FX8 and Rivera Knucklehead [K7] issues. Help!!

[tobafett]

Good day everyone,

I am a recent FX8 owner, and I am having a lot of difficulty with getting the unit to work with my Rivera Knucklehead [K7] amplifier using the 4CM. Here is the signal chain as I have it now:

Guitar --> FX8 in 1 PRE --> FX8 OUT 1 PRE L using humbuster cable --> High gain input of Rivera
Rivera FX Send --> FX8 in 2 POST L --> FX8 out POST L using humbuster cable --> Rivera FX return.

The Rivera FX loop send is set to 10. The Rivera FX loop return is set any where between 1-10. The Rivera FX loop blend is set to 10.

Here is my issue: The effects send to the FX8 never clips no matter what I have the Rivera FX send level set to. The FX8 return does not push the amp hard enough to ever reach unity gain. The effect level is super low and hard to hear. If I turn the Rivera loop blend to anything lower than 10 the amp gets much louder, but the effect goes away completely.

I've spent hours trying to figure it out, and have read the owners manual for both the amp and the FX8 over and over, but I must be missing something. I've tried the FX8 direct into the Rivera FX loop and it makes no difference. I've tried the FX8 mix at 0 to 50% with no change in the sound.

I am hoping someone out there has used this set up, or a similar Rivera amp with the FX8 and can provide me with pointers on what I am doing wrong. I have tried different cables, etc, but the issue is always the same. The send from the amp never clips the input, and the return from the FX8 is never loud enough to achieve unity gain. Any help is much appreciated! Thank you!! Tobe

 

[envelope]

Holy crap, I just went on their website and heard the shadow's fall demo. That amp has the magic crunch berries, holy shi*tballs batman! Anyways, did you pull the fx loop return knob out? They forgot to mention that in their manual, ha ha. Except in the beginning of it, the part that no one reads, ha ha!

 

[tobafett]

Anyways, did you pull the fx loop return knob out? They forgot to mention that in their manual, ha ha. Except in the beginning of it, the part that no one reads, ha ha!

Yes, the loop is active. It is working better now, but I am not really sure why. Lol! I made some changes in the FX8 and it began to work better. However, I am still not happy with the levels. The amp master volumes need to be up significantly higher to achieve the same volume when the FX8 is active in the 4 CM method. Maybe its just the Rivera FX loop? In one of my groups the other guitarist has his FX8 running through his Engl savage and it sounds great. Maybe I'll check that out. Thank you for the response!

 

[tobafett]

Well, not to resurrect an old thread, but after almost two years I have an update. I connected one of my FM3s to the Rivera and set it up as laid out in Leon Todd's FM3 4CM video. (Great video BTW) I used the following connections: FM3 output one XLR to TS into amps' Fx Return, 1/4" to 1/4" instrument cable From Amps FX send to input two on the FM3 and a humbuster 1/4" cable from the FM3 ouptut 2 to the front of the amp. I set the blend on the rivera to 10 (series) and dialed in the levels of the Rivera's send and return. For me, I needed the send at 10 and the return at 4.5 on the amo FX loop. Other than a little buzz when the loop is active, no additional noise, or volume weirdness. Sounds awesome now! After speaking with Rivera, they suggested using the loop in serial not parallel mode, and that seemed to make all the difference in the world. I sold my FX8 to help finance my first FM3, so I cannot go back and test. I do not know about using the FM3 in the 4CM for shows, but for practice, it is going to be awesome. I can leave the FM3 at the amp use the 4CM, plus a midi cable and get complete control of the amplifier and Fm3 via one instrument cable and one midi cable out to the foot controller and expression pedal. So no power required! I am excited to get this going in practice soon and ditch all my pedals and pedal board!