I have a guitar that is a little noisy. it has been gone through by different people so i am going to re-do some of the mistakes of the past. I tried to look up the correct application of Shielding tape on youtube with varying degrees of insanity. SO... when putting on shielding tape do you cover the entire cavity of the guitar AND the plastic cover (like for the volume control cavity) or just the cavity or just the cover? please give me a few pointers before i waste the piece of expensive copper tape by using it incorrectly.
thanks all!

what kind of "noise" is it making?
if it's the ol' 60 cycle you might want to start with a ground-lift adapter (you know, the 3-prong to 2-prong thing... gray most of the time) on the plug on the amp.

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it isn't the amp, i have other guitars that are quiet. It is the hmmm until i touch strings. I am basically the ground... i am going to check over the soldering on pots. The previous owner put new pickups in, they are big improvements but i think there is a ground off somewhere. So i figured while i was in there i would put some shielding in since it would be apart anyway.

Hi zenbone,

I think that you are right, "...a ground off somewhere..." Possibly the bridge isn't grounded. On a Strat, there is a black wire that connects to the tremolo claw in the back of the guitar and provides a ground through the springs. A Tele bridge would be grounded in the front to the bridge plate. You didn't say what kind of guitar that you have, but the bridge ungrounded will cause that hum/buzz when you let go of the strings.

If it is a Strat type, with unpowered single coil pickups, I wouldn't waste any time with shielding the cavity, many times the shielding will cause other noise to happen. A full pick guard shield is probably the best that you can do, but even that won't eliminate the normal single coil noise.

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---> "The amp should be SWITCHED OFF AND UNPLUGGED before you do this!" <---

Por favor, disculpe mi español, no se llega a la práctica con mucha frecuencia.

Rather than use expensive copper shielding tape you can use metallic muffler repair tape that's readily available at any automotive store. A technician buddy of mine has been using it for decades and has had good results with it.

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'65 Strat,65 Mustang,65 Jaguar,4 more Strats,3 vintage Vox guitars,5 Vox amps,'69 Bassman with a '68 2-15 Bassman cab,36 guitars total-15asst'd amps total,2 vintage '60s Hammond organs & a myriad of effects-with a few rare vintage ones.

I have done a couple with very good success. Use tape that has conductive adhesive or you will have to fold an edge to make contact with every strip. Stewart Mac has copper tape with conductive adhesive. Line the entire pickup and control cavity. If your pickguard does not have shielding already then yes, you need to cover that also. I even lined my plugin cavity the last time I did this. You want the shielding on the pickguard to make contact with the shielding in the cavity and create a grounded enclosure for your pickups and controls. Some people will tell you to run a wire from this shield to your ground, but I have found that is not really needed if you do a good job with everything making contact and being grounded. It really makes a big difference. I have also tried alternative methods of arranging the grounding. If you shield everything nice and neat, then stock wiring works just as well as far as I can tell. I really have not had any problem with the ground loops some people claim are there. Also, any conductive material will work; Aluminum foil (again, need conductive glue) works as well as copper. I guess copper is technically better but I find the difference insignificant. At first you may find this to be a cumbersome process but by the end you will be a master taper.