Cavity paint

Tue Feb 12, 2013 7:55 am

StewMac. Paint plus shipping about $40.
Triple layer per instructions. Took some time, couple of days.
Image

Nickel Spray can. Bought 2 from eBay. $50 for both.
One layer. Toxic. Spray can is messy. Took less than a day.
Image

For both I used a cotton swab to get the channel between the control and the plug.
Using the DMM, set the resistance to the lowest settings.
The graphite paint read 40 ohms from one corner of the control cavity to the opposite end of the jack cavity.
The Nickel read < 4.

Interesting read on someone who did some testing. http://bit.ly/VSgSEI

Re: Cavity paint

Tue Feb 12, 2013 2:59 pm

Good info Meow, and a good looking shielding job there. Thanks for posting. Now the most important question - has the single coil hum been reduced?

Re: Cavity paint

Tue Feb 12, 2013 5:26 pm

G&L has some really tight specs on the jack cavity. Adding paint to the walls will almost guarantee the hot wire to touch ground. I had to cut away some wood so it would not touch.
The volume pot is messed up. No idea where I went wrong, I need to get back inside and fix it. But not today. Maybe the next time I change strings.
Also the Canare Star Quad http://www.canare.com/ProductItemDisplay.aspx?productItemID=53 has to be the best built cable I have ever seen.
Great for guitar and mic. I split one open and was surprised seeing the twisted wires. Fantastic!

Re: Cavity paint

Tue Feb 12, 2013 6:12 pm

Meow, you are correct on the jack cavity. On some of the Legacys (my 2010) the cable will not fully seat in the output jack. I used a center punch to make a dent so it would plug in completely. It you coated it with shielding paint before correcting this problem, it would be noiseless like we've never seen before!-- Darwin

Re: Cavity paint

Tue Feb 12, 2013 6:35 pm

Noiseless? No. But a little quieter. I am working on getting a recording. Hold on.

Re: Cavity paint

Tue Feb 12, 2013 6:56 pm

meowmix wrote:Noiseless? No. But a little quieter. I am working on getting a recording. Hold on.


if the tip of the jack touches the connective ground on the wall of the cavity, it will be noiseless. totally. you missed the joke.

Re: Cavity paint

Tue Feb 12, 2013 6:57 pm

meowmix wrote:G&L has some really tight specs on the jack cavity. Adding paint to the walls will almost guarantee the hot wire to touch ground. I had to cut away some wood so it would not touch.
The volume pot is messed up. No idea where I went wrong, I need to get back inside and fix it. But not today. Maybe the next time I change strings.
Also the Canare Star Quad http://www.canare.com/ProductItemDisplay.aspx?productItemID=53 has to be the best built cable I have ever seen.
Great for guitar and mic. I split one open and was surprised seeing the twisted wires. Fantastic!


both canare and mogami offers those star quad cables, and for mic cables, where you run balanced signal it is indeed great, not for guitar.

Re: Cavity paint

Thu Feb 14, 2013 9:50 am

Here is the evidence.

http://tinyurl.com/ar42o9f

2 G&L S-500 set to Neck Single coil position. Both guitars sat in the same spot during the test.

First is the 30th with no changes from the factory.
About 5 seconds later is the Red one above using a Metal pg http://www.tone-guard.com/Leo%20Fender%20Shielding%20Info/,
Nickel plus graphite cavity paint except where the jack touches the wall. (G&L fault, not mine)


While I was inside the Red, I changed 1 pot to a junky low end 1Meg Bournes. It was all I had available. Changed to silver mica and orange sprague caps. And put acoustic foam between the pickups because it reduces the feedback from the pickguard when using high gain.