Excessive Buzzing in the Bridge PU

[slinehan]

Hi All,

I got a new tele back in December which I absolutely love, but I've been looking for the right tone out of my bridge pickup. I tried a Lollar which I thought was a bit too muddy, switched over to an Antiquity which was closer but still didn't nail what I was looking for, and now have dropped in a lower-output Antiquity which perfectly nails what I'm looking for.

My problem is though, that this pickup is giving me a great deal of buzz...so much so that I'm getting disturbing feedback on solos. The pickup buzzes particularly bad whenever I touch the strings of the guitar, but lessens when I touch the control plate. I've checked the ground wire, but that wasn't it. I've tried soldering another ground to the bridge plate but that hasn't helped either.

I didn't have this problem with either the Lollar or the previous Antiquity I installed, so I'm ruling out the amp, cables, etc. I even tried the guitar through another guitarist's rig to be sure, but the buzz was still there.

Is there any reason one pickup would do this while a different, but same model, pickup would not? Anything I can do to fix this problem?

As always, any help is greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
-Sean

[red57strat]

First, I'd make sure that your solder joints are good. look for any joints that are grey instead of silver and reflow them.

Second, I'd add a ground wire from the electronics groung to the bridge plate. Teles don't usually need one, but it can help eliminate a problem. It doesn't need to be soldered to the bridge plate just trap it between the plate and the body.

[slinehan]

I went back at it last night and tried re-soldering everything on the guitar but I still couldn't get rid of the buzz.

Out of desperation, I decided to try grounding the yellow (lead) wire of the bridge pickup and use the black (ground) wire of the pickup as the lead. Plugged it back in, no more buzz. Go figure. Now though, my middle position sounds out of phase. Anybody out there know a fix for this?

Thanks again,
-Sean

[yegbert]

Which Antiquity pickup?

Seymour Duncan's description of the 6.4k flatpole 11024-22 Antiquity I for Tele includes this:

Like the originals, the ferrous bottom plates are not wax-potted for that "breakin'-up Tele twang tone" that's just on the verge of feedback.

SD doesn't have the same note on the 6.1k staggerpole 11024-27 Antiquity I, but being in the same series it's likely also not potted. The Antiquity II is wax potted but it's also 6.4k, so I'm guessing yours is the 6.1k Ant I?

With the wiring change, did the feedback lessen also when the bridge pickup is selected by itself?

What effects and amp settings - a high gain high volume environment?

[slinehan]

It's the Antiquity Version I. With the wiring change, there's no problem at all when the bridge is selected by itself. I can't quite figure it out.

Before the buzz was occuring both with my live rig (Fulltone OCD into Fulltone '69 into Fender Blues Deville), but it was also occuring when I had my Pro Junior on "2" at home with no effects. It was pretty bad stuff.

[Mike Fleming]

On traditional tele Bridge PU's, the plate on the bottom is used to connect the strings and bridge to ground. The pickup mounting screws connect the plate to the bridge and strings electrically, and then a little wire goes from the plate to one of the leads, like this:



(From Fuzzy's archives)

If that wire is going to a hot lead instead of a ground, you get bad buzzing because all that stuff gets connected to the hot side. And then it goes away when you switch the leads, just like you did here.

Now your bridge pickup is out of phase with the neck because SD pickups and Fender pickups tend to be wound out of phase with each other. The cover of your neck pickup is connected to its ground lead as well, either directly soldered or with another little wire. To get these two pickups in phase with neither one buzzing, you'll have to switch either the cover of the neck pickup or the base of the bridge pickup to the other lead. Both of those are very delicate things to do.

Also some people connect the neck pickup cover to a third wire, like how texas specials are set up; then you can ground it separately from the pickup and use a 4 way switch to get the pickups in series as well as parallel.

Good luck,

Mike

[slinehan]

Thanks Mike. Sounds like it would be easier to look into a four-way switch then to try something that delicate. I really appreciate the advice and help.
Best,
-Sean

[Mike Fleming]

yeah no problem sean. Actually if you do the third lead for your neck pickup, which grounds the cover separately, you can still use the regular three way switch. You'll just have two wires to ground instead of one. So you can ground the cover on its own, and switch the other two around so that the neck pickup is in phase with the bridge.

The four way is fun too though, it gives you a big thick tone in series, sort of gibsony and gretchy, definitely worth trying.

