Shielding a Tele - is it worth it?

Cranky

I shielded the entire cavity of my Tele Deluxe.  I think it makes no difference and wouldn't be worth the effort for you unless you were already having buzzing problems.  It's really a matter of having a proper ground. 

Funkfingers

Fender Telecaster Deluxe and Deluxe American Telecaster have noise-cancelling pickups with screened output cables. Conductive paint or foil would only help around the controls and output jack.

ICBM

Cranky said:

I shielded the entire cavity of my Tele Deluxe.  I think it makes no difference and wouldn't be worth the effort for you unless you were already having buzzing problems.  It's really a matter of having a proper ground. 

The huge problem with some of the modern reissue Tele Deluxes is that the long wire from the switch back to the output jack is completely unshielded... absolutely ludicrous. If you simply replace this with a shielded cable you stop probably 90% of the noise without having to do anything else at all. If yours is one that came with a shielded cable in the first place, that's probably why you didn't notice a lot of difference.

Devil#20

LastMantra said:

No option for leaving as is? If it ain't broke... 

Should have probably put it in context. No it isn't broken. It works fine. It's a Squire Infinity tele that I bought for £70 with what looks like it hasn't been played much if at all. However, I bought it with the sole intention of using it as a test bed for pickups and modding generally to see how good I can get it and the better mods will get rolled into my US teles. So far I've replace the black plastic nut with a white bone nut, fret levelled, polished and intonated so now set up properly. The nut needed replacing anyway because it was badly cut and the high E string was nearly hanging off the edge of the fretboard. Plays really nicely now so a good starting point. The pickups aren't all that to be honest but you' wouldn't expect them to be with a guitar made down to a price. Oddly enough when I whipped the pickguard off it I was surprised to see it had been routed at the factory to also accept a neck humbucker so opens up a few more options. I've got some BKP Boot Camps, No Casters, SD 1/4 pounders, Di Marzios and some Iron Gears on the way to try out. All used. The best one's I'll keep and transplant into my US teles and the one's I don't like will get flipped.  

elusivelight

My partscaster has copper shielding, MJT who I got the body from recommend it, I had no idea about putting a guitar together so I just did what I was told!

jaymenon

Try this @Philly_Q ;
...it'll tell you exactly how your tele will sound if properly shielded.

Kind regards
Jay

https://i.imgur.com/THMHsxG.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/zQBFZDL.jpg

Philly_Q

@jaymenon sorry, you've lost me.  What's going on there?

ICBM

Freemasonry.

jaymenon

I didn't realise how long ago, you made this post about shielding your tele - or if you even have that guitar any more :-)

Philly_Q

It's funny, this thread has been dragged from the grave a couple of times in the last few months.  I do still have that Tele, although the last time the thread was resurrected (July) I couldn't remember what guitar I was talking about.

jaymenon

That little technique I've pictured works an absolute treat though - on any guitar, particularly an ES335 type...

merlin

capo4th said:

To shield or not to shield that is the question?

To shield, or not to shield, that is the question:

Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer

The slings and arrows of outrageous radio interference,

Or to take arms against 60Hz hum

And by opposing end them. 

Philly_Q

jaymenon said:

That little technique I've pictured works an absolute treat though - on any guitar, particularly an ES335 type...

But what's it doing, using your body as an earth connection?  Effectively the same as resting a hand on the strings or other metal parts?

jaymenon

Philly_Q said:

jaymenon said:

That little technique I've pictured works an absolute treat though - on any guitar, particularly an ES335 type...

But what's it doing, using your body as an earth connection?  Effectively the same as resting a hand on the strings or other metal parts?

Exactly - but I then don't need to worry about keeping my hands constantly on the strings...

also, as I’m sure you’ve noticed, the neutralisation of Buzz is sometimes related to how robustly one contacts the metal parts. This little technique provides seriously robust contact...

Devil#20

Well as it was me that resurrected the thread I should report back that I shielded my test-bed tele using copper foil throughout, including the back of the pickguard and tested for continuity. I twisted pickup and signal wires where it made sense to do so. I recorded the guitar before mods. Not quite a test of shielding alone because I put in some higher output Iron Gear pickups to replace the stock affinity pickups. The result : no discernible difference. Not worth the bother IMO unless you have a noisy guitar to start with. However, there's probably an underlying problem with your wiring or the quality of the soldered joints that are causing an issue. Mine was fairly low level buzz to start with, but even so I thought it may make it quieter still. It didn't. Save yourself the time and effort. I couldn't say if it dulls the tone though because, like I said, different pickups. It does sound better generally though with the Iron Gears. 

ICBM

Did you make sure your shielding has continuity to the guitar’s ground? It won’t do anything if it doesn’t.

Devil#20

ICBM said:

Did you make sure your shielding has continuity to the guitar’s ground? It won’t do anything if it doesn’t.

Yep

ICBM

Devil#20 said:

Yep

Interesting. Every shielding job I've ever done has noticeably reduced noise, even when the guitar is already paint-shielded but still not quiet enough - so I'm not sure it could even be that yours is paint-shielded under the finish. (Modern US Fenders are, for example.)

Devil#20

ICBM said:

Devil#20 said:

Yep

Interesting. Every shielding job I've ever done has noticeably reduced noise, even when the guitar is already paint-shielded but still not quiet enough - so I'm not sure it could even be that yours is paint-shielded under the finish. (Modern US Fenders are, for example.)

It did have black paint inside the cavities which I assume was shielding paint. However, when I put a meter across it it didn't seem to be conductive at all so either a) It's not shielding paint (in which case what else could it be) or b) it is shielding paint but it's dried out and no longer works. or c) i can't use a multimeter. It's not c though. So the paint must be carbonised but it was very dry and my hands were filthy from poking around inside the guitar.  

ICBM

Devil#20 said:

It did have black paint inside the cavities which I assume was shielding paint. However, when I put a meter across it it didn't seem to be conductive at all so either a) It's not shielding paint (in which case what else could it be) or b) it is shielding paint but it's dried out and no longer works. or c) i can't use a multimeter. It's not c though. So the paint must be carbonised but it was very dry and my hands were filthy from poking around inside the guitar.  

That's carbon shielding paint. It's usually crap... but that doesn't explain why doing it properly didn't improve it!