My fretted 4-string Zon Sonus Lightwave has the first Lightwave (S1) system, whose battery is a huge 6 ounce pack of eight AA-size NiCads. Because I let the guitar idle for nine months because I didn't have the opportunity to use a 4-string, the NiCad battery pack died, won't hold a charge, and won't allow the guitar's electronics to work even with the wall wart power supply attached.

So I get my Line 6 Variax's XPS external power supply box and wall wart, say W T F, and plug the TRS cable into the Zon Lightwave. It powers the Lightwave electronics and the guitar works perfectly. To make sure I'm not charging the dead battery pack, I unhook it and the Line 6 XPS still drives the Lightwave, no problem. This setup is no more inconvenient than using the battery pack and always having to carry around the Lightwave charger, and I actually prefer it because it eliminates battery paranoia entirely while allowing me to leave my bass plugged in all the time without worrying over the battery's condition.

To make sure I'm not putting the Lightwave circuit board at risk I call Lightwave and the engineer can't explain why this configuration works, but he'll get back to me after he sleeps on it. In the meantime, he says there may be a risk of frying one of the capacitors on the circuit board after extended use, but says replacing it with a big (very big) capacitor would remove the risk. Since there's lots of room in the control cavity without the battery pack, the goofy-large capacitor is preferable to me to worrying over a battery pack that only promises 16 hours of use per charge.

If any electronics heads can shed light on this situation, that would be interesting in case the engineer never gets back to me. In any case, I'm posting this for the interest of other Lightwave users who'd rather replace their battery powered umbilical cord with a non-battery umbilical cord. The engineer said this setup might not achieve the zero noise of the battery power, but I hear no noise.

I should mention that I didn't jump in blindly. I use the Line 6 XPS to power all my conventional active 9V basses by replacing their 9V batteries with dummy 9V terminals I've shorted by connecting the red and black wires, then plugging in the TRS cable from the XPS. I figured out this would work by studying the connections of my active basses. The Lightwave's electronics are much harder to follow because the way it's constructed you can't see exactly where all the wires go. Since I'm not an expert I didn't want to disassemble things further, and finally just plugged in the powered TRS cable.

Another thing: I've read lots of info on the Lightwave system on these boards and the vast majority of questions and feedback concern fretless basses, whether Sonuses or Sabers. I just want to say that I mostly slap my fretted Lightwave and the thing is fantastic. The IceTone piezo that people normally don't find much use for, complaining of harshness, works really well in this context. I boost the bass, back off the treble, and blend in lots of IceTone for a somewhat scooped tone with a gentle sizzle on top that slaps very nicely with a slapring. (http://www.slapring.com/en/productinfo/slapring/index.php)

In a standard jack-switching setup the ring and sleeve are used to short the ground connection. This completes the circuit and allows current flow and the amplifier turns on. This assumes that you use a TS plug which shorts the ring and sleeve contacts on the jack.

You can also provide phantom power over a TRS cable by inserting a voltage bias between the ring and sleeve. It basically acts like a power plug with the R and S contacts on the bass jack and the cable plug acting as female and male parts of the connector. The only thing that can go wrong here is reverse polarity! Know which terminal is hot and which is cold, and you can do this trick with any active bass. Whether the preamp will like it is another issue... Some circuits might not work if there is no connection on the battery clip, or if they use a DC blocking cap to isolate something in the circuit.

Please post whatever response you get from Lightwave. Also, did you drop and email to Zon and ask what they think?

For another example of this, look for info on EBS effects and how they deliver phantom. EBS amps provide voltage bias like this, i.e. you use a TRS cable to connect an EBS effect to and EBS amp to phantom-power the effect. They may (I can't remember exactly) also allow you to power one effect, and TRS the other EBS effects to it and phantom power a chain of them.

In a standard jack-switching setup the ring and sleeve are used to short the ground connection. This completes the circuit and allows current flow and the amplifier turns on. This assumes that you use a TS plug which shorts the ring and sleeve contacts on the jack.

