Nickel Shielding Paint .... link anyone?

[Steve_Karl]

Does anyone have a URL to where to buy nickel shielding paint?

Thank you!

 

[Mor Paul]

Does it even exist?

 

[line6man]

Is there any reason you need nickel shielding paint?

Does it have better conductivity than (regular) paint?

I've said this a bunch of times now, but I still prefer that an instrument be shielded with copper foil rather than paint, because the paint can be quite resistive, versus the copper tape having better continuity.

 

[Steve_Karl]

The reason I'd rather use the paint is that it's cleaner and easier to work with.
I'd never heard that the copper tape gave better results.

I don't know the specifics about this paint other than it's nickel in water ( water based ) ... it's very dark gray, almost black.

I've got about 1/4" of it in a small jar which has hardened to the point where I cant revive it.
It was given to me a long time ago and it just dried up.
I did my first warmoth with it ... over 10 yrs. ago and also did a G&L F-100 with it around the same time.

Maybe it's no longer available ... EPA or something.
Remember how thy outlawed the Original Blue Shower... the best electronic contact cleaner that ever existed.

 

[chrisg]

Try here - http://www.stewmac.com/shop/Electronics,_pickups/Supplies:_Shielding/Conductive_Shielding_Paint.htm

 

[Steve_Karl]

Thanks chrisg

I'll give them a call.

Steve

 

[line6man]

I'd never heard that the copper tape gave better results.

It does.
I've seen readings of 4 ohms on the second coat from neck to bridge cavity with paint, versus 0.5 ohms with copper tape.

 

[line6man]

This stuff occasionally pops up on eBay:
http://cgi.ebay.com/Guitar-Conductive-Shielding-Paint-Acheson-Electrodag_W0QQitemZ230376023084QQcmdZViewItemQQptZGuitar_Accessories?hash=item35a37b242c&_trksid=p4999.c0.m14

 

[Steve_Karl]

I'd never heard that the copper tape gave better results.

It does.
I've seen readings of 4 ohms on the second coat from neck to bridge cavity with paint, versus 0.5 ohms with copper tape.

Ahhhh .... thanks for the details. I'm reconsidering.

 

[Steve_Karl]

This stuff occasionally pops up on eBay:
http://cgi.ebay.com/Guitar-Conductive-Shielding-Paint-Acheson-Electrodag_W0QQitemZ230376023084QQcmdZViewItemQQptZGuitar_Accessories?hash=item35a37b242c&_trksid=p4999.c0.m14

Thankyou! That looks very interesting and the price is good also.

S

 

[Super Turbo Deluxe Custom]

It does.
I've seen readings of 4 ohms on the second coat from neck to bridge cavity with paint, versus 0.5 ohms with copper tape.

Does the ohm value really matter in this case.  It is not a grounding path as far as the circuitry is concerned.  The purpose is for it to be a conductive path to ground for any unwanted interference.

 

[line6man]

It does.
I've seen readings of 4 ohms on the second coat from neck to bridge cavity with paint, versus 0.5 ohms with copper tape.

Does the ohm value really matter in this case.  It is not a grounding path as far as the circuitry is concerned.  The purpose is for it to be a conductive path to ground for any unwanted interference.

Um, are you serious with that question?

The point of shielding is to ground any RFI/EMI that may enter the instrument.
If you create a resistance between the shielding and the ground, less of that noise is making it's way to ground, making the shielding less effective.

 

[line6man]

Ok, maybe you were talking about how I was referring to the resistance between neck and bridge cavities?
By nature, the noise is going to find it's quickest path to ground.
It's not going to be 4 and 0.5 ohms from shield to ground, the ground path might be only an inch away or something.
It would be difficult to measure out the resistance in one inch of material though, as it's going to go into fractions of an ohm, and ohms aren''t generally measurable in 0.1/0.01 steps on most multimeters. That's why is easiest to try to measure the greatest possible resistance between the material, that way it will show up more accurately on the meter.
I'm pretty sure that if the paint was 8 times more resistive from cavity to cavity, that any shorter distance to ground would still be significantly more resistive with paint than tape.

 

[Super Turbo Deluxe Custom]

I was serious with that question.  "......in this case?"

 

[jlegnor]

Are you guys taking readings with the guitar plugged into an amp?  Cause unless the guitar is connected to some kind of outside ground,  wouldn't the shielding in the guitar be just a floating ground? 

 

[line6man]

Are you guys taking readings with the guitar plugged into an amp?  Cause unless the guitar is connected to some kind of outside ground,  wouldn't the shielding in the guitar be just a floating ground?   

I was referring to the resistance between the shielding itself, by placing one lead in the neck pickup's cavity and the other lead in the bridge pickup's cavity, then measuring the resistance between the two points.

If your shielding does not have a connection to ground, it isn't doing diddly squat. It must be grounded to the same ground as everything else in the guitar (back of a pot, output jack, wherever is convenient...) in order to function.

 

[jlegnor]

Ok, I get what your saying. I was thinking of the grounding as a whole.

 

[Steve_Karl]

This is really interesting to me.

Can anyone recommend a good entry level multimeter form someone that's never owned one?

Thanks!

 

[DangerousR6]

This is really interesting to me.

Can anyone recommend a good entry level multimeter form someone that's never owned one?

Thanks!

Cen-Tech has a real inexpensive multi meter that's easy to use, I bought to use for checking the bias on my amp.Easy to use and works great, I think it was like $10..