EBMM JP6 Piezo Problem!

[mrbeekle]

Hey all,

I am new here because I only got my first EB guitar two days ago - I got a second hand EBMM JP6, though it's only a few months old and in mint condition! Today the piezo started playing up a bit however - I was hearing a persistent noise, even if I'm not playing anything on the guitar, when the guitar was on the piezo or piezo/magnetic setting. If I'm on a clean sound, then it was an irregular, almost wind-like noise, with random soft thuds of different volumes (it's very hard to describe!). If I put distortion on, the noise became overwhelming and harsh... I just have a single lead out of the guitar, coming out of the mono/piezo output. The sound seems to come and go quite regularly.

I tried changing the battery which I thought had cleared it up, but then it started happening again, and I also realised another problem was that for random periods of time the piezo pickup lost pretty much of all the bass in the sound, and consequently there's a big drop in volume when going between the magnetic and piezo pickups (even though both volume knobs are on full). This too seems to come and go.

Any ideas what this might be?!

Any help would be very much appreciated!

 

[Spudmurphy]

Hi and welcome to the forum.

I have worked on the piezo system on my JP6 but have not experienced the type of problem you describe.
I don't know where you are situated but you should try contacting the Ernie Ball Customer Support team who will be able to point you in the right direction - that's what they are there for. Let us know how you get on and what the solution turns out to be ?
Cheers

 

[mrbeekle]

Thanks for the message. I've emailed EB, but am in the UK so am not sure how large the customer support team is over here. The problem is infuriating because it keeps coming and going (it's working fine as I write this!), so I'm worried i'll take it into a shop and just have nothing to show!

 

[beej]

You'll definitely have to call EB about it. FYI, they're based in California and closed Fridays. You should also try Strings & Things, the UK distributor who can help you out.

 

[mrbeekle]

Thanks for the advice. I contacted EB through their contact form page, and got what seems like a semi-automated response (except for the fact it says "in order to solve your piezo problem"). But it seemed to say little more than 1. you should go through the official MM dealer of original purchase (which doesn't help since I got it second hand), or 2. contact our distributor. So I've sent Strings & Things an email who will hopefully be able to help.

The original noise problem has not really come back anymore. I don't get any noise on clean sounds, and now just occassionally get the softer noises I got if on distortion. The annoying thing is how the piezo seems to just essentially die for extended periods at a time. I played it absolutely fine for a few hours, and now the volume has just dropped so much - when I put it onto a distortion the gain is very weak, and when clean the sound is very quiet and thin.

Do you think a decent guitar shop will be able to give advice too, or would only an official MM tech know how to deal with it?

 

[beej]

I think you should wait and talk to EBMM customer service next week. They're the experts. Everyone else is just guessing.