You can also provide phantom power over a TRS cable by inserting a voltage bias between the ring and sleeve. It basically acts like a power plug with the R and S contacts on the bass jack and the cable plug acting as female and male parts of the connector. The only thing that can go wrong here is reverse polarity! Know which terminal is hot and which is cold, and you can do this trick with any active bass. Whether the preamp will like it is another issue... Some circuits might not work if there is no connection on the battery clip, or if they use a DC blocking cap to isolate something in the circuit.

Please post whatever response you get from Lightwave. Also, did you drop and email to Zon and ask what they think?


Right, the Ring-Sleeve voltage bias is what I was able to deduce on my conventional active basses. I got lucky with the polarity since I didn't consider that. I suppose I was just counting on Line 6's configuring the Variax connection in a way that matches conventional active guitars.

Lightwave's engineer, in our long phone conversation, had me attempt to determine polarity, but we discovered that Zon's construction method heat shrinks the leads so thoroughly that I'm unable to probe the output jack without doing more disassembly than I'm willing to do myself. Clearly, though, Line 6's XPS polarity is compatible because the Zon's Lightwave system works fine. The engineer still couldn't explain why, so I'll post when he gets back to me. He did say that the largest capacitor on the circuit board may be at risk--I presume because he can't say for certain how much charge this configuration will accumulate and whether or not the current capacitor can handle that? Yet Line 6's circuit boards handle the same current, so it's reasonable to presume that the XPS regulates the power supply in a way that will prevent harm. What's more, after extended use witht Line 6's XPS I haven't harmed the circuit boards on my J Deluxe (J-Retro), 1994 Fodera NYC (Bartolini NTBT), or Sonus 519 (newer Bartolini NTBT with semi-parametric mid). I did see a huge (4600uF) capacitor inside the XPS, which may be relevant here. The engineer said to ensure 100% safety I'd have to install a capacitor the size of a pill bottle inside the Lightwave, which sounds like 10,000uF or more. He was joking, but he ultimately agreed this was actually feasible and desirable since my removing the battery pack left a huge empty space inside the control cavity.

I'd have called Zon, but I called Lightwave first and they basically had all the answers. In this case, it's all about the Lightwave electronics, so ultimately I'd have to rely on what the Lightwave engineer says, regardless of Zon's opinion. Zon just installs their electronics without modification, so I figured for now posting here for outside opinions while awaiting Lightwave's return call would be as good as calling Zon.

The thing about the capacitor is probably voltage rating: if the Variax box supplies a voltage that is higher than what this first capacitor is rated for, it might be destroyed sooner or later - sooner if it's way above the rated voltage, later if it's just a bit over.
Do you know how much voltage the Variax box supplies?
Eight NiCad cells would give 9.6 volts, perhaps the cap is rated for 10 or 12 volts (although it ought to be rated 16 volts IMO).

I should have mentioned: the Variax's battery pack holds 6AA's, which is why I assumed Line 6's XPS puts out 9V. Also, the XPS's wall wart power supply is 9V (but 2000mA). If this is all strictly a matter of voltage, which I assumed, then everything should be fine, but Lightwave's engineer still indicated their capacitor may be at risk so there must be other factors regarding the way the power is supplied.

Glad that you got some info. For checking polarity, if there is battery power in the bass you can use a trs-trs cable , or a bare trs plug, and you can check the voltage between the R and S. Positive voltage will show you the neg and pos terminals - they will match the neg and pos on the meter. The meter should read -V the other way around.

Glad that you got some info. For checking polarity, if there is battery power in the bass you can use a trs-trs cable , or a bare trs plug, and you can check the voltage between the R and S. Positive voltage will show you the neg and pos terminals - they will match the neg and pos on the meter. The meter should read -V the other way around.

I tried probing the TRS cable with the multimeter, but it just comes up zero. I don't understand that, and I've doublechecked the settings on my multimeter (such as AC vs. DC and voltage range). I'm unable to figure out how to check the power inside the bass while the TRS cable is plugged in because there's no bare wire where I want to probe. Everything has heat shrink tubing on it, and I don't want to remove any of that or insulation and risk messing things up because I can't be trusted to put things back together properly.

