Saturday
Apr302005
new pedal board
Saturday, April 30, 2005 at 09:14PM
I have finally put together my new flight pedal board, and I'm pretty jazzed about it. It's pretty ridiculous to have two different set-ups, but I've found it's been a great relief to have one for big shows and records, that can be as big and obnoxious as I want it, and one that's easily portable, light-weight for flights and little gigs around town. The one I'm going to show you is my flight board. And here we go...
This first shot is all the pedals that will go on this board, the power supply and cables. This is how I've been going to the last few shows. I'll be glad to not do this anymore.
This is the empty pedal board. It is a Pedal Train 2, their medium model, and it's sitting on its case. It's a great design. A light-weight steel frame with four slats 2' wide. The board comes with 2' velcro that lines up perfectly on the slats. You then velcro the bottom of your pedals and they stick right to it. The real genius of this board is that you can wire through the slats, keeping some of your longer cables out of the way and under the board. This makes it very easy to sway pedals out, or rearrange your signal flow. They're really a great design, and if you're looking for a pedal board, I couldn't recommend them enough. Anyway, moving on...
Here are the pedals with velcro on their backs.
Now we get to the good stuff. Afer you have them velcroed and you have all your power and audio cables ready, it's time to decide on your signal path. This is VERY important, and something I didn't understand the first couple boards I made. You need to take stock of what pedals you have, what they do to the sound, and then what order they need to be in. Putting different pedals on either side of a delay will provide the best example of this.
My set-up on this is fairly standard, but the tremolo is in a different spot than some might typically use. I start out with the tuner. This has a bypass output and a muting output. The muting on/off output goes directly to the Baggs DI on the other side of the board. This is for an acoustic guitar or mandolin. That way I can use the same cable for every instrument, but I don't have to shut off all my distortions and delays to switch to an acoustic sound. The bypassed output goes to the volume/wah. This is a cool, little pedal I got off ebay for like 30 bucks. The wah sounds great and the volume is very clean and complete, something my other volume has a problem with. I like it's tiny size as well.
From there it goes to the Rt. 66, which is a compressor and an overdrive, which I had modded to be more of a clean boost. Then it goes to the Rat, this one modded for a less-nasally heavy metal sound to more of a seventies distortion, to the Danelectro Overdrive. I had these originally swapped, but since I'll never use them together, and they fit better on the board in this formation, I moved them. Then I go to the tremolo and the Ibanez delay, which is the first pedal I ever bought and still one of my favorites. Then I go to the A/B box. From here on of the sends goes to the "dry" amp. This is considered "dry" because it will have less delay on it.
The other output here goes to the H2O, which is a nice analog delay and chorus. A very great pedal, both sonically and economically. This, and the TU-2 tuner, are the only pedals I have on BOTH my big and little boards. From here the line will go to the "wet" amp. I left some space after this on the board for whatever randomness I decide will be fun to have, maybe a pitch-shifter or phaser, and these would only go to the "wet" amp, as well.
Here is a shot of the wiring underneath the PedalTrain.
and a close-up so you can see the ties that keep it neater and less likely to wear out your cables.
and the same view from the front
Building a pedal board is never easy, and I find I need to believe in myself and go with what my heart says is true to be able to pull it off. That's why I need some encouragement.
Now, the fun part: trying it out!
It sounds great and everything works correctly. The guardian of the Velvet Eagle, the Super-Gorilla looks on with rock approval.
Now I'll fit the board snugly in its case
And it's time to make sure this wasn't all useless. If it weighs more than 50 pounds I'll have to pay an extra amount every time I fly to a gig.
36 Pounds! Awesome. This gives me room for a few more pedals, cables, strings, whatever. Take that American Airlines!!
Also, I can't say enough how you need to have good cables to have good tone. Cheap little plastic deals can cut up to 10% of your volume with each cable you use. If you use seven or eight in a row, you're losing almost 3/4's of your guitar's initial volume. I strongly recommend George L. cable, which is a little more expensive, but so worth it. The George L. comes separately as cables and jacks, and you cut the cable to the length you need and then screw the jacks on the ends. Very hands. Unfortunately, I ran out of George L. today, so I used a couple spare plastic ones, but I will replace them next week. Here are the two different kinds I used today.
Also, and I don't have a picture, but you can see the plug in the shot in the case, a good, cheap power supply is the Visual Sound 1Spot. It's made by the same company as the H2O and Route 66. They're like twenty bucks, and chains that will power 5 pedals are an additional ten bucks each. I am using two chains off one 1Spot on this board. They also make little adaptors for different style jacks, so that it can work with any pedal. I have three different jack styles on this board, and this little guy saved me probably a hundred bucks to power them all. And it's very quiet, unlike a lot of chain-styled power adaptors.
Well, there she is, and I hope you weren't bored to death. As you can see, I really love this stuff. I'm blessed that I get to do my hobby for a living, for sure. I also truly believe that excellence in what you create is a reflection of your Creator, and so I always try to make these work and sound the best they can. It also saves you a lot of headaches later on. Thanks for reading this, and if you have any questions, feel free to ask.
Also, thanks to Geof who told me how to do photos on here. Next up: Invasion of the Baby Pictures!!
This first shot is all the pedals that will go on this board, the power supply and cables. This is how I've been going to the last few shows. I'll be glad to not do this anymore.
