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    Grounding An Archtop Tailpiece en

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    vvvvv12345
    This document provides instructions for grounding the strings of an archtop guitar that has a wooden tailpiece using brass rods. It describes: 1) Drilling small holes in the tailpiece channels and inserting half-moon shaped brass rods, gluing them in place. 2) Connecting the brass rods to the guitar's ground terminal, which may involve attaching a brass ring or tube to an aluminum tailpiece bracket. 3) Covering connections in epoxy to avoid potential galvanic corrosion from the contact between dissimilar metals like brass and aluminum over time.

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    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd

    Grounding An Archtop Tailpiece en

    Uploaded by

    vvvvv12345
    130 views11 pages
    This document provides instructions for grounding the strings of an archtop guitar that has a wooden tailpiece using brass rods. It describes: 1) Drilling small holes in the tailpiece channels and inserting half-moon shaped brass rods, gluing them in place. 2) Connecting the brass rods to the guitar's ground terminal, which may involve attaching a brass ring or tube to an aluminum tailpiece bracket. 3) Covering connections in epoxy to avoid potential galvanic corrosion from the contact between dissimilar metals like brass and aluminum over time.

    Original Description:

    How To ground a benedetto style tailpiece

    Original Title

    Grounding an Archtop Tailpiece En

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    This document provides instructions for grounding the strings of an archtop guitar that has a wooden tailpiece using brass rods. It describes: 1) Drilling small holes in the tailpiece channels and inserting half-moon shaped brass rods, gluing them in place. 2) Connecting the brass rods to the guitar's ground terminal, which may involve attaching a brass ring or tube to an aluminum tailpiece bracket. 3) Covering connections in epoxy to avoid potential galvanic corrosion from the contact between dissimilar metals like brass and aluminum over time.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    130 views11 pages

    Grounding An Archtop Tailpiece en

    Uploaded by

    vvvvv12345
    This document provides instructions for grounding the strings of an archtop guitar that has a wooden tailpiece using brass rods. It describes: 1) Drilling small holes in the tailpiece channels and inserting half-moon shaped brass rods, gluing them in place. 2) Connecting the brass rods to the guitar's ground terminal, which may involve attaching a brass ring or tube to an aluminum tailpiece bracket. 3) Covering connections in epoxy to avoid potential galvanic corrosion from the contact between dissimilar metals like brass and aluminum over time.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    of 11

    Grounding the Strings Through a Wooden Tailpiece

    If your archtop guitar has a wooden tailpiece, chances are that its strings aren't grounded. Grounding is
    necessary for electric guitars (solid) because most times they are used with effects that increase the
    noise dramatically. By contrast, jazz guitars are used quite simply and many agree that they don't need
    to be grounded. Being realistic, the high-impedance design of conventional pickups makes them prone
    to noise in many common situations, such as playing close to a TV or a computer monitor, a dimmer for
    lights, etc. Also, there are modern amps that are incredibly quiet, and this has made some players aware
    of the amount of hum that their ungrounded guitar generates.
    Here you'll find a method for grounding your strings with a tailpiece that has Benedetto-style string
    holes. Even though the anchoring is not based on a flexible loop, you may find some ideas for your
    particular tailpiece.
    First, drill a 2 mm hole at the very end of the channels for the strings:

    Get some 2 mm brass rod and file its end (around 3/16") so that its section is a half moon. Cut it to
    around 3/8":

    You cannot see it, but I have filed the other side very lightly (you'll understand why in a minute)
    Insert one of those for each string, like this, putting a dab of superglue at both ends:

    The slight filing that you did will allow the superglue to wet the space between the brass and the ebony
    (use thin superglue, which has very good capillarity properties, and don't use any accelerator at least for
    a few minutes). Now you can file or sand the overhang at both sides:

    With a small circular file, round the edge of the half moon pieces:

    What remains is the connection of these pieces to the guitar ground terminal, which depends a lot on
    the tailpiece construction. My tailpieces have an aluminum bracket covered with wood. As aluminum
    cant be soldered easily, I press fit a small brass piece into one the holes in the bracket. I use a small
    piece made of 8mm outside diameter / 6mm inside diameter brass tube, which I file longitudinally. I also
    file a small lip around it:

    Then I make a 7.5 mm hole in the bracket and press fit the brass ring into it. The lip makes it easier:

    This is the bracket after sanding the overhang:

    After attaching the bracket to the tailpiece, I make the connections like this:

    I use superglue or epoxy to cover the wiring so that it can't be pulled off by accident.
    At the other end of the tailpiece I usually have an endpin jack. This, combined with the aluminum
    bracket, completes the connection quite easily.
    Some guitars that I make have very low bridges, and they use tailpieces where the strings go out from
    below the tailpiece, like this:

    In that case, I use fretwire as shown:

    Other guitars have tailpieces where the strings go out from the center, like this:

    In this case I use 6mm OD/5mm ID brass tube cut in half.


    Francisco Mercader, from Valldoreix, Spain, alerted me about the galvanic corrosion that will surely
    happen where the brass ring and aluminum bracket are in contact, due to their different anodic indexes.
    To avoid this potential problem, now I cover the area with epoxy as shown here:

    If you doubt that this can be a problem, take a look at an aluminum bracket with its brass ring attached
    that was left in a 50% humidity environment for a few months:

    Thats mild corrosion, but it can be much worse in humid places.


    Thanks, Francisco!

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