Pickup hum

[Ian Price]

As some of you may know I am the proud owner of a set of Apaches. I love these pickups but, as they are single coil, I do expect a bit of hum from them. This has never bugged me until I compared it against the tele - in comparison it has pretty much no hum.

I did fit the apaches myself and can oinly assume that bad soldering work is the cause of 'the hum'. Exactly what is the best way of soldering? Do you get some solder on the tip of the iron and then apply it to the pickup contacts/wires or do you hold the pick up contact/wires in place with the solder and then apply the iron so that the solder melts on to the contact?

Any advice on this would be greatly muchly appreciated!

Cheers,

Ian.

[hamfist]

Ian,  it sounds more like a grounding issue, rather than a poor soldering issue (unless the poor soldering is on the grounding connection!).
 If it was an amp I could hopefully be a little bit more helpful, but to be honest I'm a bit of an ignoramous when it comes to guitar wiring.

[Twinfan]

I've found some of my guitars have hummed more than others, even though all the wiring was fine.  As Alan says, it's more than likely to do with grounding.  Does the Strat have shielding on the back of the scratchplate and shielding paint in the cavities?

[Tellboy]

If it's a grounding/shielding problem, this might help:-

http://www.guitarnuts.com/wiring/shielding/shield3.php

Also similar info on shielding tele's (which I followed for my tele)

http://www.guitarnuts.com/wiring/shielding/tele.php

[Ian Price]

I've found some of my guitars have hummed more than others, even though all the wiring was fine.  As Alan says, it's more than likely to do with grounding.  Does the Strat have shielding on the back of the scratchplate and shielding paint in the cavities?

Not sure - I hadn't considered that! Will take a look over the weekend.