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Help! Noisy Cutlass

G

gelvo

Member
Joined
Aug 22, 2007
Messages
15
Hi guys,

I have had my new Cutlass Music Man for a few months now and on the whole I am extremely happy with it.

However it is advertised as having noise reducing electronics in it but mine is still fairly noisey.

As I live in Adelaide there isn't a guitar shop that stocks a full range of Music Man guitars so I cannot just go into a shop and compare one Music Man to another.

When I bought my Cutlass I had to go into a shop and get them to order one in, so I had never tried it before buying, I just had to go buy the demo videos on YouTube.

My Mexican Strat has Gold Lace Sensor Pickups which are almost dead silent, I was expecting the same from my Cutlass. I have tried replacing the battery.

Any Ideas?
 
It uses a buffered dummy-coil ("Silent Circuit") to cancel out some of the hum. But it's not perfect, and it's going to depend on your environment. Also there's a trimpot in the Silent Circuit which allows you to fine tune it a bit.

If you're concerned that it's not working properly, take the battery out while you're sitting there- you should easily be able to hear the difference. If you don't, something's not right.
 
thank you for getting back to me, I will try the battery test and see what happens
 
I don't think taking the buttery out will work. As far as I recall the cutlass won't work without the battery unlike the previous silent circuit. I'll have to take it out of mine and check
 
I've found my Cutlass to be very quite up until medium gain. But after a certain point you'll need a noise gate of some sort if you want to keep it dead quiet.

Just to say, I think your Cutlass works just like mine... so hopefully not broken ;)
 
I had the same concerns when I received my Valentine. I had no experience with the silent circuit so didn't know what to expect... although I had heard the phrase "dead silent". That is not quite the case. In the Valentine it is most obvious when switching from the single coil to the humbucker(it has both).

The humbucker is, obviously, truly silent. The single coil does still give off some noise, even with the circuit. You can't remove the battery with the current system, but you can test it by using the trim pot within the rear cavity. If you turn it all the way down, you'll get none of the circuit's effectiveness, which should give you the noise level of a standard single coil. Then turn the circuit all the way up and you should hear a significant difference. I have mine set at about 50%.

The system is intended to minimize noise without losing any true single coil sound... so it's a compromise. I was told to expect a about half the noise you'd get with a standard single coil. I find that to be about right.

Hope this helps... and hope you enjoy your Cutlass. I played around with one at Guitar Center a couple weeks ago and found it to feel and sound amazing.

gelvo said:
Hi guys,

I have had my new Cutlass Music Man for a few months now and on the whole I am extremely happy with it.

However it is advertised as having noise reducing electronics in it but mine is still fairly noisey.

As I live in Adelaide there isn't a guitar shop that stocks a full range of Music Man guitars so I cannot just go into a shop and compare one Music Man to another.

When I bought my Cutlass I had to go into a shop and get them to order one in, so I had never tried it before buying, I just had to go buy the demo videos on YouTube.

My Mexican Strat has Gold Lace Sensor Pickups which are almost dead silent, I was expecting the same from my Cutlass. I have tried replacing the battery.

Any Ideas?
Click to expand...
 
Ah yes, good point- you can't take out the batter since that kills the buffer. (I'm still living the pre-preamp era with my MMs.)
 
It's also possible that noise is coming from your power somewhere. One thing that struck me is your comment about your gold lace sensors being "almost dead silent". I used to own a Beck Strat with those pickups and they were DEAD DEAD DEAD silent. I mean no noise period!

So, if you're getting any noise with those golds, your noise issue may lay outside of your guitars and be generating somewhere else. Just something to consider. You can test by bringing your guitar somewhere else with good clean power. Where that might be where you live - I have no idea. That part is up to you! ;)
 
Lace sensors are pretty much dead quiet. Noise reducing system reduce the noise that would normally be picked up by single coils by 50%-70%, depending on who you ask. The lowest frequency 50/60 Hz hum can be reduced very effectively, but there are many sources of other noise and buzz (that many people mistakenly think is '60 cylce' hum) and they can be harder to remove without using hum-cancelling pickups or pickup combinations.
 
Sometimes computer equipment or other electronics nearby can introduce noise, even to humbucking pickups.
 
wow I am amazed at how helpful the people on the forum is, thank you all for your feedback.
 
Gelvo - welcome to the family and congrats on the Cutlass!! Did I miss the NGD post? If you haven't yet you have to post some pics! We have a rule - no pics no guitar! ;) As you can see this is a great place to talk MM or even SBMM guitars! Stick around! :)
 
edhalen said:
Gelvo - welcome to the family and congrats on the Cutlass!! Did I miss the NGD post? If you haven't yet you have to post some pics! We have a rule - no pics no guitar! ;) As you can see this is a great place to talk MM or even SBMM guitars! Stick around! :)
Click to expand...

That is an excellent point! I believe we've already breached forum protocol by offering advice for a guitar we've not yet seen. ;)
 
beej said:
It uses a buffered dummy-coil ("Silent Circuit") to cancel out some of the hum. But it's not perfect, and it's going to depend on your environment. Also there's a trimpot in the Silent Circuit which allows you to fine tune it a bit.

If you're concerned that it's not working properly, take the battery out while you're sitting there- you should easily be able to hear the difference. If you don't, something's not right.
Click to expand...

where do I find the trimpot, do I have to take all the strings off?
 
gelvo said:
where do I find the trimpot, do I have to take all the strings off?
Click to expand...

On the Valentine it's accessible by removing the back plate... I'd imagine it's the same with the Cutlass. No string removal necessary.
 
RichieZ said:
On the Valentine it's accessible by removing the back plate... I'd imagine it's the same with the Cutlass. No string removal necessary.
Click to expand...

There is no back plate on a Cutlass (other than the trem cover plate and the battery box) so I imagine you would have to remove the pickguard to get to the circuit board.
 
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