Help! Lots of Hum from my JP

[Pittman75]

Hey Guys,

So my JP (as the title suggests) is humming a lot. The cable is relatively new, and its much more noticable on the bridge pickup. I am not standing near the amp, either. Should I change the piezo battery- does that have anything to do with it? Also, if I use my piezo through the clean channel of my marshall amp, I get this loud popping noise on certain strings/notes (generally the higher pitches) anyone know why? Do I have to buy a separate amp just for the Piezo?

Edit- actually its more of a distortion noise on the piezo. Very brittle sounding as well.

 

[ivanmihaljevic]

Well, try changing the battery and see if it helps!
That's the easiest thing you can try!

 

[phatduckk]

is it new? cruise by your dealer if it is and see how they can help you.

if that doesn't work out give a shout to Music Man's awesome support people. http://www.ernieball.com/contact/

 

[Spudmurphy]

The first thing I would do is plug your amp into a socket in another room.
If you are upstairs plug it in downstairs and Vice Versa.

I very much doubt if the battery dying would be responsible for the hum.

Regarding the brittle noise - try adjusting the screws (mix/treble/bass) see if that alters the brittleness. My tip is put a drop of tippex (USA = white out?) on the screws before turning so you have a benchmark (and of course the factory settings).

Are you playing in pitch or have you tuned a tone (step) down?

What happens with me is when I use my trem arm and release the pressure on the strings, the piezo in the saddle loses the signal - thats normal).

Regarding the sound of a piezo? - through an acoustic amp they really come to life and will sound so much different to going through your Marshall.

Always difficult to asses on the net - take it to your dealer and see what he says?

 

[Pittman75]

Thanks for the help guys. I haven't been able to figure it out. My dealer (guitar center) Hasn't helped one bit. I've been calling them for months now and they haven't done squat for me. A week after I bought the guitar it had a warranty-covered issue with the frets, and they won't let me trade it for the same exact one that doesn't have the problem- in stock. Or ship it out for me. So needless to say, after months of saving up for my ball, and now with expenses to pay- I'll be saving quite awhile longer to get it fixed. I'm going to start a thread looking for some dealers in New England. Guitar Center has been a royal jerk to me, suprising because I spend a lot of money there.

EDIT: Don't want to make it sound like I'm complaining mods, I already called CS and they did all they could for me so I'm very appreciative of that.

 

[Spudmurphy]

If I had no joy with GC locally - I'd phone up their head office and see what they have to say on the matter? Ask for Marty Albertson.

Now I don't know if he is like Big Poppa and doesn't want people to contact him direct, but it's worth a shot.

 

[Big Poppa]

guys having an issue with guitar center and immediately going to the ceo that is kind enough to participate here is really like reaching for the nukes when someone double parks. It is a sign of entitlement that will limit Marty's participation

 

[Pittman75]

guys having an issue with guitar center and immediately going to the ceo that is kind enough to participate here is really like reaching for the nukes when someone double parks. It is a sign of entitlement that will limit Marty's participation

Agreed. Its not that big of an issue, and in fact really doesn't even necessitate Marty's involvement. It really just needs to get a quick checkup, so I'm looking for someone in Massachusetts. Shipping plus insurance to California is just too much to justify on something that could only cost 10-40 dollars to repair.

 

[Spudmurphy]

guys having an issue with guitar center and immediately going to the ceo that is kind enough to participate here is really like reaching for the nukes when someone double parks. It is a sign of entitlement that will limit Marty's participation

My bad! - I still had my Hackles up after having that day to contact the head of the British Heart Foundation Charity for hassling (bullying!) my 84 year old mother! I'm still seething now - long story not appropriate here, - move along!

I do believe that if you cannot resolve a problem locally then you need to escalate appropriately, and my advice of going straight to the top (as I had to eventually !) was OTT, although Knucklehead or not, anybody can shoot for the top?

In post #60 by Marty he said that Michael Doyle would be a point of contact for GC issues (see here)
http://www.ernieball.com/forums/music-man-guitars/24338-off-topic-kinda-secret-shopper-4.html

How do you contact Michael though - I'm not too sure?

I've always advocated Dealer first - then (in the UK, the distributor Strings n Things) then the next step would be EB using CS.

If I fundamentally disagreed with a large retailers decision on an issue that I had, with a product that they supplied, I would escalate by going higher, and that in essence was what I was proposing here as Pitmann had an issue with GC's handling - The problem being of course that there is always 2 sides of a story - no disrespect to Pittman.

Interestingly enough I mentioned using another power socket because a mate of mine had stripped a guitar's electrics trying to get to solving a "hum" - all along it was the power socket.

Any way as BP says contact the pros and maybe let us know what the answer to this problem is?

 

[Lou]

Pittman,

I sent you a PM. Maybe we could hook up and I can trouble shoot.

Also are you running into 2 amps at the same time? If so, get yourself a direct box for the piezo send and flip the ground loop switch on the box. That might do it. Again, I have one so if we can hook up, we can probably figure it out.

Lou

 

[Pittman75]

Alright,

D'oh! Figured out the Piezo issue. I'm running it only into 1 amp at home, as I only have one, but live I use a Direct Box or whatever its called. But, the issue was the EQ. I hadn't fooled with it since I got it from GC, but the Treble was ALLL the way up, as was the output. The bass? Off completely. Obviously someone there set this thing up.

As for the humming, I'm going to bring it to my store tonight and test it through some other amps to see if it still hums. And for the fretwork, well, no response for that. Still deciding if I should send it or not. Shipping's not too cheap.