Dimmer Light Switches

[Jock68]

We all know that home dimmer Light switches can sometimes interfere with your electric guitar. It buzzes like it is not earthed correctly and as soon as you touch any of the metal parts of the guitar it goes away. Or if you switch off the dimmer switch, yes it is true and I wanted to know if this is a weakness in PRS guitars?

My 594 has it bad, my HB11 less, and my PRS One also has the problem. Not one of my Japanese guitars has this problem, so it must be fixable. The PRS One is second hand but I have rewired it so it should be good, the other two are new.

Anyone else experienced this phenonium or have I just been unlucky 3 times?

 

[Maxime Bousquet]

I do not have a great knowledge of PRS pickups, but on my McCarthy and my custom 24 I notice a cavity which is not shielded, I also have a 60 Hertz hum but with a fairly pronounced saturation, only in split coil .. normal.
after there are also waxed pickups or not, mass loops to the ground which is for the most part the problem, to remedy this problem I have dedicated two circuits which go directly from my power supply panel just to my two amp, and a homemade Eliminator hum, always safe! do not mess with electricity! and it's pretty quiet! check your environment, wiring, but some things the PRS pickups are very sensitive!

 

[Serious Poo]

RFI is a pain in the butt, it affects an awful lot of music gear not just PRS guitars. Try playing a Tele in a room with RFI issues sometime...

 

[bodia]

One forum member tracked his issue to the wireless device the water company installed on his water line to read the meter.

 

[Nice F Holes]

My SE HB was picking up noise but only in a certain location. The pickup wires are shielded, but not the signal wire from the switch to the volume pot. Because it has Piezo, the wire from there goes to a PCB, and that wire is 'shielded' but uses the shield to carry ground signal.

One thing I noticed is the PRS schematics with coil split mostly all have ground loops, which I think would be more likely to pick up EMI. The "-" wire and the "tap wires" should ground to the same location to avoid this. Maybe because there are resistors in the path its less of a problem than it could be.

 

[jak3af3r]

Here's a weird RFI experience I had.

I was playing downtown Nashville at Wildhorse Saloon. I had just bought a Wampler pinnacle deluxe and put it on my board so my rig is Les Paul to the board to a Princeton reissue. Everything works great and I'm happy.


The next time I take my McCarty and in a moment of silence while the singer gets some water I hear, very faintly, Mexican polka in my monitors.

Through a variety of tests I discovered that Wampler would pick up AM radio signals and if I had my hands on the PRS, it would pass through to the amp. Then later I found my LP was the opposite.

The weirdest thing about it is that's the only place I've played where that pedal behaves that way.

 

[GuitarJammin]

Here's a weird RFI experience I had.

I was playing downtown Nashville at Wildhorse Saloon. I had just bought a Wampler pinnacle deluxe and put it on my board so my rig is Les Paul to the board to a Princeton reissue. Everything works great and I'm happy.


The next time I take my McCarty and in a moment of silence while the singer gets some water I hear, very faintly, Mexican polka in my monitors.

Through a variety of tests I discovered that Wampler would pick up AM radio signals and if I had my hands on the PRS, it would pass through to the amp. Then later I found my LP was the opposite.

The weirdest thing about it is that's the only place I've played where that pedal behaves that way.

LOL...it always seems to be Mexican Polka! ....or more precisely Tejano music. I had an amp that would pickup AM radio Tejano stations at the practice pad back in the day.

 

[aphantomvaper]

On a different experience...I was installing a phone system at an office and on first test I picked up the phone and heard Mexican radio! The person on the other end could not hear it.

Turns out there was a broadcast station (looked overgrown and abandoned) less than 1\4 mile from the office, and these first generation IP phones had bad shielding.

I tried to explain it as background music but the company wouldn't buy it. Replaced the devices with more recent model and it went away.

Ambient RF can happen anywhere.

 

[vchizzle]

LOL...it always seems to be Mexican Polka! ....or more precisely Tejano music. I had an amp that would pickup AM radio Tejano stations at the practice pad back in the day.

I had a religious station coming through back when I was in high school at my parents house. It sounded like straight tv evangelism too. Very dramatic. We’d hold up a vocal mic to the cab and use it for effect before busting into some Black Sabbath.

 

[László]

There are players who feel that shielding affects the tone of the instrument. I have no idea whether that's true. Just going on the science, it could be a figment of someone's imagination. It'd be interesting to hear how Paul Smith feels about that, or other reasons why the guitars aren't shielded during construction.

If I get pickup noise, I just move a little bit to make it stop. But that, of course, depends on one's environment, and on matters that are out of our control.

 

[Alnus Rubra]

.....I hear, very faintly, Mexican polka in my monitors.....

 

[Jock68]

Explain how a £200 Harley Benton, made who knows where, does not have this issue but a CORE 594 made in the US does ? It is fixable and based on the price of the Harley Benton it is not expensive.

 

[SinSir]

On a different experience...I was installing a phone system at an office and on first test I picked up the phone and heard Mexican radio! The person on the other end could not hear it.

Turns out there was a broadcast station (looked overgrown and abandoned) less than 1\4 mile from the office, and these first generation IP phones had bad shielding.

I tried to explain it as background music but the company wouldn't buy it. Replaced the devices with more recent model and it went away.

Ambient RF can happen anywhere.

Great add. I've experienced this myself in IT. Although, I have a feeling this will fall on deaf ears and it happened to your client because you own a PRS lol

 

[bodia]

I had a religious station coming through back when I was in high school at my parents house. It sounded like straight tv evangelism too. Very dramatic. We’d hold up a vocal mic to the cab and use it for effect before busting into some Black Sabbath.

I approve!