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Tech 21 bass fly rig

#363
I will start looking for open box sales I guess. I've used Tech 21 products since the 90's. If I can use the octave/fuzz to get a moog like sound this will work great for me. Maybe an Uptown Funk kind of vibe
It will be my small board to keep in my bass case. I already have a BDDI, dirt, chorus, more dirt and compression on my big board.
 
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#364
It's arrived!
Can't wait to try it out!

image.jpeg
 
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#366
YouTube user funkebass (guy that did the Presets demo below) has another vid that gives a pretty good look at the non-octaver features.

Boyan Hristov did a number of videos. He admits that he had trouble condensing some of them down to a reasonable length. Be prepared to fast-forward a lot.

Still, there's a lot of good information between them.

Put it all together, and it seems that the octaver controls are very sensitive and quite interactive. Looks quite tricky to set up, but despite some real clunkers, there are some useable tones in there. Not all of them are synthy sounding.

It also seems that the filter can sound quite good by itself. Once again, those little knobs are touchy.

funkebass' "first sounds" video has made me quite confident that I can get the sounds I need out of the BFR. I think I've ditched the idea of settling for a guitar Fly Rig- I want the DI, and compressor. Also, when I played bass through the guitar versions, I found that the pseudo-chorus that's built into their delay section wasn't as rich as the dedicated chorus in the BFR.

Still trying to decide whether to wait for the G-K Plex. To be truthful, I'm not hot on the two-button layout. I really like the idea of one footswitch per function, a la FR5, RK5 and BFR...
 
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#369
I have fiddled with my Fly Rig for a couple of days now and I still like it.

I agree with the critical voices above when it comes to the fuzz and octave. On their own they are sub par but in the mix they work well, especially together.

The SansAmp is brilliant, the chorus is simple and good sounding, the compressor is transparent and easy to use and the boost is my favorite thing. I didn't even know I needed it, and now I don't want to be without it!

One strange thing though: With the compressor on and the comp-knob turned all the way down, the octave doesn't work. It's losing track, spluttering and acting all strange. Turn the comp up a notch and everything is back to normal. Anyone else noticed this?
 
#370
Interesting experience this afternoon. Long & McQuade (Canada's GC equivalent) just added the BFR to their website, with two in stock in Brampton. I was in the area, so I dropped by.

The new knobs are a distinct improvement, as are the crisp white graphics with black shadows. The tuner is eas to read and tracks well. The pre/post button on the Boost adds some useful variation at certain settings. The output stage seems more muscular, adding a useful amount of extra output over the guitar version.

Like the bite button, the character knob is useful for quick adjustments. The compressor and chorus are well voiced.

I only found two downsides to the user interface:
1. The Headphone amp isn't much use without an 1/8" audio input.
2. The octave section is just as quirky as others have reported.

In particular, the length of the filter envelope almost always seemed to be wrong, swallowing some notes unpredictably. I spent an hour with it, and couldn't find any octave, fuzz or filter settings that I would use live or in the studio.

Overall impression: The form factor is just as good as the other versions, and the build quality is impressive despite the light weight. At the Canadian pricing, you get all the extras (tuner, DI, character/bite, headphone amp, etc.) for a $100 premium. I would definitely pay that much to get all those features in such a small package, if all else was equal.

So why didn't it follow me home?

Here is where it all came unglued for me: I find the original FR5 extremely intuitive and easy to set up. I was loving it within the first ten minutes, and found it the same way with guitar. It's a breeze to enhance a variety of instruments and amps with it. It can add a pleasing thickness to the notes, without any loss of articulation. The DLA section works well as a bass chorus, the boost works great as long as you don't overdo the Sansamp gain, and a touch of reverb is nice in some situations.

In comparison, I found the BFR much harder to dial in. The chorus adds top end, and the fixed rate frustrated me. It also loses low end at some settings, requiring further tone tweaks on the fly. I'm picky about compressors, and this one doesn't stand up the the quality of the Sansamp section. The character knob and bite switch seem to fight each other.

Still, I could live with the other quirks if the clean bass tones were comparable. Unfortunately, there was an FR5 there for comparison, and I could never quite dial in the sweetness and clarity of the original.

The Bass Fly Rig always seemed a little too gritty, boomy or unbalanced. At least to my ear, it seems like the extra analog circuitry has compromised the tone in some way.

I hate to leave the built-in DI on the table, but I'm back to trying to decide between the FR5, the RK5 and the G-K Plex.
 
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#371
Well I have one on order. I plan to use at mainly at church instead of my big pedalboard for conveinence. If I really like I may use it more. I already have a BDDI, choruse, compressor & a few dirt pedals on my big board. But early Sunday morning if my load is that much easier I'm all for it. I really don't use dirt for worship much anyway. If I can get the octo section to get that uptown funk or bass keyboard sound that would seal the deal on it. We'll see.....
 
#372
cableguy said:
Well I have one on order. I plan to use at mainly at church instead of my big pedalboard for conveinence. If I really like I may use it more. I already have a BDDI, choruse, compressor & a few dirt pedals on my big board. But early Sunday morning if my load is that much easier I'm all for it. I really don't use dirt for worship much anyway. If I can get the octo section to get that uptown funk or bass keyboard sound that would seal the deal on it. We'll see.....
Click to expand...

