My Wah Is Turning On By Itself

PeteLaramee

PeteLaramee

Member
My wah is starting to turn on or auto engage all by itself. I'll be playing or recording and I'll be nowhere near my pedalboard and the wah will just kick in. The heal will be down all the way on my expression pedal yet it will turn on. It may take 2 seconds, 2 minutes, or 2 hours, but it's happening every day. And it's happening on more than one scene. I haven't updated software in months. I re-calibrated the pedal, but no luck. I'm using the Boss FV-500H into my MFC-101 into the Axe II. What am I doing wrong?
 
Yeah, same thing happened to me, it was in the arm inside the wah, it had come a bit loose. I took it apart & tightened everything up on the inside & been straight ever since.
It’s only going to get worse. It drove me crazy for a little while till I figured out what was going on.
 
If the pedal tension is slipping toward toe down it would do what you describe

You should be able to easily adjust pedal tension with an Allen wrench. At least on my exp and wahs pedals they all have a screw for it under the pedal treadle
 
I'm betting its the cable... But if you do find that it is slowly drifting into being active, then take a look at the different auto-engage methods. There are modes that will help with that.
 
This is one more reason why I use 95% (Toe down) for 'Auto-Engage'. Our first show at the House of Blues with the Axe-Fx, The Subs under the stage kept auto-engaging the Wah. Plus it feels more natural to me (because Wahs have toe switches) and there is less of a bump when switching at the high end of the Wah as opposed to the low end of the Wah.

You could also try some of the speed based activation modes, instead of position based?
 
Thanks for all the replies. It's definitely not the cables (I replaced them) and the pedal itself is not drifting because I can pound on the heel and it still won't disengage. I have to physically go into the layout and bypass. I don't know if it's something inside the pedal, but I ordered an EV-1 last night and i'm hoping that will do the trick.
 
Its the knob on the side of the pedal. They are a pain in the butt, I have 3. The stage vibrations are constantly slightly causing them to move and I have to recalibrate. My next purchase is going to be 3 ev 1s
 
Moke said:
This is one more reason why I use 95% (Toe down) for 'Auto-Engage'.
Click to expand...
+1 on this, have been doing it this way for years. The pedal won’t “fall” towards the heel end, but it will fall towards the toe if it’s loose or vibration gets to it. No such problems with toe down, and I set mine around 93%, if I recall.
 
I had same problem with a FAS EV-1 pedal.
It was a hardware failure and g66 sent me a replacement right away :)
 
Well, i rec'd the EV-1 today and plugged it right and the wah seems to be working as it should. I'll have much more time with it this weekend.
 
I find it interesting that with all this fancy, state of the art, digital technology the failure is caused by a mechanical part that fails to remain stable when used in its intended environment.
 
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