the sound with shielding. Your Tele sound way more beautiful without shielding. :) Way to go!
@@ErnestoGennariNeto Thats interesting. I wonder what the effect is when playing through a much louder rig? With the Fletcher-Munson curve, would that perceived loss of highs even out?
@@Hades_88 I can't say about the Fletcher-Munson curve in this specific case, but maybe it'll be affected by many variables (system, ambient, etc...). although, talking about a louder rig, I think that this shielding effect is more audible with clean tones. It's like having other pickup (or eq pedal in front, or eq setting in the amp). That's what I experienced on this issue. I hope someone can explain the technical details more accurately. :)
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses Thanks for the reply. I probably agree - I did not hear that much of a difference anyway, which is why I asked. But I'd say you are probably right about the treble loss. I say "probably" because I am still waiting for my hearing aid to arrive. 😉
Noise floor is the exact same, why would anyone do this if the noise floor is the same? It gets quieter in the middle example, then back to peaking between 40-50 db in the 3rd one with full shielding. I'm genuinely curious why no one else is bringing this up???
Well I'd say the shielding did little for the background noise, but maybe the tone was affected a little? It sounded a little fuller and warmer with the shielding, to me anyway.
I fully agree on the lack of noise reduction. What I've heard regarding the tone, is that the shielding took away a significant amount of presence/treble. That's why it sounds warmer. I didn't like that at all. If I want to reduse the treble, I use the tone knob after all... :) Cheers //Kris
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses that's what I've heard about coated strings as well, they take away some brightness.
Any difference is from slightly different hand position when you went back, pick angle, ect, how warm/state the amp is in as these were videod quite a time appart. in reality shielding makes no tonal difference to your guitar signal. You never play somthing, put it down mess with the guitar, strings and then pick it up and play it exactly the same/have it sound identicle.
So no need for extra wires to create ground just the foil? No extra soldering?
It seems to my ears that there is a little less hum with shielding only in the high frequencies.
As a result, the tone with shielding is a little darker. That might be useful with a very bright guitar... but an EQ would probably be a better solution.
Ok! But I have a paradox. There are two guitars, one is homemade, made from pine boards and cheap spare parts from Aliexpress, Open humbuckers, noise at high gain - 24 dB. And then there's the Harley Benton SC-550. The noise level on the same path is -12 dB. I replaced the pickups with open ones with the brand name - noise, bought others on Ali with covers, noise -12 dB. Bridge, strings, switch - everything shows 0 on the ground wire. It's just the cry of my soul! I do not know what else to do... Thanks!
when i tool my pj bass into a studio it picked up a very high ringing frequency , what can that be. its not 60 cycle hum or ground noise
Hey, it's hard to tell without being there with you. Did you use a tuner or anything connected to a power plug? Some pedals are very sensitive to which power supply you are using, etc.
//Kris
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses direct , no units nothing ...
its a very high frequency , like nothing i have heard before.
IMO there is a clear tone Change with a more round and less treble sound, the more shielding os added. Migth be an ilusion but on both demos didn't hear any noise diference, but a tone improvement.
This kind of noise seems bearable at first. The more you add effects like compression, distortion etc. The noise will also be exaggerated and make the recording unusable. It's like the saying garbage in garbage out.
My work around is to record the clean guitar without any effect then use advanced noise filters in my DAW to get rid of the noise. Then, I process the clean signal with desired effects using virtual guitar effects in my DAW. It might be inconvenient to record your guitar clean and add the distortion or effects later but if you are looking for quality it is worth it.
What do you prefer? Actual copper shielding like in the video or the liquid brush in the PU cavities type?
Both work fine. Copper tape is easier to install yourself and much cheaper than shielding paint. That's the only big difference, really. Cheers //Kris
I’ve always wondered if the “claw” on Fender Jaguar pickups (which are grounded if installed correctly) is better or worse than shielding everything.
Brilliant channel ... great topics, great people ;)
Does ...... (Insert Tonewood/waxing/shielding...) change your tone?
Yeah, no, maybe, I don't know.
You know what really changes your tone? EQ on your amp or EQ pedal, and the speaker in your amp.
and the room where u are !!!!
Listening on a pair of Genelec 1032a monitors.. I definitely notice a difference in vibrance between the shielding configurations. More shielding sounds like you are progressively rolling the tone knob back.
This makes sense, since more shielding will inherently increase the capacitance between the hot and shield conductors inside the guitar since those conductors are close in proximity. Just the same as if your guitar cable was longer, it's introducing more capacitance. A possible solution to this is a thicker jacket on the wires coming from the pickups? Not sure the science on what could help. But noticeable for sure
OK, since you are representing Thomann, tell me, do Thomann left handed guitars come fitted with reverse taper audio pots or only with standard audio tapers (as fitted to right handed guitars) but wired in reverse? Obviously the taper would work poorly in that case with a lefty guitar. Bet I don't get an answer. :)
No...didn't think I would. Lol. Mine arrived. It has ordinary A250K pots. with reverse wiring which is no use as the taper is the wrong way round. Reverse taper audio pots are marked C250K. If Thomann don't want the extra expense of proper Reverse taper audio pots in their Lefties then they should fit Linear 250K pots as they can be wired in reverse.
Great Video! Did you remove the cooper from the bottom of the pickguard after this video? When you play with no shielding there is bo cooper on the backside of the pickguard?