This is the empty pedal board. It is a Pedal Train 2, their medium model, and it's sitting on its case. It's a great design. A light-weight steel frame with four slats 2' wide. The board comes with 2' velcro that lines up perfectly on the slats. You then velcro the bottom of your pedals and they stick right to it. The real genius of this board is that you can wire through the slats, keeping some of your longer cables out of the way and under the board. This makes it very easy to sway pedals out, or rearrange your signal flow. They're really a great design, and if you're looking for a pedal board, I couldn't recommend them enough. Anyway, moving on...
Here are the pedals with velcro on their backs.
Now we get to the good stuff. Afer you have them velcroed and you have all your power and audio cables ready, it's time to decide on your signal path. This is VERY important, and something I didn't understand the first couple boards I made. You need to take stock of what pedals you have, what they do to the sound, and then what order they need to be in. Putting different pedals on either side of a delay will provide the best example of this.
My set-up on this is fairly standard, but the tremolo is in a different spot than some might typically use. I start out with the tuner. This has a bypass output and a muting output. The muting on/off output goes directly to the Baggs DI on the other side of the board. This is for an acoustic guitar or mandolin. That way I can use the same cable for every instrument, but I don't have to shut off all my distortions and delays to switch to an acoustic sound. The bypassed output goes to the volume/wah. This is a cool, little pedal I got off ebay for like 30 bucks. The wah sounds great and the volume is very clean and complete, something my other volume has a problem with. I like it's tiny size as well.
From there it goes to the Rt. 66, which is a compressor and an overdrive, which I had modded to be more of a clean boost. Then it goes to the Rat, this one modded for a less-nasally heavy metal sound to more of a seventies distortion, to the Danelectro Overdrive. I had these originally swapped, but since I'll never use them together, and they fit better on the board in this formation, I moved them. Then I go to the tremolo and the Ibanez delay, which is the first pedal I ever bought and still one of my favorites. Then I go to the A/B box. From here on of the sends goes to the "dry" amp. This is considered "dry" because it will have less delay on it.
The other output here goes to the H2O, which is a nice analog delay and chorus. A very great pedal, both sonically and economically. This, and the TU-2 tuner, are the only pedals I have on BOTH my big and little boards. From here the line will go to the "wet" amp. I left some space after this on the board for whatever randomness I decide will be fun to have, maybe a pitch-shifter or phaser, and these would only go to the "wet" amp, as well.
Here is a shot of the wiring underneath the PedalTrain.
and a close-up so you can see the ties that keep it neater and less likely to wear out your cables.
and the same view from the front
Building a pedal board is never easy, and I find I need to believe in myself and go with what my heart says is true to be able to pull it off. That's why I need some encouragement.
Now, the fun part: trying it out!
It sounds great and everything works correctly. The guardian of the Velvet Eagle, the Super-Gorilla looks on with rock approval.
Now I'll fit the board snugly in its case
And it's time to make sure this wasn't all useless. If it weighs more than 50 pounds I'll have to pay an extra amount every time I fly to a gig.
36 Pounds! Awesome. This gives me room for a few more pedals, cables, strings, whatever. Take that American Airlines!!
Also, I can't say enough how you need to have good cables to have good tone. Cheap little plastic deals can cut up to 10% of your volume with each cable you use. If you use seven or eight in a row, you're losing almost 3/4's of your guitar's initial volume. I strongly recommend George L. cable, which is a little more expensive, but so worth it. The George L. comes separately as cables and jacks, and you cut the cable to the length you need and then screw the jacks on the ends. Very hands. Unfortunately, I ran out of George L. today, so I used a couple spare plastic ones, but I will replace them next week. Here are the two different kinds I used today.
Also, and I don't have a picture, but you can see the plug in the shot in the case, a good, cheap power supply is the Visual Sound 1Spot. It's made by the same company as the H2O and Route 66. They're like twenty bucks, and chains that will power 5 pedals are an additional ten bucks each. I am using two chains off one 1Spot on this board. They also make little adaptors for different style jacks, so that it can work with any pedal. I have three different jack styles on this board, and this little guy saved me probably a hundred bucks to power them all. And it's very quiet, unlike a lot of chain-styled power adaptors.
Well, there she is, and I hope you weren't bored to death. As you can see, I really love this stuff. I'm blessed that I get to do my hobby for a living, for sure. I also truly believe that excellence in what you create is a reflection of your Creator, and so I always try to make these work and sound the best they can. It also saves you a lot of headaches later on. Thanks for reading this, and if you have any questions, feel free to ask.
Also, thanks to Geof who told me how to do photos on here. Next up: Invasion of the Baby Pictures!!
Reader Comments (6)
It's both awesome to see this and really unbelievably amusing for you to intersperse crazy stuff in the middle. I am still crying over the O mag appearance. :D
i'm the same as geof...that was hilarious. but also really cool to see your setup, and i look forward to seeing the big board.
Yes, happy to see that Oprah is a motif on this blog.
Wow, I feel educated. Seriously...I'm not just being sarcastic! If I ever get ONE pedal, I may feel the need to start branching out more and then I would know what to do!! Now I know...and knowing is half the battle...
dude, that was EXTREMELY helpful, thanks for all the info. now it's time to go pray to oprah.
*drooool* very nice. and thank you for the cable recommendation, i'll have to look into those.