Telecaster making unbearable Humming noise. Changes when I move

[iamdro]

I haven't played it in a while, or in the particular house i'm in for that matter but my telecaster is humming to a point where I can't record anything because the hum is so prominent... on a clean channel. Now I understand telecaster= single coil= hum... not like this though. I tried touching all of the metal contacts on the guitar to see if something wasn't grounded properly, but it all stayed constant. Here's the kicker whenever I move around, point the guitar up down rotate, the hum changes significantly, If i play with the guitar pointed to the ceiling I barely get a hum. I assume this is the electro magnetic interference from the powerlines outside affecting my pickups, Is there a way I can remedy this issue? Or should I try playing somewhere else? Basement etc? The hum is making a similar sound to that of a guitar cable that is not plugged in, the weird thing is when my cable is unplugged, and I move it around the room, point it at different areas, the hum changes. I have tried using it on a tube amp with and w/o a ground lift, on my laptop using my interface with the computer plugged in/ on batter power and the hum never changes. Please help.

[frans]

There could be circumstances in your house that cause this.. or your guitar has a broken ground connection from the bridge to the output or something.
In short: do you want to find the problem or do you just want to record some guitar tracks? Try another guitar. If the hum remains, THEN search for the problem, you aren't a commercial studio where the circumstances have to be in check all the time.

BTW I regularly let the people who record guitar at my place turn on their spot to check IF there's less or more hum at a certain angle and if, have them play in the direction there's less trouble. Or get them one of my guitars

[fastlanestoner]

Check your wiring. Definitely sounds like it could be a short

[dkelley]

this isn't helpful, sorry, but it's funny to me that the OP's thread title is probably the exact thing that someone said 60 or so years ago that caused some clever person (whether an engineer at Gibson or Les Paul himself I'm not sure) to invent the humbucking pickup.

back to your regularly scheduled thread now...

[Whitecat]

Do you use dimmer switches on the lights in your house?

[Jim Williams]

Find 'mecca'.

[changeng]

also, check for simple things - turn off cellphones, tv's, anything electrical that doesn't need to be on. Also, I get less um from my tele if I'm not near my 'puter and screen.

[Musiclab]

After you're done doing all of that shield it.

[Early21]

Also, things in other rooms can cause it. I've noticed when a certain bathroom fan is on in my location it makes the hum increase substantially. I will fix the fan eventually, but for now it's easier to turn it off.

[iamdro]

I know what the telecaster hum is supposed to sound like and this seems different, I tried playing my guitar into my macbook pro without it being plugged in and it made no difference to the sound. I'm skeptical that it's a wiring issue with my guitar since touching different parts doesn't affect it, the only way I can seem to change it is by pointing the pickups at different things, which leads me to believe my house is getting some crazy electro magnetic interference. The house i'm in right now is very old, i'm not sure what the grounding system in the house is, but many of the wall outlets have no ground (as in only 2 prong outlets). I wouldn't be suprised if the 3 prong outlets weren't actually connected to a gound. I also have a telecaster deluxe, although it's getting fixed right now at a friends house because it constantly slips tuning. I don't know what the hum is like on that, but I feel like it wasn't as bad or else I would have started looking into it earlier.

If I wrap the entire outside of my guitar in foil and plug it in, would this be a good/ valid test if the problem is Electomagnetic interference? or would that just act like an antenna for more interference? I'm trying to nail down the problem before I go taking it apart and fiddiling around.

[iamdro]

Also, If i turn the tone knob all the way down the hum goes away, but my guitar sounds like crap.

[stevens119]

I always have this problem. My solution? Move the guitar around till it makes the least noise...then I play it in that spot

[soul&folk]

how about trying one of these?

[kafka]

I don't want to retype the whole saga here, but check my experience in this thread:

Electrician Coming today. Need help

[pwn]

Is this while recording? Or just all the time? I've had to position guitarists when in the control room because the pickups were catching its own signal through the monitors. Positioning them certain ways would cut the noise down significantly.

[iamdro]

it happens always, but I only really care when i'm recording. here is a recording I just took, this is straight into my mac using an mbox 2 no plugins and the laptop was running on battery power. I move the guitar around and thats when you hear different level of noise, I can't have my cleans sounding this way. I had my roommate turn off the main breaker in the house while I listened and the humming still persisted. I put a skillet in front and in back of my pickups and the hum almost disappeared. How much can I benefit from shielding my guitar?

http://soundcloud.com/iamdro/nasty-hum

[changeng]

good shielding is pretty critical with single coil pickups. also, check the "dumb guy" stuff - make sure you don't have anything metallic in your pockets, don't play near any kind of rf, radio or tv receptors. Even microwave ovens can screw with "the hummm". Also make sure your guitar cable is quality - if it hasn't been mentioned already, you may want to try a TRS cable instead of the standard TS. It's not supposed to make a difference, but gosh dang it, sometimes it does.

[blaarg]

Originally Posted by stevens119

I always have this problem. My solution? Move the guitar around till it makes the least noise...then I play it in that spot

do this. or turn off other electrical stuff in the room that arent necessary

[RedWallStudio]

Change everything in your signal chain ONE THING AT A TIME until you narrow it down to the root cause. Start with power.. plug into a different outlet that is known to be on a different circuit breaker. Your always best being plugged into an outlet that doesn't have things like microwaves, bathroom fans, flourescent lights etc on the same circuit. Then try a different power cord to the amp (if you can disconnect this).. you may have a bad ground there. If not, try a different amp, then guitar cable, then guitar. In all these types of situations you can generally narrow it down by a simple process of elimination. Also take the guitar to your local tech and see if the single coils are properly shielded and that your internal wire harnass on the guitar is not shorted out or been molested in some way. I play nothing but Tele Standards, Customs and Deluxes (Humbuckers) and I sometimes run into this issue, but I can always narrow it down to one of the things I mentioned above.

