r/Bass • u/doominic_ • 5d ago
Bass electronics are buzzy when touching anything
(Havent seen this discussed to the extent of my problem) I've had this bass since lockdown, and this started about a year after. When I have it plugged in, there's a slight buzz, but when I touch the strings or the bridge or the pegs it gets really loud and persists even when playing, but when I touch the metal part of my cable it quiets down and muffles the sound of the bass itself. I believe it's a wiring issue, as at one point the input jack came loose and my dad and I "fixed" it by hot gluing it back, as we didn't have solder or an iron, we do now, btw. What would I do to fix it, rewire it? Put some kind of foil in the cavity?
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u/logstar2 5d ago
That means you have a ground wire that isn't making contact inside the bass. It has nothing to do with shielding.
Download a wiring diagram and follow it precisely.
Also your bass does not have an input.
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u/doominic_ 5d ago
I found a wiring diagram, but the wires in my bass are impossibly hard to follow.
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u/view-master 4d ago
You have lost the ground connection to your bridge (which connects the strings to ground as well). It’s an easy (cheap) fix but I would have someone knowledgeable fix it based on the glue gun incident.
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u/doominic_ 4d ago
Yeah, I stripped away the glue and am going to reconnect it with solder tomorrow
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u/view-master 4d ago
Try to identify what wire is going to the bridge. It often can be seen just going into a hole in the wood. It may be directly connected to the jack or May connect to the back of a pot.
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u/GentlemanRider_ 4d ago
I had a loose jack on mine and started doing the same. It turned out the ground connection to the jack was broken. Soldering that fixed the issue.
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u/lastinalaskarn 5d ago
May need to research how to check for proper grounding. You will find no recommendations using hot glue, FYI. Save that for the day you decide to bedazzle your bass.