effects loops, not loopers

[badhabit]

I have a FUCHS modded DRRI that is close to the perfect amp for me, except it has no effects loop. I use some effects sparingly ( two overdrive pedals, echo/delay, chorus, verb, compression, tuner ). They usually sound okay except for the echo/delay. I read where Joe B. runs his Boss echo through the loop circuit in his amps, and says this is the only way it sounds good. What do I need to do to be able to do this? Is there another way I am unaware of outside of modding the amp? Would changing the order improve the sound of my echo/delay? Currently, my order is:

*tuner

* Pearl Drive

* Keeley modded TS9-DX

* Boss Compressor

* Hardwire Reverb

* Boss Chorus

* Ibanez Echo/Delay

 

Thanks!

[BryanMichael]

I would put the reverb at the end, the delay or chorus before that.
My preferred chain would probably be:

Tuner>Compressor>Pearl Drive>TS9>Chorus>Delay>Reverb

[bowlingshirt]

If you dial in a clean sound on your amp, putting a delay in front really shouldn't be a problem. If you dial in some dirt, a delay would sound better in the effects loop.

[badhabit]

 

If you dial in a clean sound on your amp, putting a delay in front really shouldn't be a problem. If you dial in some dirt, a delay would sound better in the effects loop.

 

 

This is the problem. Playing clean, the echo/delay is okay. It's when I kick in the overdrive pedals that it sounds poor. The amp doesn't have an effects loop. Is there such a thing as an outboard loop device? I thought ( perhaps mistakenly ) that many early Dumbles did not have loops, so he built a "Dumblator" that somehow hooked up to his amps and was a loop device. Is there such a thing available?

[BryanMichael]

This is the problem. Playing clean, the echo/delay is okay. It's when I kick in the overdrive pedals that it sounds poor. The amp doesn't have an effects loop. Is there such a thing as an outboard loop device? I thought ( perhaps mistakenly ) that many early Dumbles did not have loops, so he built a "Dumblator" that somehow hooked up to his amps and was a loop device. Is there such a thing available?

 

 

The loop would "fit" between the PREAMP section of your amp (the tone shaping part) and the POWER AMP section (the part that drives the speakers) - the reason you are having this problem is the exact reason loops were created. A qualified amp tech should be able to modify your amp with an effects loop if that is truly what you need, but you are saying that the overdrive PEDALS are causing the delay to sound bad?

[badhabit]

The delay pedal sounds merely okay ( to me anyway ) when the overdrive pedals are off and I'm just using a little delay with a clean guitar setting. When turning on the overdrive pedals, the sound quality of the delay is much worse. Part of this makes sense because now I'm sending a distorted signal to the delay and overdriving it as well. What I'd like to accomplish is to retain the clearer, cleaner sound of the delay when using the overdrive pedals ( or the amps overdrive as well ). When I read Joe Bonamassa's explanation of his pedal set-up, he mentioned he ran his Boss echo through the effects loop(s), and that was the ONLY way it sounded good. He didn't mention if he ran all his pedals through the amp(s) loops.

 

It does sound like if I'm going to do this, I will need the amp modded to by-pass the amp's pre-amp and have a loop installed into the amp's signal path ( post pre-amp and before the power amp ) Then I could chose which effects pedals to run into the pre-amp and which to run into the effects loop. Is this correct?

[BryanMichael]

The delay pedal sounds merely okay ( to me anyway ) when the overdrive pedals are off and I'm just using a little delay with a clean guitar setting. When turning on the overdrive pedals, the sound quality of the delay is much worse. Part of this makes sense because now I'm sending a distorted signal to the delay and overdriving it as well. What I'd like to accomplish is to retain the clearer, cleaner sound of the delay when using the overdrive pedals ( or the amps overdrive as well ). When I read Joe Bonamassa's explanation of his pedal set-up, he mentioned he ran his Boss echo through the effects loop(s), and that was the ONLY way it sounded good. He didn't mention if he ran all his pedals through the amp(s) loops. It does sound like if I'm going to do this, I will need the amp modded to by-pass the amp's pre-amp and have a loop installed into the amp's signal path ( post pre-amp and before the power amp ) Then I could chose which effects pedals to run into the pre-amp and which to run into the effects loop. Is this correct?

 

 

Yes, basically. You aren't BYPASSING the preamp so much as only using it in a different spot in your signal chain. Most people prefer to run things like delay, chorus, and reverb in the effects loop while running compression, overdrive, and distortion directly into the front of the amp as part of their tone shaping, overdriving, etc... but some people actually like the sound of an overdriven chorus or the way a delay sounds in front of the amp. Think about your amp as TWO separate "blocks" - Preamp and Poweramp. Your FX chain with a loop would be: Compressor>Overdrives>AMP PREAMP [loop - Chorus, Delay, Reverb]>AMP POWERAMP to speakers. without the loop your modulation, delay, and reverb are being "effected" by your preamp- which can be good or bad depending on your preference, but it sounds like you want a loop.