I contacted Zon and when they called me back they said Joe didn't know anything more about Lightwave's electronics than Lightwave's engineers already know.

Who did you speak to at Lightwave?

Another thing: I've read lots of info on the Lightwave system on these boards and the vast majority of questions and feedback concern fretless basses, whether Sonuses or Sabers. I just want to say that I mostly slap my fretted Lightwave and the thing is fantastic. The IceTone piezo that people normally don't find much use for, complaining of harshness, works really well in this context. I boost the bass, back off the treble, and blend in lots of IceTone for a somewhat scooped tone with a gentle sizzle on top that slaps very nicely with a slapring. (http://www.slapring.com/en/productinfo/slapring/index.php)

Well, Lightwaves sound so good with fretless, but you're right -- I tired out a fretted saber 5-string with the current Lightwave model and it sounded amazing slapped.

I don't know how to help you with the power problem but i would LOVE to see some pics of this bass.

I tried probing the TRS cable with the multimeter, but it just comes up zero. I don't understand that, and I've doublechecked the settings on my multimeter (such as AC vs. DC and voltage range). I'm unable to figure out how to check the power inside the bass while the TRS cable is plugged in because there's no bare wire where I want to probe. Everything has heat shrink tubing on it, and I don't want to remove any of that or insulation and risk messing things up because I can't be trusted to put things back together properly.

Not to beat a dead horse, but were there batteries in the bass? If they are using the ring and sleeve as a switch then there should be voltage there, and that means polarity. So you shouldn't need to worry about anything being heat-shrinked. Put batteries in the bass, plug in a trs cable, and measure DC volts (low voltage range) between the ring and sleeve of the free end of the cable.

And yeah... PICS! the bass doesn't really exist until we see pics.

:cool:

I forget the name of the guy I spoke to at Lightwave. If I heard the name again I'd probably remember. It was an engineer who they had return my call, and the way he was talking it sounded like he was one of the original designers.

It's nothing special to see, being an ordinary Zon Sonus, but here are some pix:

http://img528.imageshack.us/img528/8427/zonlightwave1th5.jpg
http://img168.imageshack.us/img168/2655/zonlightwave6mj0.jpg
http://img168.imageshack.us/img168/2831/zonlightwave5fa0.jpg
http://img168.imageshack.us/img168/482/zonlightwave4pn4.jpg
http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/1688/zonlightwave3ws1.jpg
http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/5443/zonlightwave2es5.jpg

Not to beat a dead horse, but were there batteries in the bass? If they are using the ring and sleeve as a switch then there should be voltage there, and that means polarity. So you shouldn't need to worry about anything being heat-shrinked. Put batteries in the bass, plug in a trs cable, and measure DC volts (low voltage range) between the ring and sleeve of the free end of the cable.


The NiCad battery pack was in the bass, but I removed it because it's completely dead, won't receive a charge at all, and weighs 6oz. I could reinstall it for testing purposes, but since it's totally dead do we really expect to see any kind of voltage or polarity indication on the free end of the plugged in cable?

OK, being a dedicated dead horse beater and an old school W T F sayer, I reinstalled the battery, plugged in the TRS cable, got the multimeter, and touched the red probe to ring and the black probe to sleeve. The voltage came up negative and after 30 seconds had slowly climbed to -0.200. I swapped red and black and the voltage changed sign. I guess that means the Lightwave has negative polarity? But when, as I did yesterday, I plug the TRS cable into the Line 6 XPS and probe the free end trying to get the XPS's voltage and polarity, it comes up zero. I don't understand that.

If the NiCad battery is dead, it can output bits of reverse polarity voltage. I've seen it many many times - the industrial IR remote crane controllers I repair as a day job have NiCad batteries in them and this can happen. I've seen it happen to single cells in the battery, which only reduces the total output voltage, but if the battery is fully discharged you could see negative output.

Hey, if it works, keep using it.