Hum/Buzz

I have a hum only when I turn the knob toward one pickup. I found this answer on the web, i this true? How do I know if my J is a single coil. And if this is true and my J is a single, isn’t that a shitty way to make a bass? I’m confused, but right now I use one pickup as I can’t stand the hum.

To give a bit more detail to what the others have said, you want a split coil Jazz pickup. The two halves of the P pickup are wound and biased so that they humbuck. A split coil Jazz pickup is made the same way internally but you can’t tell the difference from the outside, they look just like single coil Jazz pickups. Dual coil hum canceling Jazz pickups are also available but the split coil pickups sound closer to the single coil tone, minus the hum.

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Single coils pickups are susceptible to electromagnetic interference, that’s the down side. The upside though is the clear/bright/quaky tone they have. If you switch to J sized humbuckers you’ll get rid of the noise but you’ll lose the signature single coil sound and get something darker.

Is it possible that you are playing in a room with a lot of EMI (flouresent lights, computer, etc)? Try a different room.

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@Korrigan Absolutely I notice the hum changes as I walk around the room. So the atmosphere is not helping. If you’re old enough to remember I feel like the old days when you got the antennae on the TV just right, and if it moved you’d start to get static.

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Yeah that’s classic EMI interference being picked up by the pickup.

Despite the advice you got, humbuckers and split coil pickups help a lot with this but don’t totally solve it if the interference is strong enough. There’s also internal electronics shielding to consider depending on the interference. Basically, the problem is the interference, not your bass.

I wouldn’t say it’s a bad way to design a bass, I would say it’s just one of the drawbacks of single coil pickups (balanced by other characteristics like @Korrigan said).

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Thanks for the feedback guys. My house is an interference nightmare and I’ve had issues with wireless products forever. Good to know it is more environment than anything else.

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