The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
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  1. #1

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    I love my Ibanez GB200. I have only one complaint: the pickups resonate in their rings with some notes. It bothers me when I play / practice unplugged at home – sounds like a choir of monks humming with the notes I play. It's not audible through an amp so I guess it's the mounting, not the pickups.

    Any suggestion how to get rid of this? I thought I could use rubber tubes in place of the spiral springs for the distance between pickups and rings. Would that help?
    Any other suggestions?
    Last edited by guavajelly; 05-09-2021 at 05:04 AM.

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  3. #2

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    Typical solutions would be

    • firmer/longer springs (but that will make life "interesting" when you want to dismount/remount a pickup, believe me)
    • wedge something between the pickup and the mounting, the thickness will depend on how much gap there is - experiment with a pick to begin with.

    Hope this helps, and maybe others have more ideas

  4. #3

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    Quote Originally Posted by guavajelly
    I love my Ibanez GB200. I have only one complaint: the pickups resonate in their rings with some notes. It bothers me when I play / practice unplugged at home – sounds like a choir of monks humming with the notes I play. It's not audible through an amp so I guess it's the mounting, not the pickups.

    Any suggestion how to get rid of this? I thought I could use rubber tubes in place of the spiral springs for the distance between pickups and rings. Would that help?
    Any other suggestions?
    Ha! I’m having the same issue right now and I thought the same thing about a choir of monks.

  5. #4

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    replacing the springs with rubber tubing is what fixed it for my ES 175

  6. #5

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    My experience as well; rubber springs seem to damp the vibrations better than metal ones. Leo Fender was on to something, I guess.

  7. #6

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    You could also try putting foam underneath the pickups, in concert with using rubber tubing. It certainly won't hurt anything to try it, and it worked well for me.

  8. #7

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    Soft surgical tubing over the springs, or even two springs on each side nested together works.

    I always wondered why after all these years three and four adjustment screw mounts were adopted by some then summarily dropped and the industry looked the other way.

  9. #8

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    Thanks mates. Anybody knows which diameter I need for the surgical tubing? They specify inner and outer diameter, like this: https://smile.amazon.de/Silikonschla...5&sr=8-26&th=1

    Which one do I need? This is amazon germany so all diameters are in mm.

  10. #9

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    The required inner diameter depends on the adjustment screws and on whether you intend to install the tubing over the springs, or just use the tubing over the screws. You need to measure the springs if you want to keep them, or measure the adjustment screws. They're not all the same size for all pickups.

  11. #10

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    I had a long running similar issue with an archtop guitar.
    And the 'noise' was intermittent to boot.
    I ended up taking the guitar apart and taking some measurements.
    I used digital calipers and got the dimensions for each pickup, which meant I measured the pickup covers at the their base,(length and width) and the hole dimensions for each.

    The pickup hole for the neck pickup was about 2 mm wider than the hole for the bridge pickup, which is where all the noise and extra vibrations were originating.

    The 'corners' of the pickup holes also had a radius, that I suspected were not helping at all.
    You might try those steps and see what you find. YMMV. Or have a local repair person/luthier take the measurements.
    That was the starting point of the resolution for me.
    I also ended up using some clear tubing I had on hand instead of the standard springs.

    Anything beyond taking measurements, is entirely up to you, depending what you find and requires being hyper careful.
    Good luck.

  12. #11

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    I always start by removing the springs and stretching them. It’s tricky reinstalling but it might do the trick. If not filling the gap between the ring and pickup with what ever will fit.

  13. #12

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    I installed surgical tubing over the springs today. I may have ordered a little wide diameter – which turned out to be a good thing, as the tubing sits tight against the pickup covers. So it did the trick quite nicely. It was an easy fix that took like 30 min. including restringing. Now I wonder why they don't do it at the factory ...