Official Luthiers Forum!

Hi,

I was playing my Squier Strat through a tube amp last week. Everything was working fine until I unplugged the cable, plugged it into another instrument and then plugged it back in. No sound was produced by the guitar. However, I noticed that the slight hum of the pickups is still heard (and disappears when you turn the volume knob to 0). I also tried plugging a different guitar with the same cable and amp and it works fine.

I opened up the pick guard of the strat and all the connections looked fine. There weren't any signs of anything being burnt. I also tried testing the resistance of the pickups and of the volume and tone pots and they seemed to be working fine (I'm no electronics professional but I followed some YouTube videos).

Has this happened to anyone before? Would anyone have an suggestions as to what the problem might be? Any troubleshooting?

SM

Welcome Steven!

A couple of things to try;

1) A different cord that works with another guitar and amp.

2) Is the input jack loose? I do set-ups for around 300 electrics guitars annually and have yet to meet an input jack that is not loose unless it's a regular client.

3) Try a different amp.

Squires have really cheap pots and parts and if you can't find the problem simply take it to a decent Luthier. Most issues can be found in a few minutes by the folks who do this stuff for a living.

Squires also suffer from cold solder joints as do even some of the big names... so an experienced Luthier will spot this stuff quickly.

Check to see if the tip of the jack is going all the way into the plug, and be sure it's not touching anything that's grounded.
That's pretty easy with the pickguard off, but you also need to be sure the tip isn't touching ground with the pickguard on.

_________________
A man hears what he wants to hear, and disreguards the rest. Paul Simon