[MarvinDog]

What else is on in your room? Flourescent lights, including CFLs? Computer monitor? CFLs? Television? CFLs? Dimmer switches? CFLs? Neon lights? CFLs? Induction motors? All of these will cause hum, even LCD monitors and televisions, and in these cases, can cause hum in single coil pickups even when they're off-- you'll have to cut power to 'em.

[candidate]

One time I had a fender american telecaster with a wire mashed under the whole bridge piece thing. Ground wire? Well, it came out of contact with the bridge metal. Stuffed into the paint. Unscrew the whole bridge pickup cover and check that wire?

[MadGuitrst]

Originally Posted by whitecat

Do you use dimmer switches on the lights in your house?

It's most likely this or an offending wallwart somewhere in your place.

[Bad Machinery]

I play single coil guitars almost exclusively, and I disagree about the need for all that copper shielding and star grounding stuff. My Fender USA and Rickenbacker guitars are nice and quiet stock from the factory--I wouldn't dream of ripping apart my 660/12 and fouling it up with copper tape.

That said, my Tele isn't even RW/RP and it doesn't make the kind of noise described. If yours is RW/RP (and most are,) my number one question is: does the noise mostly go away in the middle position?

edit: Dude--your clip sounds like a ground problem. I use $#@$ George L. "no solder" pedalboard cables, and lose ground connections are a constant gremlin with those things, so the sound is familiar to me.

[NEWTON IN ORBIT]

Originally Posted by Bad Machinery

edit: Dude--your clip sounds like a ground problem. I use $#@$ George L. "no solder" pedalboard cables, and lose ground connections are a constant gremlin with those things, so the sound is familiar to me.

I agree.

That is most certainly a ground problem. Busted cable?

Cold solder joint?

Something is broken.

Still, I disagree with the poster I quoted only in that the shielding ain't going to hurt the tone. I think your issue is ground, but shielding ain't evil at all.

john

[Bad Machinery]

Originally Posted by NEWTON IN ORBIT

Still, I disagree with the poster I quoted only in that the shielding ain't going to hurt the tone. I think your issue is ground, but shielding ain't evil at all.

Point of order: I didn't say it would hurt the tone, only that it was largely unnecessary.

And I, for one, don't want a pound of copper tape in my thinline tele, or a bunch of sticker goop on my nice Ric just because somebody made a website about stargrounding, once.

[iamdro]

ok, reading through all of these, let me clear some things up.

I tried 3 different cables, is it possible they are all bad? Maybe.

I recorded that clip straight into my interface with my macbook pro running on battery power, so I believe that eliminates any ground looping problems within the house, however it's still possible its a ground problem within the guitar.

I tried playing in 4 different rooms, some of them varried in amount of hum, but none of them were at a level low enough that I can record.

I cut the power to the house and the hum was still there, so that eliminates any electronic devices within the house interfering.

The only way I was able to seriously decrease the amount of hum was by putting an iron skillet infront of and behind the guitar.

I have a Fender P bass, it also hums to a point where I can't record, but it's not as loud as my telecaster.

[dkelley]

frustratingly, it honestly sounds like you have a grounding issue in your room. some houses has badly grounded or, get this, UNgrounded ground wires in their supposed 3 wire grounded outlets.

you may need help from an electrician, at least to confirm yes or not on this possibility.

I've had that problem before, back when I played single coils a lot.

it takes a lot to make a precision bass hum - the split pickup is semi-humbucking. so this tells me that you definitely have either a ground loop as noted (which is extremely hard to nail down by the way, start with amp and guitar into wall plug with everything else turned off, and gradually turn gear on from there. or guitar into di into computer with everything else turned off (monitoring headphone out of computer with phones rather than amplified speakers), and again gradually turn gear on from there.

but as I said it could simply be an issue in your room.

also when you test things out you can't just keep other gear turned off, you need to unplug it from the wall or powerbar. even turned off, a reverse grounded ac power supply can negate the ground on the rest of your gear making things hum.

and when you gradually one at a time plug things back in and finally find somethign that makes your guitar hum, check if it's an unpolarized 2 wire ac plug on that gear (or on any of your existing gear that hasn't hummed until now. If so, unplug it, turn it around, and plug it back in again, and try to see if htat helps. remember, 2 wire ac cables typically ground to one of the wires also...

[NEWTON IN ORBIT]

Originally Posted by Bad Machinery

Point of order: I didn't say it would hurt the tone, only that it was largely unnecessary.

And I, for one, don't want a pound of copper tape in my thinline tele, or a bunch of sticker goop on my nice Ric just because somebody made a website about stargrounding, once.

OK, welcome to the forums.
john

[sonic dogg]

The ground for the bridge and strings has gone wrong. Get out the soldering iron.

I own 5 Strats right now. Thats not counting the 20 or so in the past and the several Teles and a Jazzmaster and a Jag. ALL of them were treated to copperfoil and PROPERLY done star grounding as well as a .047uf cap on the input to filter unearthed shocks from crappy live venues. It certainly doesnt weigh down the guitar when done properly and the LACK of hum is quite telling.

The fact is the wiring of guitars is lacking in so many ways. If you were to wire your house with the techniques employed for all these years you would have burnt it to the ground by now.

[Go Nigel Go]

You said you haven't played in a while, maybe you just need to clean the jack. I have a Les Paul that sat in the case for several years that hummed and howled like a banshee when I plugged it in after a long hiatus. tried several cables, and no difference. I gave the jack a quick scrub with a .30 caliber rifle bore brush soaked in contact cleaner, and it was problem solved. May not be your problem, but it costs next to nothing to try it!