Not all shielding paint is alike. I don't like the water based stuff.
I use solvent based shielding paint (Miller-Stephenson MS-487N) which works well but may be hard to find.
The good thing about solvent based paint is that subsequent coats bite into the initial coat so there's good adhesion and continuity between coats as a film thickness is built up. The solvent based paint also wets out the surface it's painted on better than water based material. And with the amount of toluene it contains, it dries very fast.
Also, not all copper foil is the same. The first foil I ever used came with a Carvin bass kit 20 plus years ago. It was thick, stiff, and miserable to handle. And the adhesive backing was low grade and had a short adhesion life before detaching from the surface being shielded.
Higher grade copper foil is thinner, easier to work with and has good quality adhesive backing.
I generally use copper foil when it's easy to apply, such as on the underside of cavity covers and pickguards, and use paint when foil would be a major nuisance.
I had a vintage tube amp whose chassis cover panel needed to be re-shielded. It was a lot of surface area to shield and good copper foil is expensive. I shielded the panel with aluminum foil glued down with 3M aerosol contact cement. It worked very well.
I use solvent based shielding paint (Miller-Stephenson MS-487N) which works well but may be hard to find.
The good thing about solvent based paint is that subsequent coats bite into the initial coat so there's good adhesion and continuity between coats as a film thickness is built up. The solvent based paint also wets out the surface it's painted on better than water based material. And with the amount of toluene it contains, it dries very fast.
Also, not all copper foil is the same. The first foil I ever used came with a Carvin bass kit 20 plus years ago. It was thick, stiff, and miserable to handle. And the adhesive backing was low grade and had a short adhesion life before detaching from the surface being shielded.
Higher grade copper foil is thinner, easier to work with and has good quality adhesive backing.
I generally use copper foil when it's easy to apply, such as on the underside of cavity covers and pickguards, and use paint when foil would be a major nuisance.
I had a vintage tube amp whose chassis cover panel needed to be re-shielded. It was a lot of surface area to shield and good copper foil is expensive. I shielded the panel with aluminum foil glued down with 3M aerosol contact cement. It worked very well.
