Your thoughts on converting to humbucker

[edvard]

I have an original '82 Fender Bullet S-3 which I've already destroyed the resale value of by modding it here and there over the years.
That's OK, I'll never sell it, it's an awesome guitar...
My problem is I seem to have more hum/buzz than I remember, probably due to the old wiring in this house, the new CFL lights, computer monitors, etc.
So I have two options:
1- Add shielding.
I figure if I line the pickup and electronics cavities and the underside of the pickguard with foil and ground it, I might cut much of the hum, but I wonder if it's enough.
2- Convert to humbucking.
I don't want to cut any larger holes in my pickguard, and I like the tone of single-coils, so I figured I could put one pickup under the other one in a 'stacked' configuration.
Flipping the magnets and reverse-wiring it, of course.
However, I worry about how it might affect the tone and whether I'll need to install a larger volume pot (humbucker circuits usually call for a 500k pot rather than the Fender's 250k)

Thoughts? Opinions? Criticism?

[newfish]

Try re-wiring your guitar first using screened cable wherever at all possible - and watch for shielding (or lack thereof) on the scratchplate.

I say this on the back of a recent 'fix-up project to an old Squier strat.

I ended up with new low-noise singlecoils I was lucky enough to find inthe clearance section of the GFS pickups website.

Seventeen US Dollars for three pickups.  No-brainer...

[edvard]

Holy smokes, GFS looks awesome!

If only I had a few extra bucks I'd swing for the noiseless pickups, even at full price.
Either way, you think shielding will be enough for my stock equipment?

[Mark Hammer]

You can also consider the Suhr backplate system, or some other form of dummy coil, if you like the current tone of your pickups.

[WGTP]

Seymour Duncan, DiMarzio, etc. have stacked (usually lower output) and side by side humbuckers in single coil sizes.  Some simulate single coil tones and some are voiced to sound like their larger humbucking counter parts.  Lots of used ones around on ebay, etc. 

[edvard]

You can also consider the Suhr backplate system, or some other form of dummy coil, if you like the current tone of your pickups.

Hmm... How might I incorporate a dummy coil?
Just wind some magnet wire on a form to a similar resistance and stick a magnet in it?

Seymour Duncan, DiMarzio, etc. have stacked (usually lower output) and side by side humbuckers in single coil sizes.  Some simulate single coil tones and some are voiced to sound like their larger humbucking counter parts.  Lots of used ones around on ebay, etc.  

Well, sure I can always just BUY humbucking or noise-reducing pickups (the GFS ones are damn cheap, and they got good reviews too...) but until I make that leap, I need to know whether shielding or stacking will be my best bet with what I have now and what the caveats are.
When I still had 3 pickups in the thing, I RPRW'd the middle pickup for humbucking operation, but the bass was too much so I didn't use that anymore.

One of these days I'm going to build a project guitar so I can do all those funky pickup tricks with it.
Parallel, series, out-of-phase, etc. w00t!!

[blooze_man]

shielding the body cavity and using shielded wire quieted my guitar down quite a bit. But I switched to humbuckers and now it's even more quiet. I would suggest shielding it anyway.

[aron]

I would go for noiseless pickups like the Bill Lawrence 280s or equivalent. The Suhr backplate works, but is $$$.

[Joe Hart]

You say you love the guitar, so any change in pickups will change the guitar (at least tone-wise). My advice is to shield it as good as possible and then just live with any remaining noise!
-Joe Hart