OctoberBass RCA-4 First Build

[OctoberBassRCA-4]

I found a good stripper. Lol! Back to my sample boards. It removed the layers really quick and easy.
I wont go near the binding with this stuff, so I figure I'll tape off just beyond the binding and sand, Lacquer Thinner, to remove the top coats along the binding.
Is this the proper method?
I'll wait until I hear the best method of keeping the binding.

[OctoberBassRCA-4]

I found a good stripper. Lol! Back to my sample boards. It removed the layers really quick and easy.
I wont go near the binding with this stuff, so I figure I'll tape off just beyond the binding and sand, Lacquer Thinner, to remove the top coats along the binding.
Is this the proper method?
I'll wait until I hear the best method of keeping the binding.

[OctoberBassRCA-4]

Hello,
So while waiting to clear coat, what about shielding?
I understand I need to shield the Pit Bull Single coil neck pickup, what about the pup ring?
What about a coil tap option on the MM Bridge pup, and the control cavity.
The control cavity is quite large, will the normal roll of 2 inch tape cover everything need to be shielded?
Does the whole backside of the Pickguard need to be covered?

I included my photo of masking tape in the pickup cavities placed for painting.
I imagine this would represent how I would shield with copper.
The other photo is what I'm going for with pickups.

Any help would be appreciated.

[OctoberBassRCA-4]

These are what I'm going to use.

[OctoberBassRCA-4]

No help with shielding? Have I upset the PBG Community? I'll figure it out I guess.

[Sonic Mountain]

Heya, sorry missed that question. So what you are trying to do is create a 'Faraday Cage' around your electronics. In the best case scenario everything except the pickup poles is contained within the 'cage'. This isn't always possible, but any shielding is better than none if you are keen to eliminate excess noise and hum.

I'm not sure what you mean by pickup ring? But you can certainly shield the inside of the pickup cavities. I did this on a mates Jazz Bass and it did improve things. You only need to put shielding on the pickguard where it will create a 'lid' for the cavities. So you want a little overlap with the tape out of the cavities so the lid has something to contact to. Also important to earth the shielding.

I've not ordered the PBG shielding tape before so I don't know how much you get. I got a roll from Aust Luthier Supplies that had stacks on it. I've seen people on here use snail tape from the big green shed as well, it's essentially the same stuff, but narrower strips.

[Sonic Mountain]

Just went and looked at the pics earlier in the thread. I see the pick guard is really part of the control cavity cover, so yeah, just shield the bit that goes over the cavity. I'm not sure if doing under the pickup ring itself is necessary, you'll be able to partially shield the cavity though. That will help, but probably won't completely eliminate interference, so it'll depend on where and what kind it is (the interference)

Bear in mind that a whole heap of commercial guitars don't bother shielding at all or only do a bit of an attempt that is in no way a complete cage.

[OctoberBassRCA-4]

Thanks Sonic, i'll need to ground/earth each cavity to the others, like a wire soldered to one to the other and to ground?
And covering the neck pickup ring on the back with shielding is not necessary, Thanks Man!

[Sonic Mountain]

Yes that would work, ideally all the shielding should be continuous and grounded. Too easy.

[wazkelly]

Bit late on the scene but love the colour of this Bass!

As for shielding I have used both snail tape and the black graphite shielding paint on different guitar & bass builds with great success.

Snail tape can be a pain as it is barely 1" wide which works well on the vertical sides of control cavities but needs multiple overlapping strips to cover larger wider areas. Never bothered with soldering any of it together nor created a continuous contact/circuit. Only build that has a bit of hum is my MMB4 that is fitted with a Belcat pre-amp and reckon that is what is causing the hum. I used the black shielding paint under the MM sized PUP and snail tape in the control cavity, likewise on my J Bass too and it is whisper quiet through headphones. Only reason for for using shielding paint was to have a dark background where using copper tape might be seen from above.

MM Bridge PUP can be coil tapped, just depends on whether it is the kit supplied 4 wire or an aftermarket 3 or 4 wire version? On mine I dropped in a Guitar Fettish upgrade that was 3 wire (I think as it was over a year ago) and eventually ended up with a 3 way mini dpdt switch where centre is series (standard HB mode) and then one side splits to coil nearest bridge and the other splits to coil nearer the middle or neck of the bass. Splitting drops output a bit and it does give you a single coil sound and it is hard to decide which sounds better? Splitting nearest to Bridge or Nearer to middle/neck, hence why I ran with a 3 way switch. If I had to choose just 1 option, it would be split to bridge coil as that seems to sound closest to Bridge J sound out of the 2 options plus it is the only way to get that brighter popping sound which lends itself to the traditional Ric vibe.

You can find more info on that build from the link in my signature.

Hope this helps in some way.

Cheers, Waz