High Gain Amp, Passive Pickups, Squeal Need help

Ghostman

Ghostman

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Need to get back to Guitar setup 101 here probably, but I have an issue with an amp of mine. With Two of my three guitars, I get a high pitch squeal from the higher gain settings. I thought it could be that I was pushing the front end too much but it happens a lot more with one of my guitars than the other. So here's the deal:

Randall 667 - Higher gain settings - Ran through a Captor and into my interface.
Guitar 1: Jackson Soloist with custom humbucker 16.8K. - When untouched, I get a high frequency squeal that goes away as soon as I touch the bridge or strings.
Guitar 2: Dean VMNT Voodoo Custom Hot wound pickups - Same but less prone to squealing.
Guitar 3: Schecter Solo Elite - Dave Mustaine Livewires - no squeal at all at any time.

All of these I tested through my pedal board with both the effects turned on and off.

I tested through my Crate BV120 head and it does not squeal at all on any of the guitars. Today I'm going to try a few things:
Amp plugged directly into my cab, no Captor in the middle.
Guitars plugged straight into the amp, not through my pedal board
Nothing in the Effects Loop.

Anything Else I can provide for info?
Anyone have an idea of what I could have on my hands?
 
Ghostman said:
Need to get back to Guitar setup 101 here probably, but I have an issue with an amp of mine. With Two of my three guitars, I get a high pitch squeal from the higher gain settings. I thought it could be that I was pushing the front end too much but it happens a lot more with one of my guitars than the other. So here's the deal:

Randall 667 - Higher gain settings - Ran through a Captor and into my interface.
Guitar 1: Jackson Soloist with custom humbucker 16.8K. - When untouched, I get a high frequency squeal that goes away as soon as I touch the bridge or strings.
Guitar 2: Dean VMNT Voodoo Custom Hot wound pickups - Same but less prone to squealing.
Guitar 3: Schecter Solo Elite - Dave Mustaine Livewires - no squeal at all at any time.

All of these I tested through my pedal board with both the effects turned on and off.

I tested through my Crate BV120 head and it does not squeal at all on any of the guitars. Today I'm going to try a few things:
Amp plugged directly into my cab, no Captor in the middle.
Guitars plugged straight into the amp, not through my pedal board
Nothing in the Effects Loop.

Anything Else I can provide for info?
Anyone have an idea of what I could have on my hands?
Click to expand...

Try a different cable. I've had a bad cable cause this.

Then, isolate the signal chain, one component at a time. Even import Jackson pickups are potted and I don't think I have ever heard one squeal...
 
Ghostman said:
I will give this a try as well. The Pickup isn't a Jackson. It's a custom made pickup but definitely the worst of the bunch.
Click to expand...

Oh!!!!

I have a 16.5k A4 pickup I built with a short lead (fits Strat) and it is squeal free with my master volume on 7 and standing less than 10 feet from my tube Marshall half stack.

I'll send it to you if you want it...
 
Cadorman said:
I bet they aren't potted. My SD Seth Lovers (unpotted) do that if I turn the gain way up on my baby DSL. Nothing else does. I have 3 guitars with these pickups and they all do it. The trick is to never stop playing.
Click to expand...

I've had unpotted pickups that didn't squeal. That's disappointing.
 
But how come the squeal goes away when I touch the bridge? I don't have to do anything else but lightly touch the bridge and the squeal goes away. I don't see how that could be a potting issue of the Pickups. Also, wouldn't a non-potted pickup be considered Microphonic to create the squeal? Then that would be debunked because I'm playing through my Captor into my headphones, no cabinet. No cabinet means no sound to reflect onto the strings from a speaker.
 
Ghostman said:
But how come the squeal goes away when I touch the bridge? I don't have to do anything else but lightly touch the bridge and the squeal goes away. I don't see how that could be a potting issue of the Pickups. Also, wouldn't a non-potted pickup be considered Microphonic to create the squeal? Then that would be debunked because I'm playing through my Captor into my headphones, no cabinet. No cabinet means no sound to reflect onto the strings from a speaker.
Click to expand...

Grounding issue. Change cable first.
 
Ghostman said:
But how come the squeal goes away when I touch the bridge? I don't have to do anything else but lightly touch the bridge and the squeal goes away. I don't see how that could be a potting issue of the Pickups. Also, wouldn't a non-potted pickup be considered Microphonic to create the squeal? Then that would be debunked because I'm playing through my Captor into my headphones, no cabinet. No cabinet means no sound to reflect onto the strings from a speaker.
Click to expand...
It's a grounding issue, like Robert said.

If it's the cable you should have the same problem with all guitats. Unless you have two problems, poor grounding in co bination with a slightly wonky cable.
 
I did a partial test today. Plugged straight into the head, no effects or effects loop. Head hooked up to one of my cabs. No squeal. Then went and added the effects loop, still nothing. Finally the effects up front. still no squeal.

Hooked everything back up like normal, into the Captor, and ..... no squeal.

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Ghostman said:
But how come the squeal goes away when I touch the bridge? I don't have to do anything else but lightly touch the bridge and the squeal goes away. I don't see how that could be a potting issue of the Pickups. Also, wouldn't a non-potted pickup be considered Microphonic to create the squeal? Then that would be debunked because I'm playing through my Captor into my headphones, no cabinet. No cabinet means no sound to reflect onto the strings from a speaker.
Click to expand...
You could have mentioned you were using headphones in the first post and saved me from getting carpal tunnel. ;)
 
Ghostman said:
But how come the squeal goes away when I touch the bridge? I don't have to do anything else but lightly touch the bridge and the squeal goes away. I don't see how that could be a potting issue of the Pickups. Also, wouldn't a non-potted pickup be considered Microphonic to create the squeal? Then that would be debunked because I'm playing through my Captor into my headphones, no cabinet. No cabinet means no sound to reflect onto the strings from a speaker.
Click to expand...

It's oscillation, and the best start is to shield the entire inside of the guitar.
With high gain amps, it's pretty useless until the guitar is shielded.

Microphonic: Much of this problem is caused by the guitar itself....hollow cavities, bridge springs, light weight wood.
You will notice that mahogany is far less microphonic than poplar...

Now there are a lot of tweaks to amps to make the audio less microphonic.

Equalizer: is used to notch out the feedback frequencies. This is one of the most effective tools to eliminate squealing and feedback.
But also, it is one of the most difficult to explain to people who have decided that equalizers are unnecessary.
 
I discovered the problem. It's the Torpedo Captor 16.

If I run my amps higher than 2 on the MV, then the Captor starts to distort the signal. Anything higher than 3 or 4 and I get massive howling and whistling when you don't play. You can hear a high end fizz added to the signal too. I contacted Two Notes to see what's next.
 
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The Two Notes crew finally got back to me after 9 days and say it's a gain/volume issue. How can that possible be?! It was fine when I first started using it, and now it has a problem and some how that's my amps fault?

The problems:


am I wrong that something aint' right?
 
Ghostman said:
I discovered the problem. It's the Torpedo Captor 16.

If I run my amps higher than 2 on the MV, then the Captor starts to distort the signal. Anything higher than 3 or 4 and I get massive howling and whistling when you don't play. You can hear a high end fizz added to the signal too. I contacted Two Notes to see what's next.
Click to expand...
Why would it stop when you touch the bridge? Gotta be a ground somewhere.
 
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