Mike

[yegbert]

slinehan,

Two parts of this puzzle me greatly: 1) you had to connect the wires the opposite of what would be expected based on the colors, which implies that someone before you wired that pickup non-standard; 2) the problem didn't show up with the other Antiquity you tried (right?).

As a sanity check can you confirm that wiring configuration on the bridge pickup with an ohmeter? Remove the control plate; put the selector switch in the neck-only position (or disconnect both bridge pickup leads from the switch); touch the ohmeter probes, one to a bridge pickup mounting/adjusting screw, the other to each pickup lead in turn. What will be consistent with the situation you have described here is that the yellow lead will read 0 ohms, meaning that end of the pickup coil is grounded to the baseplate; and the black lead will read somewhere close to 6.1k ohms.

What neck pickup do you have paired with this bridge pickup now? Might as well check it the same way, with the neck pickup deselected and with the ohmeter probes between the pickup cover and each pickup lead in turn.

Someone else correct me if I'm wrong here (Mike?), but: if the baseplate-grounded lead of the bridge pickup, and the cover-grounded lead of the neck pickup, are both connected to the pot (common for both pickups) ground; and the pickups sound out of phase in the middle position; then the only way to avoid a buzz situation from one of the two pickups in an in-phase wired configuration, is to change either the neck cover ground or the bridge baseplate ground.

I think it would be useful to know what the neck pickup is and confirm the grounds as I suggested, before making a decision about rewiring one of the pickups though.

[Mike Fleming]

All very good points Yegbert.

Mike

[slinehan]

I have to admit, I'm not quite so advanced in wiring to be able to pull off what you're asking. However, I can answer a few of your questions.

You're right, the problem did not appear with the other Antiquity. This is what had me really confused. I've got it paired with a Lollar humbucker in the neck pickup (it's a Nash-built tele and this came stock) so I haven't messed with that wiring at all. I do enjoy the out-of-phase tones, but I'd much rather have the standard tele bridge/neck humbucker blend in that middle position.

Should the second ground wire solution work on the neck humbucker to clear up this problem?

Thanks again for the help,
-Sean

[yegbert]

Originally Posted by slinehan

I have to admit, I'm not quite so advanced in wiring to be able to pull off what you're asking. However, I can answer a few of your questions.

You're right, the problem did not appear with the other Antiquity. This is what had me really confused. I've got it paired with a Lollar humbucker in the neck pickup (it's a Nash-built tele and this came stock) so I haven't messed with that wiring at all. I do enjoy the out-of-phase tones, but I'd much rather have the standard tele bridge/neck humbucker blend in that middle position.

Should the second ground wire solution work on the neck humbucker to clear up this problem?

Thanks again for the help,
-Sean

Well yes, but just maybe, if the neck pickup is already equipped with a third wire for ground, that workaround will be made easy for you. I was assuming (and shouldn't have) that you had a traditional Tele single coil neck, which in a lot of cases doesn't have the cover ground as a third wire.

Which Lollar humbucker do you have? Or more importantly, check to see if you have three wires coming from it, with two connected to your pot ground. Looking at the Lollar products, some have a braided shield around the two pickup leads; if that is there, it would serve as the third wire. If you have a third wire already coming from the neck pickup, then maybe (if neither lead is connected to it on the pickup end) you can simply switch the two wires at the switch/pot end which are the two ends of the pickup coil and have the problem solved.

Even if you have just two wires, it's worth just switching their relative positions on the selector switch and the pot ground. The worst that will happen, I think, is that you now get a buzz from the neck pickup cover. I lived with a slightly buzzy Tele neck pickup because of that scenario for a couple of months before I understood this was happening.

By the way, when you make that wiring change, make sure the bridge pickup wires are in the position that didn't cause the buzz: yellow to ground and black to the selector switch.

If you make that change and they are in phase with no ground buzz, just remember this and reckon the bridge pickup to have been wired (how the wires are connected on the pickup) by someone before you, in this unusual way and any future uses of that pickup with other pickups will have to be reconciled in a similar way.

If you make that change and they are in phase but you get the buzz from the neck cover, then you'll be back to deciding whether to rewire (or have someone else rewire) one of the pickups, or pull this oddly wired bridge pickup out and use a different bridge pickup.

[slinehan]

Thanks so much for all of your help and advice Yegbert. There is a braided sheild, so I'm hoping this will be as easy as switching the two wires on the neck pickup. We'll see how this works itself out. Thanks so much for you help with this again.
-Sean