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Hello peeps,

I have two vintage guitars I really like, but sqeeel like crazy at high volumes and when going through fuzz boxes. Does anyone have any expert advice on how I should remedy this?

I have always heard this means I need to pot the pickups, but I am a little skeptical. Plus, I had a buddy who did so and it clearly affected the tone of the guitar in a bad, bad way.

Help?

What's vintage mean? 1954 Stratocaster or 1992 Ibanez Roadster?
Are the pickups microphonic maybe? (If you yell into them, does it come out the amp?)
Is everything louder than eveything else?
(Have you seen Deliverance?)

the pickups are either microphonic or you have semi-hollow or hollow bodies that aren't properly protected....

I saw Modest Mouse open for R.E.M. a few years ago and Isaac Brock used his microphonic pickups to sing into on a number of songs and it sounded

devnulljp wrote:What's vintage mean? 1954 Stratocaster or 1992 Ibanez Roadster?
Are the pickups microphonic maybe? (If you yell into them, does it come out the amp?)
Is everything louder than eveything else?
(Have you seen Deliverance?)

70's Lyle lawsuit SG and a 60's? Kay SGish thang.
Yea they seem to me microphonic... hard to hear my little amp over me yelling though.
It's bee too long since I've seen Deliverance

please don't pot pickups like those. especially the one on the Kay. it'll ruin them. the microphonic quality is part of their charm. try to get farther away from the amp; i find that a 45° angle from the cabinet/speaker is good. rolling off treble on the amp also helps, especially with small amps where the tendency is to turn up the treble too high to compensate for lack of volume.

dubkitty wrote:please don't pot pickups like those. especially the one on the Kay. it'll ruin them. the microphonic quality is part of their charm. try to get farther away from the amp; i find that a 45° angle from the cabinet/speaker is good. rolling off treble on the amp also helps, especially with small amps where the tendency is to turn up the treble too high to compensate for lack of volume.

THIS

Those guitars are beatiful.

does a noisegate help if its microphonic ?

Ironbird13 wrote:does a noisegate help if its microphonic ?

Dude, nothing helps! it's waaaay worse than you could imagine. Impossible to play live with any fuzz at all.

I hear you guys on not potting them...but they can't even be played at decent recording volume, and I'd like to get some regular feedback without the shrill.

SpennyJ wrote:70's Lyle lawsuit SG and a 60's? Kay SGish thang

Ah, OK, that's your problem. Those are plywood guitars with cheap microphonic pickups and no/poor insulation & cheap wiring.
That Kay BTW, 1970s Kays catalogue. My brother had one. Cost 60 quid new (and was horrible IIRC).

I'd punt them both and buy something else rather than sink cash into trying to fix em up.

devnulljp wrote:

SpennyJ wrote:70's Lyle lawsuit SG and a 60's? Kay SGish thang

Ah, OK, that's your problem. Those are plywood guitars with cheap microphonic pickups and no/poor insulation & cheap wiring.
That Kay BTW, 1970s Kays catalogue. My brother had one. Cost 60 quid new (and was horrible IIRC).

I'd punt them both and buy something else rather than sink cash into trying to fix em up.

The Kay is definitely not plywood.

What kinda amp are you using, how many/what kinda pedals, cables?

I just got an old Teisco this weekend and I play through a Kalamazoo Reverb I2 and a Model II with lots of FuzzHuggers and don't have a problem... I use an EHX Black Finger early in the chain...

not that these aren't kool or anything but they aren't exactly high quality. the lyle is not a lawsuit model but rather just a cheap SG copy.
neither will ever be worth much money so you could change pick ups (but then you'll be dealing with second or third rate wood and side effects of such), dial in the amp to find the tones the guitar has in it instead of trying to get them to do something they can't.......or just flip them......

i've seen some commentary on guitar sites that pickup squeal and microphonics can be affected by the pickup(s) contacting/vibrating against the cover; a cursory Googling says that some PU makers use tape or dabs of silicone putty inside the PU covers to guard against this. this certainly sounds like it would be worth a try.

breathes there a man with soul so dead, who never to himself hath said, "damn, these cheap cheesy pickups sound awesome!"?

I have a pickup from the bass model of that kay (and the plywood body).
It sounds killer in the neck of my p-bass

do you have any buffer pedal? TU-2 maybe? Place that first in chain might help.