I am planning out my very first pedal board build and I've been watching your videos for about 2 years now Mason. I'm getting close to where I have all the pedals that I need for the rig I'm building (W/D/W) and I want to begin stocking up on all the supplies like square plugs, mogami cables, dual lock velcro, zip ties, tie down mounts etc. so that I have everything I need as soon as I'm ready to assemble the board properly. However, concerning specifically the zip ties and tie down mounts I would like to know where I can get hold of the specific quality and sizes within the EU. I live in Sweden and I'd prefer not having to order these from the US to save on both time and custom charges and shipping. Do you know of a supplier within the EU that sell these?
No Pedalboard is official . . . "Without the Tone-brush" - I actually have one to keep my pedals clean & dust-free = Preventive maintenance against Scratchy-pots !!!
Two things I always do: * Use a cable tester. I have one that takes plethora of audio connections, but 95% of the time I use it to test patch cables. It can detect not only persistent, but intermittent problems, and... * Shake cable tester hanging by patch cable. I have elecrtical and mechanical engineering background, and I learned hard way that if something cannot withstand rough testing, it cannot withstand rough use. So I plug in the patch, reset the tester and give it all a little shake, turn around the jack, etc.
Cable testers are good, but sorta outside the scope of "neat" pedalboards in terms of category. Cable testers tell you some information but not the quality of the connection, the best way is actually using your DVM and set it to ohms - should read "0" tip to tip to ensure that you don't have any resistive load on the cable in addition to checking the continuity.
I've been watching your videos for a while and I just wanted to thank you for providing all of this great information over the last couple of years! Just a few questions (if that's alright). I've been looking at a lot of interface boxes/output buffers recently, in particular the GoodWood Output (as I run a G10 wireless + polytune 3 most of the time as my input) but on the output impedance specifications it says it's rated at 500 ohms. While this is higher than what you recommend for an output buffer, it's also a lot better than many other buffers out there, and it incorporates a ground lift which is a must have for my situation. Would this be sufficient for driving ~20 feet of cable, or would there be a significant benefit from getting a custom interface box made which which would essentially be the same thing but with better buffers? One more question, the GoodWood Products use an audio transformer to deal with ground loops, would this need to be treated the same way as the transformer in linear power supplies? (as in not mounting pedals above it) Thanks so much!
Should be fine RE the Goodwood. The transformer would only be needed if you have a stereo or multi-amp rig. In terms of hum, usually the transformers have a mumetal can on them to prevent this.
@@VertexEffectsInc I do run stereo amps, been dealing with a ground loop/hum issue for a little while, so I'm hoping it will fix it. Thanks for the great info as always!
So after I made all my cables with 2319 mogami and then I purchased a cable from you going to my VP from my boost and it was made of 2314. So what did I do. Bought 100’ of 2314 and a bunch of SP4 square plugs and remade all my cables. The smaller 2314 is so much easier to route.
I wanna get a high wire but I use a stereo chorus last in the chain and go out to two amps... should I put the high wire before it or is there some other way to do it?
@@VertexEffectsInc Thanks! Damn I'm looking at $580 Australian dollars right there... and I can't find an Axess in this country haha. Oh the joys of living in a provincial colony.
Love your videos bro Question - I find having to bend over to dial in pedals very hard on the back and it’s a “try it and bend over, try it and bend over carousel”. Do you know of anyone who makes a board that can raise and lower so you can adjust pedals without having to break the back?
get a keyboard stand for testing out pedals on your board... or you can just sit at a desk. Wayyy easier than paying for something custom made that's probably gonna turn out clunky lookin
Tips for a very compact rig (less than 7/8 pedals) using a flat pedalboard (no tiers): - Mounting pedals on top of interface and/or power supply - good idea? - Routing under the pedals using very low profile cable (Mogami 2314) - is it possible? - Should you mount the wah directly to the pedalboard surface or is dual-lock enough? Thank you!
Interface, sure. Power supply, depends...if it's switch mode, no problem, if it's linear you'll have noise. Under pedal routing is fine. Depends on how hard you are on the wah pedal - some like it hard-mounted, if you use Dual Lock or our signature Power Grip veclro, you should be fine.
Do you find many customers want a more “modular” setup - one where they might swap pedals in & out of different boards - eg. if someone plays in different acts from night to night, or is going through a process of trying out different options for one of their pedals. All of your builds seem to be “semi- permanent”. Perhaps an episode featuring someone who needs a few boards for different applications and is able to swap pedals in and out of boards really easily would be interesting, showing what you would do differently in that scenario to add flexibility.
I went through just that, built my board although I was still adding or replacing pedals or even changing their order. It's pretty easy to 'disconnect' a pedal from the Dual-Lock velcro, so I just do that, and the velcro stays on the board so I can do most changes without removing velcro etc.
