Choosing of Volume Pedal and needed suggestion of Blender

[redangel]

Excuse me, I know nothing about volume pedal
But I am choosing between Boss FV500L and Ernie Ball 6168

And I have some question about the volume pedal
whats the taper switch of ernie ball's?
And is that 6168 is better than 6166?
Also is there a need of "STEREO" volume pedal?
or just a mono is ok?

Also i am looking for a blender that can let me mix a clean low end channel with a high dist channel that separate by TU2
any idea? only X Blender can do this?

thanks a lot

[Lebowsky]

volume: ernie ball VP jr
blender: Xotic or barge concept

that's it

[speak_onion]

Originally Posted by redangel

Also i am looking for a blender that can let me mix a clean low end channel with a high dist channel that separate by TU2
any idea? only X Blender can do this?

thanks a lot

Can't help you with volume pedal stuff, but if you already have your signal split by the tuner into the parallel chains, and you just want to mix the two back together, you don't need a full blender, just a mixer. Here's one that fits on a pedalboard:
http://www.amazon.com/DOD-VAC240-Res.../dp/B0002GU1MO

[HRC Matt]

Originally Posted by Lebowsky

volume: ernie ball VP jr
blender: Xotic or barge concept

that's it

+1

[redangel]

Oh VP Jr? 6180 or 6181?
6180 is for passive and 6181 is active??
which should I choose?

[assboglin]

Depends on whether you play passive or active basses. They're the same just with a different value for the potentiometer's resistance, the active version being tailored for the higher output of an active instrument. I plugged an active bass into my passive volume pedal and it could mute the volume just fine, however, so this might not even make a difference for you.

The taper switch switches between linear and logarithmic reduction of resistance as the pedal is stepped on. This translates into a different sounding swell. It's basically a pick which sound you like and set it and forget it thing.

And for a blender I recommend the Xotic, which I own and like. I find the added controls over the effected signal (boost, volume, bass, treble) are useful for me.

[assboglin]

Also, a mono volume pedal is fine.

[johans]

meanwhile we're here ..


say you have a Dirty and Clean loops ..

do you need only 1 blender for all of them of 1 for each loops? for example, if you have a 2looper strip, does it work fine with just 1 blender or 2?


talking about that can Barge Concept build a custom 2 loopers box like the VFB-2?

[speak_onion]

Originally Posted by johans

meanwhile we're here ..


say you have a Dirty and Clean loops ..

do you need only 1 blender for all of them of 1 for each loops? for example, if you have a 2looper strip, does it work fine with just 1 blender or 2?


talking about that can Barge Concept build a custom 2 loopers box like the VFB-2?

That depends on what you want. If all you want is to always have some of your clean bass tone mixed with whatever combination of effects you're using, then you can just run your loopstrip in the send/return of the blender and all your effects in the send/returns of the loopstrip. If you want to be able to vary the amount of blend you have on each group of effects, or if you want some effects to not be blended (a volume pedal for instance), then that won't work.

Barge is usually very good about doing custom stuff, but I think they are in the middle of trying to get out a few new products, so unless you're willing to wait a long time, they might not be able to accomadate a mutli-loop VFB. You could always go with a VFB in each loop on your loop strip, but that seems excessive to me.

In my opinion, blending is totally necessary on some effects, but completely superflous on others. Most modulation effects already have a clean blend built in. Delay does too. Filters, depending on how you use them, can loose some of their impact when blended. I doubt you want to blend your compressor. You should think hard about whether you really want to blend everything, or just your harmonic distortion effects.

Flame away.

[johans]

sounds good indeed ..

the hard part is .. i do have the pedals but have never really know how does blend affect the overall sound and tone .. so until i tried it and heard it, i am not sure if i need to simple blend all loops or just the dirty one ..

speaking of which, does blending mostly use for gain, drive and fuzz thingy?

Originally Posted by speak_onion

That depends on what you want. If all you want is to always have some of your clean bass tone mixed with whatever combination of effects you're using, then you can just run your loopstrip in the send/return of the blender and all your effects in the send/returns of the loopstrip. If you want to be able to vary the amount of blend you have on each group of effects, or if you want some effects to not be blended (a volume pedal for instance), then that won't work.

Barge is usually very good about doing custom stuff, but I think they are in the middle of trying to get out a few new products, so unless you're willing to wait a long time, they might not be able to accomadate a mutli-loop VFB. You could always go with a VFB in each loop on your loop strip, but that seems excessive to me.

In my opinion, blending is totally necessary on some effects, but completely superflous on others. Most modulation effects already have a clean blend built in. Delay does too. Filters, depending on how you use them, can loose some of their impact when blended. I doubt you want to blend your compressor. You should think hard about whether you really want to blend everything, or just your harmonic distortion effects.

Flame away.

[niftydog]

Surely many of your questions are answered by the Ernie Ball volume pedal FAQ page.

As for "is X better than Y", well that's totally subjective and it is therefore up to you to decide. Only you know exactly what you need in a volume pedal, and the differences between them all are clearly explained by the manufacturer on their website.

[funkalicious101]

i noticed that the EBVP gets nothing but praise on this forum, but lots of steel guitarists really dont like it. just seemed odd to me.