• TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
    Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
    Join freeLog in
    Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.

Need VU meeter

Hey,

So i was using ashdown products for years and now i ended up using alembic pre and power amp. And i need VU meter. i cant live without it :D I've been using it all the time: to adjust efects levels... Is there any rack mount vu metters or smth? Because looking at PA clipping light is totally not the same thing
 
you can get rack mounted VU's but they are pricey. you could however, probably throw something together yourself with a little guidance from someone like BassmanPaul or other electronic gurus around here. the meters themselves are cheap, just how to wire them up to emulate the meter on the ashdown is what you need to know. this would be a good project I would bet a lot of people would be interested in...
 
Definitely go for this one:

Invalid Link Removed

WB_XTM4.jpg
 
Yea, but where in chain do you want it? And most PA's have meters? I thought about a meter to monitor my signal out of my amp, but I ended up getting the MXR M87 compressor and it has a meter, so I can monitor my signal right out of the bass.
 
Back in the Eighties when I designed my first SS system, I bought a pair of similar units to the one Fdeck posted from Radio Shack. I built them into a 1U rack case along with a pair of power supplies to phantom power for my EV condenser microphones. The VU units were fed from the speaker outputs of the dual mono power amps. I set them for 0dB being the maximum output into the speaker loads I was using.

The kit that Fdeck proposed is a very simple build but will most likely require a power supply to operate it. A little design ingenuity will be require to make the finished device "pretty" but that's about the only con I see with the project.