Brett's First Build - IB-6S

[dingobass]

Have you copper shielded the cavity?
If so, you wont need an earth jumper across the pots.
Other than that, wot Tin said

[Mechanixxxer]

I did shield it, but it was at about 2am, and upon inspection today I did a terrible job of it. Gaps everywhere

I'll try redoing it better, and grabbing a multimeter today. I sanded the paint off the back of the bridge but that didn't help at all either. Touching the pots also doesn't reduce hum so I'm wondering if they're not part of the circuit or something too...

[WeirdBits]

If you can't find the fault, post some pics of your wiring and we'll see if we can spot any problems.

[Mechanixxxer]

Pretty messy. Multimeter says everything is connected. I'm probably missing something really obvious though.

[WeirdBits]

Shielding with recessed pots can sometimes cause hard to find shorts, complicated with the preamp and the power/signal ground switching and separation. Just check that none of the pot lugs and/or circuit boards are touching the shielding. It may pay to put some electrical tape on the underside to the lugs to may sure they can't short with anything.

Also, check the wiring digram for your preamp and make sure you have the grounds connected as specified. They often have the power negative connected to the jack for switching, but keep the signal grounds separate.

[dingobass]

And don't forget to solder the joins in the shielding tape

[Mechanixxxer]

There's no shorting, I did that the first time around but I fixed that, and I've made sure all the lugs aren't touching the shielding as well. The diagram just says to solder the bridge ground to the volume pot, which I've done, so I can't figure out where I'm going wrong.

Apparently you don't need to, DB! The adhesive is conductive
I sure hope I don't have to solder them anyway, there's about a million little pieces in there

[stan]

whilst the shielding should work to create a connection between the pots, try running a wire from the volume pot to each pot in turn

like the black wire going from pot to pot in this pic

[Mechanixxxer]

Thanks Stan, I'll give that a shot.

Should actually ask first, how noiseless should I expect this to be? I get the feeling I might just be expecting too much. I'm used to noiseless active pickups.

Sorry for all the questions/problems, just not sure about a lot of this stuff. The strings are crazy high off the fretboard past the 12th fret, and lowering the saddles didn't do much. Any solutions?

[stan]

not personally familiar with this kit, but it shouldnt be noticeable, i would have thought

post up some closeups and general shots of the action, this will help us give you some advice on the action