WAH w/o smooth transition?

jarabuandi

Experienced
Hi all,
hope you guys can help me out here. I've got a WAH block (Cry Babe) and think that the transition heel to toe isn't very smooth???? Not sure how to describe it but if you rock the foot 'fast' it seems to me that there's a sudden change between the low and high freq (not sure how to describe it better). If I rock the pedal slowly it's much smoother. Now, I never had a WAH pedal but last week I was a a local pub and the guitarist has a cry baby and it sound very smooth. Are any of my settings wrong?
 

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for starters straighten out the modifier start mid and end, lower the damping %. If that does not fix it, what kinda expression pedal? is the expression pedal connected direct to the axe fx? with a trs cable? is the pedal calibrated? more info is needed. more then likely the trouble is not the wah block.
 
for starters straighten out the modifier start mid and end, lower the damping %. If that does not fix it, what kinda expression pedal? is the expression pedal connected direct to the axe fx? with a trs cable? is the pedal calibrated? more info is needed. more then likely the trouble is not the wah block.

Hi @paranoid…thanks for looking into that. It's is a Mission Engineering pedal and it's attached to the MFC-1010 with a two TRS cables. Pedal is calibrated as per @Chris@AxeFxTutorials instructions.
 
So I followed @Perdikament advised and se it to linear. Different, still not sure it solve the issue completely. Will do more testing. I've notice another thing though. When playing above the 12th fret the WAH effect seems to disappear! Is this normal?
 
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Did you square up the modifier settings? if not, by the looks of your screen shot you are not getting full range of the wah control.
 
Did you square up the modifier settings? if not, by the looks of your screen shot you are not getting full range of the wah control.
Yes, you have to do that as well as change the taper.
Linear makes it an even sweep, the log(s) will make it sweep faster thru by varying degrees. But you have to even out the modifier as well..
also, did you calibrate the expression pedal to the AxeFX?
 
Yes, you have to do that as well as change the taper.
Linear makes it an even sweep, the log(s) will make it sweep faster thru by varying degrees. But you have to even out the modifier as well..
also, did you calibrate the expression pedal to the AxeFX?

Thanks @paranoid and @Perdikament ... what you mean by 'square up' and 'even out the modifier' ? and yes the pedal is calibrated to the Axe-fx.
 
in the screen shot you posted in the op shows a modifier window that I assume is the one you have attached to your wahwa control. the mid point should be set to 50% and the end should be at 100% for your exp to control the modifier smoothly, but it is not. Also the damping set at 50ms will delay the pedal control, if you want quick response you should lower that to 10ms or less.
 
It might be helpful to post a recording. It doesn't look like the modifier curve is the problem. That's still a pretty even transition from min to max.

Setting the max. freq. too low can make the wah effect disappear on higher notes. (You could say the modifier curve is part of this issue, but it can be addressed by just increasing wah max. freq. parameter.)

Are you familiar with how auto-engage works? It's not clear if part of what you're noticing could be the wah switching on and off. It would be ideal to disable auto-engage for now, during any further testing or recording an example.
 
in the screen shot you posted in the op shows a modifier window that I assume is the one you have attached to your wahwa control. the mid point should be set to 50% and the end should be at 100% for your exp to control the modifier smoothly, but it is not. Also the damping set at 50ms will delay the pedal control, if you want quick response you should lower that to 10ms or less.

So basically you're saying it's best to leave those two param at 50% and 100%? Try this as well and set the damping back at 10ms as well. Cheers
 
It might be helpful to post a recording. It doesn't look like the modifier curve is the problem. That's still a pretty even transition from min to max.

Setting the max. freq. too low can make the wah effect disappear on higher notes. (You could say the modifier curve is part of this issue, but it can be addressed by just increasing wah max. freq. parameter.)

Are you familiar with how auto-engage works? It's not clear if part of what you're noticing could be the wah switching on and off. It would be ideal to disable auto-engage for now, during any further testing or recording an example.

This is just a very generic preset I'm using for a Hendrix song. I don't use the on/off switch of the pedal. What I do is switch scene and the WAH is on.
What I will ry though is what you're suggesting...increase the max freq param.
 
The modifier screenshot you posted shows auto-engage enabled. That means the wah block can engage & bypass based on pedal position. Try setting auto-engage to "off" instead of "slow speed". Then see if you notice the abrupt changes mentioned earlier.
 
Another thing I was just thinking of, what are the low & high frequencies set to? If they are out of normal Wah ranges that would change the speed of the sweep.
 
The modifier screenshot you posted shows auto-engage enabled. That means the wah block can engage & bypass based on pedal position. Try setting auto-engage to "off" instead of "slow speed". Then see if you notice the abrupt changes mentioned earlier.


You're right...i was noodling around trying different settings before posting it and it shows auto-engage. It is off.
 
Another thing I was just thinking of, what are the low & high frequencies set to? If they are out of normal Wah ranges that would change the speed of the sweep.


So basically I set everything back to default except I've changed the taper to linear instead of the Log30 and yes it makes a huge difference even up in the higher register the WAH effect is more present now.
 
So basically I set everything back to default except I've changed the taper to linear instead of the Log30 and yes it makes a huge difference even up in the higher register the WAH effect is more present now.
Cool, the taper is definitely a personal preference thing but does make a huge difference. The log values can be good if you're looking for more of a funk type Wah sound as you don't have to rock so much back & forth to sweep thru the frequencies.
If ya want more range frequency wise I'll bring down the low value to 200-250, the high value I leave, once you get too high it really gets lost.
 
Cool, the taper is definitely a personal preference thing but does make a huge difference. The log values can be good if you're looking for more of a funk type Wah sound as you don't have to rock so much back & forth to sweep thru the frequencies.
If ya want more range frequency wise I'll bring down the low value to 200-250, the high value I leave, once you get too high it really gets lost.

Thanks mate, the taper is the thing. Thanks for explaining the log taper as well. At least I know how to use it properly… I'll try the low values as well.
 
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