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Post new topic A/B Line Selector with both channels "off" capability?
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Author Topic:  A/B Line Selector with both channels "off" capability?
John Poston

 

From:
Albuquerque, NM, USA
Post  Posted 7 Sep 2021 7:59 am    
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I have never used A/B pedals before, but basically want to get something very basic to either send line A, line B or neither to one amp.

From what I can tell, most just switch between channel A or B. But it would be nice for me to be able to turn both channels off as this is for 2 acoustic instruments that I would not always be using.

Anyone know of something that would fit the bill? Thanks.
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James Collett

 

From:
San Dimas, CA
Post  Posted 7 Sep 2021 10:11 am    
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You could always get an A/B/C pedal, and just not use the "C" channel. I'm not sure I've seen one with an off setting.
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Jerry Overstreet


From:
Louisville Ky
Post  Posted 7 Sep 2021 10:19 am    
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Check with loopmaster.com. If they don't, they can probably custom build it.

The A/B Switchers I build do have a center off position, but they are built with a 3 way toggle switch, not a stomp switch and designed to clip on a steel leg or mic stand.

Having said that, I don't have anything available at the moment and it would be some time before I'm able to build any more. But, as a last resort, I can build one for you at a later time if you have time to wait.

Here is a post describing it: The cost has gone up to $75 however considering parts prices, etc.
https://bb.steelguitarforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=346199&highlight=switcher
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D Schubert

 

From:
Columbia, MO, USA
Post  Posted 8 Sep 2021 6:52 am    
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Maybe use a tuner pedal to turn the volume off, along with conventional A/B/A+B switch?
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Brooks Montgomery


From:
Idaho, USA
Post  Posted 8 Sep 2021 6:59 am    
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A banjo, like a pet monkey, seems like a good idea at first.
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Jon Light


From:
Saugerties, NY
Post  Posted 8 Sep 2021 8:39 am    
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Loopmaster is an absolute no.
You have to dig into the FAQ page to see that he claims health issues and is behind on orders.
But you have dig even deeper on the page to find, buried, that fullfillment time is 8-12 weeks! 2-3 months.
I'm into week 16 on a small ($30) order.
If you do not state this sort of lead time info ON YOUR ORDER FORM, you do not deserve to be trusted.
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Richard Sinkler


From:
aka: Rusty Strings -- Missoula, Montana
Post  Posted 8 Sep 2021 8:51 am    
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It's loop-master.com. Needs the dash in between loop and master.
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Eric OHara


From:
Peru, NY, USA
Post  Posted 8 Sep 2021 11:51 am    
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Hi - I’ve found this pedal very useful and it’s built
like a tank. The Mute switch turns off the main output
Jack and stops the guitar signal from reaching
the amp. EO


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John Poston

 

From:
Albuquerque, NM, USA
Post  Posted 8 Sep 2021 2:50 pm    
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Thanks everyone for the input!

For the price that Bigshot looks pretty sweet - just found a used one and placed an order.
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Dave Mudgett


From:
Central Pennsylvania and Gallatin, Tennessee
Post  Posted 14 Sep 2021 6:09 pm    
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Unfortunately, what I need is the equivalent of loopmaster's Deluxe Pedalboard Router, to accept two inputs with a loop into a single pedalboard and route each input to a different output (amp). I need to be able to do instrument/amp switching for my gigs much more quickly these days. So I started investigating loopmaster (which is loop-master.com for sure). I don't like what I found, for more read up at the gear page - e.g.,

https://www.thegearpage.net/board/index.php?threads/avoid-loopmaster-loop-pedals.1996866/

https://www.thegearpage.net/board/index.php?threads/loop-master-pedals.2221311/

https://www.thegearpage.net/board/index.php?threads/loop-master-pedal-wait-time.1993515/

The loopmaster website was up until today, but I tried it just now and it comes up Website Disabled.

Explanations vary from the owner being sick to being deceased. There is an obit for a guy of the same name in KY, but it's not at all clear that it's the same guy. I don't want to contribute to rumors at all - just stating what I have been reading - just a warning to do your homework before you even think of sending money. I think it's pretty sad either way - the stuff of his I've tried was good and reasonably priced.

