UKC

Don't know that this is culture, exactly, but at least it's music-related ...

I want to mount a power supply on a pedalboard with a number of boss effect pedals, and distribute power to them via 2.1mm jack DC power cables. The power unit has isolated outputs, so I don't want to daisy chain. I have some individual connector cables but they're all far too long - the board looks like a plate of spaghetti. Can anyone suggest where I could get some really short ones? I've done some searching but can only find just the jacks or daisy chain arrangements.

Thanks in advance

In reply to bpmclimb:

cut some cable to correct length and mount your own plugs?

In reply to bpmclimb:

+1

You are right to avoid daisy chains - you risk creating hum loops and there's no guarantee that the pedals' ground connects to the same pole of the power supply.

In reply to Mikkel:

I had a feeling that was where I would be heading.

In reply to bpmclimb: Have you bought the power unit already? - the one I bought for tis job had the cables with it.

Ben

In reply to bpmclimb:

http://www.visiosound.co.uk (then click on "Cables and connectors").

They're in Halifax, and all the stuff I've had from them has been spot on, with the added bonus of almost instantaneous delivery and extremely reasonable prices.

HTH, JW

In reply to bpmclimb: maplin sell all plugs wire, crimps, cable tidys etc, I've soldering up so many set ups, generally making a pedal board for a gig by gig basis, its not just daisy chains that give hum, its also the length of cable from amp to geetar, which when reading further into it you can use pedals to rectify this. As it happens a lot of more modern power supply units are self regulating with a daisy chain, unless you're prepared to send over a hundred notes for one as you have different voltage and the earth the other way round type jack plugs like Electro Harmonix on your board

If you have some mid length ones that you want to shorten the simplest thing to do is shorten them by taping them up, as you need to be reasonably accurate with your soldering as the wires are quite fine, or just chop the wire down the center shorten re solder and apply shrink wrap.

All this hum is theoretical anyway, once you get your amp warm all that happens is sound guy tells you to turn down, and you can't hear any hum no more, you then move your volume knob by a few microns till he looks happy.

If you don't have one, what you really need is a good quality noise gate, have you ever tried standing on a lead to see the sound that you hear, no more with noise gate, dial the amount of feedback you want, switch off and still have tuner working etc etc.

In reply to johnj:


I just cant work this sentence out at all.

In reply to Mr Mark Stephen Davies:

I understand your difficulties, having many times having tried to gate switches but have delay in the switch circuit which cannot be gated has got my logic a little fuzzy or hard to follow on more than one occasion.

In reply to johnj:

Thanks for the thorough reply.

I already checked out Maplin - they don't sell ready to go connectors, but as you say they sell the bits to make them up. I can do this, but it's a fiddly job and I don't have the time to do it before my next gig.

As I said I already have a good power distributor with fully isolated outputs (I sent rather more than a hundred notes for it, actually). I have the set of connectors that came with it, which are fine for powering pedals when not mounted on a board, but now that I've (finally) got round to using a board they're far too long - I need some much shorter ones.

I think you may have jumped to the conclusion that I'm playing screaming lead guitar! Actually I'm making up a pedal board for use with amplified cellos, both electric (piezo pickup) and acoustic with DPA condenser mic and tube preamp. Both these set ups are particularly sensitive to hum and unwanted noise of other sorts, and the gigs I do tend to be relatively quiet - hum problems are far from theoretical.

In reply to BenTiffin:

Yes, but they're far too long for use on a pedalboard.

In reply to John Ww:

Thanks for the link, but I can't see any DC power connectors there, unless I missed something ..

In reply to bpmclimb:

No problem, yes you're correct in the assumption that I was talking about hum in the context of rock guitar setup which I've found you can mask with over-amplification; However it is still a concern hence the suggestion of a noise gate.

I've used this one for a good while now, probably the most important pedal i use.

youtube.com/watch?v=Wk3FV_Aqe18&


As I find that unwanted noise always suppressors tone, and the more units you use all add to the noise. I'm far from been an expert in this field but I've spent a lot of time with experimental set ups. At times I've found that using batteries in the effect units which hum the most reduced noise, and then it seemed to be venue specific so I'd run a cut out switch on the board and amp. At one point I even earthed and grounded the power supply case to floor with a short earth strap.

What I have found that works as well as anything is using the shortest runs on amp to instrument cables with good shielding, sometimes making patch leads to length with good cable as a lot of those cheap patch leads seem to be sensitive to radio frequencies.


As you said you already have the cables but are too long, maybe the easiest solution is cut them to length and re solder and shrink wrap, which only requires one joint per cable rather than a plug on each end of a new cable.

Good luck with it anyway :+)

In reply to johnj:

Finally, I found some short ready made ones online. Manufactured in US by CIOKS and distributed by HOTROXUK

In reply to bpmclimb:

..... but they're the wrong sort. Specific to a CIOKS power supply with non-standard outputs. Not made clear on website. Grrrrrrrr!! I'm off to Maplins.