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On Guitarnuts.com, they go through a very advanced step-by-step process, but it includes not only normal shielding, but also mods to pots and so on and so on. If I just do the normal quot;adhesive and foilquot; method, will this cure most of the single coil hum problems?

Yes, just doing the shielding and not rewiring will help. Star grounding is a good idea, but in a guitar the difference is usually negligable. I would suggest wiring it that way if you were starting from scratch, but if you're not handy with a soldering iron, just leave it the way it is. You'll need to solder a ground wire from the foil to a pot, which is why I recommend adhesive backed copper foil. Aluminum tears too easily and you can't solder to it.

Ryan

I think it was on the Fender forum, but someone posted about how they bought a cookie sheet, placed their pickguard on it and made a cut out they used for shielding.
You can buy an aluminum pickguard shield from cost me $13, and it eliminated virtually all of the hum in my CS 54's. Very easy for a non technical person like me.

This person has a copper Strat shield, scroll down to see the pickguard shields. from : localhost/www.monteallums.com/Product_links.html

Shielding is definitely the way to go. It can be a pain to put in, but it works. They used to make this copper shielding that came in strips, with a really strong adhesive backing (a little hard to work with). The guy who owned my Les Paul before me had the cavity spayed with some sort of paint that has nickel in it. He was a studio musician, so I guess he needed it to be perfectly quiet (which it is).Jeff

Check out Skarekrough's thread about shielding paint.