Personally, if I had money into him, I'd file a dispute (paypal, credit card, whatever) to see if that shakes some apples loose. But I saw this before I ordered, thanks for the heads up.
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Tony Prior


From:
Charlotte NC
Post  Posted 15 Sep 2021 12:44 am    
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The Big Shot is a nice unit but the MUTE is for the Tuner use (splitting hairs here) not for either input. Yes it does the same thing, it silences the inputs. But also consider that a tuner behind the A/B box does the exact same thing.

I've been using a Morley A/B box for years now and it allows for customizing the Pedal Board signal routing. If I had to do it again I would use the Morley A/B/C which allows yet another bunch of options, or use C with NO OUTPUT to silence the inputs which is what an in line tuner does as well.

Many options available with each unit . Use 2 or more A/B boxes to route to different amps .

The great Eric Johnson uses multiple A/B boxes for switching to his now famous rig. 3 different amps and various delays/effects. It's nuts !

have fun ! Laughing



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Emmons L-II , Fender Telecasters, B-Benders
Pro Tools 12 on WIN 7 !
jobless- but not homeless- now retired 9 years

CURRENT MUSIC TRACKS AT > https://tprior2241.wixsite.com/website
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Steve Sycamore

 

From:
Sweden
Post  Posted 15 Sep 2021 2:45 am    
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Dave Mudgett wrote:
Unfortunately, what I need is the equivalent of loopmaster's Deluxe Pedalboard Router, to accept two inputs with a loop into a single pedalboard and route each input to a different output (amp).


The inexpensive Boss LS-2 might do the trick. There are 3 selectable outputs and 1 main input jack. But there is a second and third input for handling "effects" input channels that I think can be mapped to the output channels.

https://www.boss.info/global/support/by_product/ls-2/owners_manuals/23279539-620b-4e83-b456-93cee397e702/
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Jon Light


From:
Saugerties, NY
Post  Posted 15 Sep 2021 2:54 am    
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re: Loopmaster, last week this thread moved me to finally write him demanding immediate shipment or refund. I received an automated reply with a sad sad tale to tell (dated well before my order that he should never have accepted). My order having been made in May, I don't imagine I've got any Paypal recourse. Dude being dead surely would explain things. Website being down would seem to dot the I. Fortunately I'm only out 30 bux.

eta: discovered on Paypal that I've got 180 days to dispute it (I've never done this before) so I've started the ball rolling. First message goes to the seller, then I follow up with the next step.
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Dave Mudgett


From:
Central Pennsylvania and Gallatin, Tennessee
Post  Posted 15 Sep 2021 7:57 am    
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Quote:
The inexpensive Boss LS-2 might do the trick.

That would work OK except for the fact that I am hell-bent to retain a pure true bypass path through my pedalboards. I am OK with buffering in some situations, but there are others where I am adamant to retain a straight signal path from guitar/steel to volume pedal (or not) to amp. I have guitars and some playing situations that just flat-out sound better straight into the amp. I sometimes don't even run my guitar/slide guitar or non-pedal steel signal through my volume pedal. I pretty much excised all my Boss pedals from my life about 10 years ago and I add DPDT switches to some other pedals to give true bypass. I understand that active switching with buffers has advantages in some situations, but I don't need or want it.

I was gonna buy a Klon years and years ago, but didn't because the buffer is in the signal path all the time and Klons are hard to work on because the circuit is gooped. But I got a Klon KTR because it has a switch to disable the buffer. Perfect!
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Jon Light


From:
Saugerties, NY
Post  Posted 15 Sep 2021 8:02 am    
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Dave -- if you haven't already, have a look at this product line. I've got a simple 1 in, 2 out (or 2 in, 1 out) A/B switcher on my board but they have some more complex stuff. I haven't looked closely enough to see if they have what you seek.
https://www.one-control.com/switcher
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Dave Mudgett


From:
Central Pennsylvania and Gallatin, Tennessee
Post  Posted 15 Sep 2021 11:26 am    
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Yeah, Jon - I looked through their entire line, and a bunch of others, and I don't see anything ready-made with a simple true-bypass version of what I want. I went way down the rabbit hole on this. There are a bunch of complex midi-switched switching units, but that is way too much and wouldn't help my situation. For simple switches, I looked at one-control, American Loopers, Saturnworks, and some others that I dug out of those threads I posted earlier and more. I really don't think anybody else makes what I'm looking for off-the-shelf.

