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Trouble with PA last night.... operator error

troy mcclure

troy mcclure

Mar 5, 2007
3,299
931
Central Florida
#1
I have a new band and haven't used the PA in about 4 months, so I threw it together at home worked fine get to the gig and the drummer is about 3o minutes late so we rush sound check and we have no mains. I have a Mackie 1604..we have monitors just no mains. I am think bad wire. I start pulling the stuff apart trying to narrow it down finally we are 5 minutes past stage time, I plug the monitor sends in the mains, send 1 to tops for and send 2 for subs with just kick drum and some bass and we play the gig with no monitors.
I get home and look at the board this am.. I accidentally hit the main mute. Do I feel stupid but lesson learned.
 
#2
Reminds me of a gig long, long and long time ago. We borrowed another band's PA system and I asked twice for the one who borrowed it if he knows the mixer and setup. "No problems" he said. Well we had no high-end/low-end during the concert and the sound was like someone using a ghetto-blaster on-stage.

Lesson learned was that you can't just trust if someone says they know the system. You have to be present and they show how it works. Or, it's good to know your equipment inside out as during gigs time is ticking and there's less time to fix mistakes.
 
#3
I have a check list that I use when something seems to be amiss. It covers all the silly little things that stress us out at setup/sound check. Somehow, with the pressure of having to be ready at X:xx hour, I lose my normally acute engineer's mind. The list keeps me on track (even if that track doesn't seem to be working at the moment ... grin!).
 
#7
Got the PA all setup.... no monitors. Checked all the cabling, the settings, everything seemed good.

Except I forgot to turn the power amp on :atoz:

The one thing I don't like about the Peavey IPR is that it lights up blue when you plug it in. So it looks like it is on when it isn't. Lesson learned, play close attention to the LEDs.
 
#8
Well hey troy, I'd say that the good news is that you'll probably-maybe never do that again, right?

My crew uses a Mackie powered mixer that's probably close to yours and although it's not my unit, I'm the only one who's taken the time to read the book and figure it out. The positions on a couple of those darned buttons are sort of tough to spot on a dark stage, but they'll make a hot mess of things if they're in the wrong alignment for sure.

The last time I was away and the band played a gig with a substitute 4-stringer, one of those buttons was positioned for stereo mains instead of one channel mains and the other to monitors. Nobody could figure it out and they pretty much played the whole night with no monitors. One frickin' button...

Your hard-earned knowledge will probably save many a gig for your gang down the road.
 
#9
RustyAxe said:
I have a check list that I use when something seems to be amiss. It covers all the silly little things that stress us out at setup/sound check. Somehow, with the pressure of having to be ready at X:xx hour, I lose my normally acute engineer's mind. The list keeps me on track (even if that track doesn't seem to be working at the moment ... grin!).
Click to expand...

This. It's amazing what "obvious" things can get overlooked in the heat of the moment, when band leaders are screaming, people are running around trying to "help," etc.
 
#12
troy mcclure said:
I have a new band and haven't used the PA in about 4 months, so I threw it together at home worked fine get to the gig and the drummer is about 3o minutes late so we rush sound check and we have no mains. I have a Mackie 1604..we have monitors just no mains. I am think bad wire. I start pulling the stuff apart trying to narrow it down finally we are 5 minutes past stage time, I plug the monitor sends in the mains, send 1 to tops for and send 2 for subs with just kick drum and some bass and we play the gig with no monitors.
I get home and look at the board this am.. I accidentally hit the main mute. Do I feel stupid but lesson learned.
Click to expand...

Do you mean the "break" switch? I hate that thing. ...can't tell you how many times I've started a set w/no mains having forgotten I activated it. I no longer use it ...ever. Problem solved.
 
#13
Question for Tom - does your break switch have an LED next to the button to at least alert you that it's pressed?

My beef with the mains/monitors amp distribution switch on our rig is that I can look right at that button in good light and it's still hard to tell if it's in or out. Not the way I would have built the thing, but at least with some working knowledge, this unit has done nothing for us but deliver.
 
#15
I really like the break switch. People will come up and try to use the mics during breaks, so I like to have them off.

My Yamaha mixer has a LED that flashes when the break switch is on (very noticeable). My Carvin mixer has nothing.
 
#16
I have an older Mackie CFX-16. The "break switch" has no light, although it's easy to tell that it's pushed in IF you remember to think about it. This is not a complaint about the Mackie, BTW. It's been a real workhorse for 15 years or so. But my habit on breaks is to pull the main sliders down, has been for years. I'm not sure why I remember that but not a break switch, but it works for me... BIG visual cue :)
 

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