Pedal Board
The heart of my board is the top right patch bay I built. It's main function is to rout all signals going in, through and out of the board, to be the one place where all cable connections are made, including the FASlink. It has a selectable input between regular cable and a Line6 Relay G30 wireless unit. The patch bay also acts as a splitter via an internal AMZ buffered splitter. The original idea was to split the signal into main guitar signal going into the board and another signal going into a volume pedal into a Line6 Verbzilla to create a separate shimmer output. But after experimenting with the shimmer in my Axe I've decided not to use that separate route any more and that output is now vacant. Could be used for a separate amp input in case I ever want to experiment with wet/dry though.
Main guitar signal goes into the board and into the red 2 loop switcher next to the polytune. An old unit I rehoused years ago built by a (then) local guy who frequents a lot of tech boards under the name Bernaduur. He used to troubleshoot a lot of my builds back then as well. Loop 1 of the looper has the Boss DD-7 which I use for looping. At first to troubleshoot my rig, and then to test out sounds with the Axe without having to play guitar all the time. Loop 2 has the Boss DF-2 into the Digitech WH-1. I use my Axe for most Whammy things, but there are some things the Axe can't do (yet) that the WH-1 can. The DF-2 is not used for dirt, just to provide a constant feedback signal. From the looper the signal goes back to the patch bay, into a THcustoms relay bypass switch, which serves as a tuner out with mute. Tuner out goes into the TC Polytune. From the relay bypass switch the signal finally leaves the board and goes to my Axe. Everything is powered by a Voodoolab Pedal Power Pro 2 mounted underneath the Pedal Train frame.
Switching on the MFC is done via a standard method. Switches 1-5 do presets, swtiches 6-9 do scenes 1-4, swiches 11-14 do scenes 5-8, switch 10 does scene down, switch 15 does scene up, switch 16 activates the Axe tuner and mutes everything and switch 17 does tempo. Two Roland EV-5's are used as expressionpedals 2 and 1 from left to right, to follow standard old pedal chain orders.
Keyboard
A Yamaha CS-2 keyboard that I got in 2012 when I was still in a Radiohead tribute band, still programmed with the old RH patches. I mostly use piano anyway. Stereo signal goes into a Line6 DL-4 for added delay fun. Stereo delay, reverse delay and sweep echo are my programmed sounds. The keyboard also doubles as storage space for my picks, bottle neck and capo.
The Rack
Top Shelf
Bottom row has a Korg Kaosspad 3 and a Korg Kaossilator. Top row has a Kenton wireless MIDI receiver sending MIDI input into the Kaossilator and Kaosspad. Then a Line6 M5, which sits inside the Axe's FX sent/return loop to give me a few coveted sounds that the Axe can't do (yet). Top right is another Line6 wireless receiver, in this case the Relay G50. Which I will probably patch through to the pedal board as this is a superior unit to the G30.
19" rack
From top to bottom:
- Behringer Ultralink splitter mixer
- Samson Powerbrite power conditioner
- Axe-FX2 XL+, you know what this does
- Self made 1U plate with all my connections up front
- Matrix GT1000 power amp
- Self made 3 channel signal buffered splitter/cab simulator with balanced outputs, from now on called cab simulator.
I use the Behringer to mix the outputs from the Kaosspad3, Kaossilator and my keyboard into 2 balanced outputs. This to reduce the number of channels on our channel list.
The Samson is basically a gloried powerstrip that provides power to everything and I get to switch on or off at the front, instead of having to reach in the back of my rack. I'm really big on not having to grope in the back of my rack, especially on dark stages. Never a good thing in my book.
You all know what the Axe-FX does. I use the balanced outputs of the Axe to go straight into the FOH mixer if there is one, and the unbalanced outputs for speakers with the Matrix poweramp.
The Matrix is my most recent addition. Previously I used a Marshall 8008 valvestate poweramp but the Matrix is both 5 kilos lighter, plus it really does work very well with modeling preamps. With the Marshall cab sims sounded like shit so I had to use separate patches without cab sims. Those however sound crap on the Matrix so I get to use my cab sim patches instead. Did I also mention that its 5 kilos lighter?
The Cab Simulator that I build was part of my old setup when I used my old pre-Axe FX pedal board. I was heavy into AMT preamp pedals so I didn't really need a traditional amp, just a power amp. The idea was to have a unit where I could plug my pedal board in, stereo of course, and then split the signal. One path would go into the old Marshall poweramp and then into speakers, the other path would go into an analog cab simulator circuit, I used the one from the Marshall JMP-1, and then get converted into balanced signal so I could also send signal straight into a FOH mixer using XLR outputs. I created three channels, two for the pedal board, one for additional shimmer. I also planned for future use by having 2 inputs on each channel, up the front for the pedal board outputs, and in the back for future Axe use. The inputs could be selected via switch with a bicolored LED showing which input would be in use. Red for front, green in the back. The unbalanced outputs of the Axe go in there, so green is currently showing. Speaker outputs would also be in the back and 2 currently go into the back. If no input is used, as is in the left channel, then the bicolored LED cannot light up. Complicated? Probably, but at least it makes sense for me.
As I said I HATE groping in the back of racks for connections. I see a lot of you guys go this way, but I would go insane having to fumble with flashlights to see which jack goes into which input. So I used a 1U plate to have all my connections up front. From right to left:
- Powercon connector to provide power to the Samson
- XLR connector for the FASlink cable between the Axe and the MFC101
- Two jack inputs for my keyboard that go to the Behringer mixer
- USB connector for the Axe-FX. Why this is in the back of the Axe is a complete mystery, as it would be a nightmare to quickly do some editing on a badly lit stage. Which they almost always are if you really need to do this. Bad design if you ask me. Fractal, if you're ever going to do an Axe FX3, have this connection also up the front.
- Four XLR outputs. 2 for the Axe FX, 2 for the Behringer mixer
- Two jack outputs from the Matrix poweramp.
As it is one of the last additions I could probably use one more jack connector, for the Relay G50 going to the pedal board. But I'll doubt there's any room left.
These were just speakers that I used in the rehearsal room that we rented. I used the two Marshall cabs. The right one, a JCM900 1960, sounds a little better and louder then the left one, a JCM800 1960. So I had to compensate for it by turning that channel up a little more on the poweramp. We rented the room in a local youth center which has now been closed thanks to government cuts. Unfortunately I was too late to bag the two Marshall cabs for future use. Mostly for rehearsal in the new rehearsal room as I don't plan on using cabs for live purposes, the idea is to go straight into the FOH mixer at all times, and if there's a local cab for me to use to only use it for feedback. Live I use In-Ear so no need for me to use anything for stage sound.