Saturnworks does custom work. I need to figure out the absolute coup de grace switcher that would cover all my needs - probably 3-inputs (typically steel, guitar, slide guitar) into 2-outputs controlled by one switch, 2 loops controlled by one switch in case I want to use two separate pedalboards, silent tuner-out controlled by one switch - and get a quote from them. Their stuff looks good.

But this thread on talkbass shows the most basic 2-input/2-output/single-loop circuit I need - https://www.talkbass.com/threads/need-a-non-standard-dual-input-dual-output-switcher-with-loop-capabilities.1424192/ - they don't seem to permit hot-linking to the image, but this is a direct link to it: https://www.talkbass.com/attachments/abswitchfxloop-png.3549236/

This is a piece of cake to build. The only slight PITA is the LEDs and external power for same, which I don't really need if I just use a 3-position toggle switch, with the center position to handle a slight modification to give the silent tuner out. Add a leg/mic-stand clamp, this should fit in a small box and solve my basic problem for cheap. And it shouldn't require a lot more real estate to add a third input, but that would force a separate switch for the tuner out. Only reason I haven't done it is that the need arises from a veritable ton of multi-instrument gigs that have come my way since late July and I've been too busy to fool with it.

Oh, I do note the Carl Martin Route Box - https://www.carlmartin.com/route-box - this would do the basic function, but it's two buttons for every guitar/amp switch, no tuner out, and so doesn't hit all the important points for me at $194 + tax street price.

I'll be honest - I don't understand why there seems to be so little out-of-the-box thinking on this kind of stuff. Almost everything out there is for one input, one output, and tons and tons of loops possible. I see lots of potential applications for the kind of box I'm talking about where multiple instruments need to be simply routed to multiple outs with one or more loops for effects. I have to believe there are lots of multi-instrumentalists out there who could really use multiple inputs, and multiple outs for different kinds of amps, DI, or whatever.
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Bill Hatcher

 

From:
Atlanta Ga. USA
Post  Posted 15 Sep 2021 7:47 pm    
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this is the unit i am going to get to sum 3 different pickup inputs from three necks. added bonus is EQ for each and the impedance is built in to work with guitar pickups. cost is reasonable too. you can use it for one input to three outs too. effect loops, eq, phase knob in case you get an out of phase situation with different pickups. cool unit. https://www.ehx.com/products/tri-parallel-mixer/

a demo...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Agvh7llFioQ
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Tony Prior


From:
Charlotte NC
Post  Posted 15 Sep 2021 11:35 pm    
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Bill, thats a pretty kool unit, I didn't even know it existed ! Priced fairly as well.

tp
_________________
Emmons L-II , Fender Telecasters, B-Benders
Pro Tools 12 on WIN 7 !
jobless- but not homeless- now retired 9 years

CURRENT MUSIC TRACKS AT > https://tprior2241.wixsite.com/website
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Jon Light


From:
Saugerties, NY
Post  Posted 8 Oct 2021 9:24 am    
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Jon Light wrote:
re: Loopmaster, last week this thread moved me to finally write him demanding immediate shipment or refund. I received an automated reply with a sad sad tale to tell (dated well before my order that he should never have accepted). My order having been made in May, I don't imagine I've got any Paypal recourse. Dude being dead surely would explain things. Website being down would seem to dot the I. Fortunately I'm only out 30 bux.

eta: discovered on Paypal that I've got 180 days to dispute it (I've never done this before) so I've started the ball rolling. First message goes to the seller, then I follow up with the next step.


If anyone was interested, I was just notified by Paypal that they are issuing me a refund and closing the case.
I don't consider them my friend but I do use them a lot. Gotta say, I did not expect to be protected on this 5 month old transaction. So this exceeds my expectations. It means that you do get something for the user's fees. Even if the seller were honest (which in this case he was not, otherwise he would have stated his inability to fulfill orders in a timely manner on his website's front page) and only defaulted due to death, Paypal's insurance kicked in and covered me. Wonder what would have happened had it been a $300 claim.
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