I have 2 Holeyboards that I need to put together. Plus, the EHX Super Switcher. Thanks for the great ideas, Mason! I will look at your cables..You're always so Logical.
So to get the really clean cable runs, you cut the cables a bit longer and then terminate at the other end once you "loom" it to the next pedal... Do you end up throwing out a ton of cable clippings? This is the one challenge I couldn't totally overcome on my last couple of board builds -- I used zip ties and anchors, but I have too many looms and even somewhat sloppy looms because I did my best to measure and cut to length before laying the cable down (mainly to avoid wasting cable).
Correct! Cable is pretty negligible in cost. Mogami 2314 for example is under $0.50 per foot - you over estimate slightly so you’re maybe only loosing a few inches total end to end.
I’m looking for high quality dc 9 volt solderable plugs. Do you have a recommendation? I’ve ordered several different ones on line and they are all flimsy.
Hi mate, love your episodes. I have two pedals one draws 12V 1A and a 9V 600mA. Is there a single power supply that could run this with a few small current 9V pedals ?
Will those tie down mounts stick to Velcro, I have a pedal train board and I have my power supply on top, so I’m trying to figure out how to keep the power cables nice and neat. Any suggestions?
The Interfacer? Is it a good buffer unit on par with High-Wire? The output impedance is 500 ohms, 5 times the amount you always recommend. This is the 1st time I heard you mentioned about the unit.
Just ordered the Kleinulator to convert my passive effects loop to active on my tube amps. Does it matter if its velcroed on the back of the amp or on the pedal board? I'm using a 4CM.
Hi mate, love your episodes. I have two pedals one draws 12V 1A and a 9V 600mA. Is there a single power supply that could run this with a few small current 9V pedals ?
I suppose it's a preference but you can have more control of the heights using a tiered system and it's easier to trouble shoot if you can have it all top mounted.
I show some tips on a John Mayer giveaway pedalboard we built for Sweetwater and a artist pedalboard we built for Kerry Marshall, check out those videos!
I had this with my old board, I could faintly hear Jason derulos voice in my amp somehow acting as a radio. I don’t know the solution exactly but I was told cables when coiled can act as antennas.
mason, i just redid my whole pedal board. used all the info from you, thank you. the power was an issue, 2 pedals needing 600mA dc 12 volt and 1 needing 1000mA ac 12 volt. the cioks chocolate handled it though.
Hey Mason...I saw one of your other videos on buffers and you had the Suhr buffer as a recommendation. In your most recent buffer videos though, you seemed to have dropped them from your recommendation? Is it because their ourput is 150 Ohms and outaide of your 100Ohm spec? The Mesa Boogie Highwire was backordered, so I picked up a couple Suhr buffers.
Ideally the lower the output impedance the better...the closer to ZERO ohms is best. However, reasonably, anything around 200 ohms or so it going to be good...the further you get away from that the more color you'll have with longer cable runs.
Can you do a video lesson only about "interface pedal boxes" because some have isolation transformers or audio transformers. Audio transformers are used in studios often for I/O inputs into studio preamps, compressors, EQ outboard gears which has an audio transformers on each I/O inputs and outputs. I'm not sure which Interface pedal boxes use audio transformers like these. The interfaces pedal boards use isolation transformers for the Effects loop send and return to get the send and return ports an isolated ground galvanic isolation to prevent ground loops on different amplifiers. If you're using Two amplifiers and want to use the effects loop going to two different amplifiers effects sends and returns both amplifiers send and return jacks grounds are going to be at a different ground potential which causes ground loop issues.
Transformers for this application are not used for an audio enhancement but rather galvanic isolation. Generally the transformer sides sound worse than the non-transformer side, and aren't quite as transparent, and might have some distortion if pushed too hard at certain frequencies, even the best of them.
@@VertexEffectsInc open up the interface pedal box and bypass the galvanic transformer and lift up the ground. I don't know why the isolation transformer have bad frequency response and saturate causing intermodulation distortion because they should make better frequency response. Why doesn't vertex make really good isolation transformer for interface boxes for effects loops to prevent ground loop issues
@@VertexEffectsInc yes I know the isolation transformers aren't audio transformers. If the interface pedal box had good audio transformers that used like those studio outboard gears used nickel, iron, cobalt,etc the right mixture in neve,ssl, etc it will make you preamp pedals and compressor pedals sounds like hifi Because audio transformers add more even harmonics and compression from the magnetic field. The audio transformers are frequency masking the audio from 20hz to 20khz
Meh. My small pedalboard is controlled chaos. I use the powergrip, so my pedals aren’t going anywhere though. I don’t need the fancy stuff. I’m pretty simple. 😬
