Cobra makes buzzing/hum unless I hold strings or bridge

[spitalny]

My new Cobra with M1 M2 M2 makes a buzzing kind of hum sound when I am not either touching the strings or the bridge. Is this normal? How can I alleviate this?

Thanks,

Paul

[tom]

all our guitars will do that to some degree, depending on surrounding conditions. i once wrote a long responce but i'm at a different computor so i don't have it handy. fromthe time i was a kid i learned that i should roll the volume down when not playing, kinda like puting you foot down when you stop riding a bike.

[killerburst]

Your body, being largely composed of water is actually acting as an antenna for stray electronic fields. If is physically connected to the circuit ground, those stray fields find their way to ground and out of your signal path. If you disconnect from the ground by taking your hands off the bridge or strings, then those stray fields are concentrated right near you pickups and electronics. Something like that.

[sylvanshine]

ALL guitars do this to some degree (Tom is being nice again). It's how they are designed. The player is the ground. Personally, my hands never leave the guitar when I'm playing, so I don't notice it.

We should make this sticky or put in a FAQ. It comes up so often.

[dave]

is that why you sometimes pick up radio signals through the amp too?

[tom]

usually it takes an active circuit or something that makes more gain to do that, but it's usually a location problem with radio stations.

[dave]

aha! maybe a hifi in the same room for play back when practicing is somewhat less than a stunningly good idea then!

[bruce]

spitalny,

Since your guitar is grounded properly, (noise goes away when touching strings/bridge), that's a good thing... that's what you want a guitar to do. If a guitar DOESN'T do this then it might not be grounded properly.

Now you can forget about the guitar and move onto the rest of your signal chain and/or building you are in with regard to clean AC.

Sometimes this is just a process of elimination with your signal chain, but sometimes it comes down to a badly wired building or lots of flourescent light etc... even you standing too close to your amp or powersource. So YES, this sometimes is normal.

This can get WAY deeper so if anyone else has input, please post.