Grounding and shielding question. Looooong question.

[kenfu]

...guaranteed to end with a few burn spots on you fingers. But it is worth the effort.

Well, when you make it sound so fun, how can I resist! Ha ha! But those rings are kind of amazing. I had not heard of those. I think I might just have to try those out instead of the free-way switch... Thanks PK!

EDIT: In the interest of future reference, PK was totally right. I tried just using the "solid contact with the shielding" when wiring up my guitar, and it worked well except the neck tone pot made maybe a 1% difference. You could kind of hear it, but only if you listened hard. I went ahead and physically wired the ground connections, and it made a marked difference with everything. Both tone pots have a wider range and are much smoother.