Hi Kris! Thank you for your video! I have a quick question. Is there any pickup on the market, which is not working properly with the copper shielding foil? For example there is a custom made pickup set, and the manufacture told me that I need to cut channels into the foil to the edge from the pickups on the pickguard, so there is no short circuit around the pickups. Is it true in your opinion? So the copper shielding foil can affect the electromagnetic field of these custom made pickups? Or just leave the foil alone on the whole pickguard with this pickup set? This is a HSH pickup set. Thanks in advance Kris!
Thank you guys! So informative!!
Would have been helpful to use a lot more gain/distortion. That's when the noise coming from the guitar can make a huge difference.
Using low gain the noise difference isn't very noticeable, so no need to bother with all that extra work
Does shielding paint work as good as the shielding tape?
Yes it does. You just have to make sure the finish is applied correctly and it is connected to ground properly. Cheers //Kris
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses thanks! 🙂
Sir do you suppose your findings would be the same with passive and active pickups?
It's hard to tell without trying it. That being said, I never had any hum issues with active electronics, nor did I hear anyone complaining about it. Cheers //Kris
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses Thanks for the info. I'm building a bass guitar for my son and I'm trying to figure out what pickups to use, so I'm in strange waters. I was looking at a variable tone pot but not sure. could you share any ideas that might make this an odd project. He listens and plays a lot of AMAN AMARTH or Bootsy Collins. He grooves for hours with Bella Fleck. Thanks I'm an old folk music guitar player.
Great video Kris! Just finished shielding a Baja Tele tonight. I A/B'd against my unshielded Baja, definitely noticed it lost a little spank. However, the guitar was so unbearably noisy in my house for me the trade off is worth it for now.
Thanks a lot! Yes, that's absolutely reasonable. If you have issues with noise, it's totally worth it! Enjoy your Baja, I love those teles. :) //Kris
I don’t think that made any difference to the noise levels but damn, that’s a nice tone!
I beg to slightly differ.
Every wire may (emphasize on may) act as an antenna in certain circumstances.
Depending on the connected capacity or inducitivity it may act as an antenna in a way it does in an old radio. Thats usually not the case in guitars, but its not impossible.
One has to analyse the kind of reception one is getting with the guitar in order to shield it against it.
Yes, you are absolutely right about that. What I meant, is purely guitar related. Most techs will agree on shielding the electronic cavity not really having any positive effect on the noise floor. Except for extreme conditions of course. :) Cheers //Kris
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses Right. Usually its unnecessary only in rare cases it can help but that means the area is littered with interferences. Many times from heavy electric equipment like high voltage overhead wires and stuff like that.
I don't see it making enough difference to matter for the most part honestly. It seems almost insignificant but then different body guitars may get different results I imagine but I agree with the other poster who asked what harm in NOT shielding is their potentially or otherwise?
There is absolutely nothing wrong with not shielding a guitar. Proper grounding is crucial of course, that's something else. I see it this way: if your instrument works fine without shielding, just leave it as it is. If you have hum issues, shield it and see if it gets any better. If it ain't broken don't fix it. That always seems to be the best advice. //Kris
According to the vu meters it looked like the hum got worse after shielding :(
Thanks that’s what I wanted to know/hear!
Why put shielding behind the pickguard? What is being (partially) shielded? There is nothing behind the pickguard.
I just slammed the shielding on there to A: surround the pickup B: shield the PU wire under the pickuguard C: have an easier and faster ground connection D: because I didn't want to spend even more time with origami. haha! Cheers //Kris
Super cool video! I always wished I did a before and after when adding shielding to my strat.
Random nerd question: What is the name of the font you use in the video description with the black background?
Thanks a lot! As long as you love the tones of your strat the A/B doesn't really matter. :)
The font: I'm not sure exactly. It's a font Thomann purchased for visual marketing purposes. I'm just using it for the thumbs and videos. haha!
Cheers //Kris
Would be interesting what you think about it Kris
Hey Cumhur, thanks for watching the video! Here's my answer (copy/pasted from None of your Business's same question): The lack of noise reduction with the shielding (shown in this video) represents my experience as a guitar player. In most cases shielding just doesn't really reduce anything. Unless you're in a power wise miserable location of course.
The only effect of the shielding I've heard here, was that it killed my tele's treble and I didn't like that at all. So I removed all the shielding right after we finished this video. haha! Cheers //Kris
@@ThomannsGuitarsBasses thanks, like your answer
Will aluminum tape shield also? 🛡️
Yes, it should work fine. Any conductive metal that is connected to ground will work.
@@Nebvin Thank you!
Well with so many classic tunes played by unshielded guitars, there has been ne unpleasant noises for me. The unshielded PU sounded more lively for me, though. The real question should be: What felt better playing the guitar and hearing the sound unprocessed in the room?
Since the noise floor was pretty much identical (and as always with this tele, very very low) the unshielded sound was much more enjoyable. With the shielding the guitar sounded like someone put a blanket on the cab. Cheers //Kris
For easier back and forth comparing:
4:22 Bridge PU No Shielding
4:33 Bridge PU PU Shielding
4:43 Bridge PU Full Shielding
4:54 Neck PU No Shielding
5:15 Neck PU PU Shielding
5:36 Neck PU Full Shielding
But you only demo’d the bridge pickup which wasn’t shielded… 🤔
I love this dude.
Haha, this dude loves you too dude. 😆 Cheers and thanks! //Kris
Great video, but I can't hear any difference while playing. Minimal before playing.
I actually choose to sacrifice a barely noticeable high-end (which can be easily recovered by EQ'ing, though) than tolerate that f***ing EMI/RFI noise.