That's my take too. I found when I had the big pedalbaord (I had to sell most of my gear), the only thing that got any use was the octave and envelop filter, and then only about once every four months. At church if I could get one decent envelope filter sound, and a decent octive tone for that sunday we don't have electric guitar I'd be fine.
 
#373
Like several of you I bought this mainly for church use. Prior to this I was using an VT Bass Di, a tuner, sometimes with a MXR M81, and occasionally a Boss ME-8B for Synth Sounds. I've used the BFR the last couple of weeks at Church and I was hoping this was going to replace all of those other pedals, and it just not going to cut it. Here's why:
  1. Compressor: I hear a distortion in it as the notes trail off. Not noticeable in songs with full band playing, but in softer parts with just acoustic, bass and light drums, it is very noticeable, especially with in-ears. I have the compression set at about 9 o'clock for reference.
  2. Octave/Filter/Fuzz - None of these seem to be usable individually, but when used all together they give a synth sound I was going for, but still has some poor tracking in the octave. The old ME-8B blows it out of the water here.
  3. Tuner/Mute - I find it extremely annoying that you can't visually tell that the unit is muted after 5 minutes of engaging the tuner. Tuner goes blank, there is no other indicator that the unit is muted.
The one thing I like in this unit the input pad. I usually an 18v Spector 5-String. It is super hot, and when I use the VTDI, the gain knob is super sensitive going from not enough to way to much drive in a short amount of space.

I bought mine on e-bay (from a Tech21 dealer), so I am not sure if I will be able to send it back. I have requested a return.

Tech 21 really dropped the ball on this one, and I've owned and loved several of their products over the years.
 
#374
John Herzog said:
Like several of you I bought this mainly for church use. Prior to this I was using an VT Bass Di, a tuner, sometimes with a MXR M81, and occasionally a Boss ME-8B for Synth Sounds. I've used the BFR the last couple of weeks at Church and I was hoping this was going to replace all of those other pedals, and it just not going to cut it. Here's why:
  1. Compressor: I hear a distortion in it as the notes trail off. Not noticeable in songs with full band playing, but in softer parts with just acoustic, bass and light drums, it is very noticeable, especially with in-ears. I have the compression set at about 9 o'clock for reference.
  2. Octave/Filter/Fuzz - None of these seem to be usable individually, but when used all together they give a synth sound I was going for, but still has some poor tracking in the octave. The old ME-8B blows it out of the water here.
  3. Tuner/Mute - I find it extremely annoying that you can't visually tell that the unit is muted after 5 minutes of engaging the tuner. Tuner goes blank, there is no other indicator that the unit is muted.
The one thing I like in this unit the input pad. I usually an 18v Spector 5-String. It is super hot, and when I use the VTDI, the gain knob is super sensitive going from not enough to way to much drive in a short amount of space.

I bought mine on e-bay (from a Tech21 dealer), so I am not sure if I will be able to send it back. I have requested a return.

Tech 21 really dropped the ball on this one, and I've owned and loved several of their products over the years.
Click to expand...

Well that's a bummer. Hopefully I will have better luck, especially since I play a Spector as well. (only running a 9V pre though) I'll see when it gets here. Like you I have and still use a variety of Tech 21 products and have always had great results.
 
#375
BBQV said:
One strange thing though: With the compressor on and the comp-knob turned all the way down, the octave doesn't work. It's losing track, spluttering and acting all strange. Turn the comp up a notch and everything is back to normal. Anyone else noticed this?
Click to expand...

With the comp control set at minimum you have reduced the level of your bass below unity gain. With that setting turning the comp level control to maximum will bring the level to unity gain and that will provide the proper level to the octafilter section.
 
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#377
tech21nyc said:
With the comp control set at minimum you have reduced the level of your bass below unity gain. With that setting turning the comp level control to maximum will bring the level to unity gain and that will provide the proper level to the octafilter section.
Click to expand...

So in order for the octafilter to function optimally with the compressor the compressor has to be at MAX? What if I only want slight compression in a song and I just want to click the octafilter on for a section and then off again? Am I expected to reach down and adjust the compression knob with each on/off of the octafilter? This seems like an odd design :cautious:
 
#379
The compressor doesn't have to be at max it needs to be set to unity gain. The previous poster had the compressor's comp control set to minimum which will reduce the level below unity. In that particular setting the compressor's "level" control needs to be set to max to compensate for the slight gain loss. Even though this is an integrated unit you still need to be mindful of gain staging as you would if using effects.

To be clear, the compressor doesn't need to be used when using the octafilter section. We recommended using it if for some reason the output of your bass wasn't sufficiently driving the input of that section. It works fine with all the passive bass guitars we've tried it with.
 
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#380
jd-ns said:
So in order for the octafilter to function optimally with the compressor the compressor has to be at MAX? What if I only want slight compression in a song and I just want to click the octafilter on for a section and then off again? Am I expected to reach down and adjust the compression knob with each on/off of the octafilter? This seems like an odd design :cautious:
Click to expand...

If you have the compressor on in your chain, you wouldn't have it set below unity anyways. If it's not in your chain, then you wouldn't have to worry because you're feeding the octave with a strong signal. Nothing weird there at all. I think the misunderstanding was that he said "turn it to maximum."

I'm dying to try one of these out!
 
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