Strange noises inside my kemper!

    Quote from Michael_dk

    Springs are the one thing I haven't messed with yet. How can I dampen pickup mounting springs best? (I will try to dampen the tremolo springs on my PRS Brent Mason - the tremolo is locked, but the springs are there).


    I dampened it with foam rubber, so the springs had freedom to adapt to pickup screw adjustment, and this way they are not allowed to vibrate or cause any rumble. I made foam strips (4mm x 4mm) with scissors and then wrapped those strips around screws so they were touching the whole springs.

    Quote from Michael_dk

    Springs are the one thing I haven't messed with yet. How can I dampen pickup mounting springs best? (I will try to dampen the tremolo springs on my PRS Brent Mason - the tremolo is locked, but the springs are there).


    I wrap my trem strings in PTFE plumbers tape, works great for me and doesn't interfere with their use.

    I hear it. I tried to extract that LF band:

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    In some moments it sounded to me like pickups were picking up vibrations from tremolo, or other vibrating metal.

    Interesting, the guitar I played that on (Chapman ML-1) I haven't re-wrapped the strings yet with PTFE since I installed the new pickups and gave it a bit of a service. Going to have to wrap them tomorrow and see if that makes any difference to it, my paranoia grows.......

    Mike, in that last clip you posted i can hear the glassy, squealy high frequencies on the attack of the notes where its clearly pushed to saturated distortion. When the note decays, it disappears. I dont hear any lower freq aliasing.


    Not sure if the squeal is kpa issue or guitar issue or what. That issue is kinda moot imho, because i would low pass that stuff out anyway. It doesnt seem to cause beating against the played note or introduce phantom lower frequencies via aliasing.


    In the clip directly above with the band pass, i hear the lower frequency drone at 2 places towards the middle and later in the clip. Impossible to tell if thats the kpa processing or an undampened string or other resonance from the guitar tho.

    Alright I tried to recreate those noises on my setup. here is the result:
    - I tried my tele with KPA - it is there
    - I tried my tele with TH2 (vst amp sim) - it is there (Hooray! That does mean no problem in KPA)

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    - I did not test it with my tube amp (Kids and wife are sleeping :) ) That's why I have KPA, YES! I can try tomorrow.


    So I have it too. :) Didn't notice it until today and even from today I don't care because normally no one can hear it when playing. Not telling about mix.


    EDIT: There is part of the string not-dampened in my tele. It is the part from back of the guitar (where you insert new string - ball end) and bridge saddles. Maybe this can cause it. And maybe it is only resonance between string and fret.


    It seems this is a some quiet resonance that after saturation (distortion) is coming out. There it may also be an intermodulation effect or some amp sim cabinet IR resonance.


    BUT - this is so quiet and not noticable. I think such distortions make the whole sounding of guitar gear. Guitar is not synth - it's live instrument with a lot of resonances and interactions.

    Guys, thanks for all you further suggestions on this
    it's kind of reassuring that the effect can be reproduced on amp sims even if I had no luck myself.
    I just tried SLAMMING (like REALLY) my DI track with a fast-attack comp, which didn't bring it out - but adding a lowpass filter and a shelf in combination with a BIG big boost down at around 200 Hz seem to bring something out which could be the culprit.

    Quote from Michael_dk

    So here is the dampened part of your DI, Shane. I definitely hear the same effect on this sample.


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    How many of you guys - especially who listen on "proper" headphones or studio monitors - can hear what I'm talking about?

    In my day job I work as a sound technician for a post-production company, mainly doing ads, animation and short films for broadcast. I just listened to this clip through my set up at work, first raw, then with a few different band pass filters and compression, then through an analyzer. I don't see or hear anything that doesn't suggest it is harmonic content, either from the string being played or others ringing sympathetically, or from resonances in the different physical guitar parts. Rehearsal last night dragged on a bit, so I never got chance to test this with my own set up, but rest assured, I will.


    Quote

    I'd really like to try with a tube amp to hear if it causes the same exaggerated effect on there.


    Yeah, for me, this will be more conclusive as per ruling the KPA out as the culprit.


    Cheers,
    Sam

    How low is the action on your guitar, Michael_dk? I'm wondering if one of your frets is touching the string when you play, which would explain why that high pitch sound is always at the same pitch when you play up the string. It could even be the string vibrating against something at the nut end. It's not something that'll manifest as fret buzz, but it could just be rubbing something somewhere along the length of your guitar fret board.

    Quote from Michael_dk

    Had that same thought. The sound is there also at the 24th fret, so not a fret buzz issue. I don't have extremely low action anyway


    Is there a lot of space around the string at the nut? If it's a bit loose and the string is not very tense or seated well, I can imagine it causing that ringing sound. It's sort of like if you have a locking nut, but don't clamp the string down, there are a lot of funny sounds going on.

    Quote from meambobbo

    Were you getting a sustained transient such as fret buzz? It seemed a bit beyond just the initial attack.


    Quite possibly, I have action quite low, and I was picking relatively hard. I do set the action just on the verge of fret buzz so it's always lurking there.