Uggg Ground hum

[pabloman]

I'd look to see if something is touching your shield plate. Think about the way you handled everything maybe a solder joint was stressed. Go through and heat your connections. Look for some stray solder on your jack.  :dontknow:  I hope you get it sorted. Good luck  ccasion14:

 

[Cagey]

Just for fun, I would clip a wire directly to the ground lug on the output jack, then touch it to various places that should be grounded to see if the hum goes away. For example, touch the pot backs, then the strings themselves. If that calms things down, then you'll know you've got a missing, open or high-resistance connection somewhere. Use an alligator lead, such as one of these...

You can buy a set of 10 here for about $4, and they're handy to have around.

Then, I'd question what you mean by noisy. Those look like single coil pickups to me. Even when wired to behave like humbuckers, they're not as quiet as a real one. When used as single coils, they're noisy as Wayne County lockup. It's the nature of the beast. How could the guitar have been quiet before? If it was, that's what I'd be suspicious of.

 

[TBurst Std]

Ah, ok, I see it.

One thing I'm thinking about ... You said in the original post that you now, after swapping and reswapping the pickguard, have a slight hum that disappears when you touch the bridge. I believe this to be quite normal.
But it also implies that you didn't have any hum when not touching the bridge before, i.e. when you didn't ground the guitar. I have experienced this a few times, but it's more uncommon.

If there's no hum when you hold and play the guitar, then it's like most guitars out there.

Yes it was quiet without touching the strings before. Now there is a slight hum unless I touch the strings. I could probably live with it, but it is annoying as my other 4 electrics are dead silent. The grounds are in the same place now as before.

 

[TBurst Std]

I'd look to see if something is touching your shield plate. Think about the way you handled everything maybe a solder joint was stressed. Go through and heat your connections. Look for some stray solder on your jack.  :dontknow:  I hope you get it sorted. Good luck  ccasion14:

I will check that, and plan to re-flow the joints in the ground circuit. Stray solder on the jack? Don't see any, but I am curious if maybe some slipped between the wafers.  Hmmm

 

[TBurst Std]

Just for fun, I would clip a wire directly to the ground lug on the output jack, then touch it to various places that should be grounded to see if the hum goes away. For example, touch the pot backs, then the strings themselves. If that calms things down, then you'll know you've got a missing, open or high-resistance connection somewhere. Use an alligator lead, such as one of these...

You can buy a set of 10 here for about $4, and they're handy to have around.

Then, I'd question what you mean by noisy. Those look like single coil pickups to me. Even when wired to behave like humbuckers, they're not as quiet as a real one. When used as single coils, they're noisy as Wayne County lockup. It's the nature of the beast. How could the guitar have been quiet before? If it was, that's what I'd be suspicious of.

Many thanks, I was too busy to head to Harbor Freight as they have them. Will stop by this weekend.
Yes they are SC pups. This is a ground hum, not SC hum. (Why I was testing in positions 2 & 4 to validate). It was quiet before, and if that was wrong, I want to make it wrong again.

I think I either stressed a joint, or its the jack. Remember my solder Q from a while ago? That was because I ran out except for some silver solder. That is what I used in the temp transplant. I wonder if during de-soldering, some of it made it between the wafers.

 

[TBurst Std]

OK went through the grounding circuit using a DMM measuring Ohms (Continuity was solid tone everywhere).
Keep in mind I have a full aluminum backing plate behind the pickguard as well as a 1 Vol, 1 Tone, 1 Blender pot arrangement).

Though I did not de-solder the switch, I validated that it is wired correctly.
I performed these tests with the claw ground wire and the jack wires unconnected.
What I checked and the values are:

jack tip to jack ground - 0 ohms
jack sleeve to jack hot - 0 ohms
claw ground wire to vol put lug - 0 ohms
jack ground wire to vol pot lug - 0 ohms
jack ground wire to joint of pup grounds - 0 ohms
jack ground wire to joint of bridge pup - 0 ohms
jack ground wire to joint of middle pup - 0 ohms
jack ground wire to joint of neck pup - 0 ohms
jack ground wire to the metal backplate - 0 ohms
jack ground wire to back of vol pot - 0 ohms
jack ground wire to back of tone pot - 0 ohms
jack ground wire to back of blender pot - .2 ohms

A perfect ground should be 0 ohms, but as I understand .2 is insignificant. I will pull and re-seat this pot to see if I can get 0.

But this pretty much tells me the ground circuit is good. Guess I am weird and remember this guitar differently.

I am going to check all the hotlines as well since its readily accessible right now. Then reassemble and check at the actual claw and jack after those joints are re-made.

Wait, the jack looked clean, but let me check. Had ranging values on tip to positive and sleeve to ground. From  -.1 ohms to upwards of 6 ohms. As I continued to check again, a small strand of wire fell out (where from specifically I do not know. Guess what, I now have 0 - .1 ohms.

There is something I am curious about, and will check when I have it all together.

 

[TBurst Std]

Well. got it all together tonight. Trem claw screw to output jack ground is .2 ohms. I am trusting we call this done.

 

[TBurst Std]

And it is done. Finally got it all back together and setup. On low/med gain patches, dead silent in positions 2 &4.