[andreas]

The reason Joe Bonamassa (and a whole heap of others ) run the delay in the amp's effects loop is not because an effects loop magically makes things sound better - it's simply because they're using the amp's distortion channel. Running the delay in the fx loop places the delay after the point where the distortion is generated. If you run the amp mostly clean, the same thing is accomplished by simply placing the delay after the distortion pedal(s).

 

The delay pedal sounds merely okay ( to me anyway ) when the overdrive pedals are off and I'm just using a little delay with a clean guitar setting. When turning on the overdrive pedals, the sound quality of the delay is much worse. Part of this makes sense because now I'm sending a distorted signal to the delay and overdriving it as well. What I'd like to accomplish is to retain the clearer, cleaner sound of the delay when using the overdrive pedals ( or the amps overdrive as well ). When I read Joe Bonamassa's explanation of his pedal set-up, he mentioned he ran his Boss echo through the effects loop(s), and that was the ONLY way it sounded good. He didn't mention if he ran all his pedals through the amp(s) loops.

I doubt turning the overdrive pedals on actually causes the delay to sound bad, and doing so isn't overdriving the delay either. Once the signal comes out of the overdrive, it has already been distorted. So unless you run the overdrive pedal at super hot output level, it can't distort pedals that sit later in the chain. It might cause the preamp to distort, though, if the signal gets hot enough. But that shouldn't change the delay tone very much.

 

Turning the amp's distortion channel on is a completely different matter, though - that's the same as adding a distortion pedal after the delay. Distortion is basically a very rough form of compression, so quieter stuff (like the delay repeats) will be much louder when fed into distortion.

 

It does sound like if I'm going to do this, I will need the amp modded to by-pass the amp's pre-amp and have a loop installed into the amp's signal path ( post pre-amp and before the power amp ) Then I could chose which effects pedals to run into the pre-amp and which to run into the effects loop. Is this correct?

Adding a loop would let you run some effects (those that benefit from it) after the amp's preamp section, yes. But you'll really only need it if you use the amp's distortion channel, and even then it depends on how distorted it is.

 

Looking at the chain you have there, I'd probably go:

* tuner

* Boss Compressor

* Pearl Drive

* Keeley modded TS9-DX

* Boss Chorus

* Ibanez Echo/Delay

* Hardwire Reverb

 

If I used the amp's distortion, and felt the need to use the fx loop, I'd run the last three pedals there.

[badhabit]

These are great replies gents. Thanks so much. I'm going to try to re-arrange my pedal line-up and experiment with various settings on the amp.

 

 

Turning the amp's distortion channel on is a completely different matter, though - that's the same as adding a distortion pedal after the delay. Distortion is basically a very rough form of compression, so quieter stuff (like the delay repeats) will be much louder when fed into distortion.

 

 

This also maybe contributing to what I referred to as sounding bad. Since my amp has an overdrive channel, when I switch that on, perhaps that's what I notice is the now much louder echo repeats. It's almost like someone reached over and turned up the volume on the delay pedal. So, overdrive(s) before chorus and delays works best. Putting overdrive(s) after causes the delay and chorusing to increase in volume ( or increase the intensity of the effect ) Do I got that right? You guys are awesome. Thanks again.

[JRBain]

If you dial in a clean sound on your amp, putting a delay in front really shouldn't be a problem. If you dial in some dirt, a delay would sound better in the effects loop.

 

Basically this.

 

The bottom line is that the conventional usage of delay (so far as I can tell) is to use it to delay the primary sound that you are using, for want of a better turn of phrase. If your sound is an amp overdrive then putting the delay in front of that won't give you the amp overdrive delayed but the guitar and whatever pedals you are using delayed into the amp overdrive, which sounds awful, in this man's opinion at least. If your amp is pretty clean, and/or your dirt comes from pedals, it's not something to worry about overly - It's not like there's a 'right' way of doing it that you should be observing. 'Sounds good is good'.

[andreas]

 

This also maybe contributing to what I referred to as sounding bad. Since my amp has an overdrive channel, when I switch that on, perhaps that's what I notice is the now much louder echo repeats. It's almost like someone reached over and turned up the volume on the delay pedal. So, overdrive(s) before chorus and delays works best. Putting overdrive(s) after causes the delay and chorusing to increase in volume ( or increase the intensity of the effect ) Do I got that right? You guys are awesome. Thanks again.

Yes. Turning an overdrive on before delay is completely different from turning a distortion channel on with a delay in front of the amp, so if you do that often you may have to adjust the delay to suit. You can get a delay to sound ok in front of a distorting amp, as long as the amp isn't super saturated (distortion maxed out). Simply turning the delay level down helps, as does using a delay that has a darker tone to begin with. Also, if you turn the amp's distortion down a bit and use a pedal to add the rest of the distortion you need, that can help too.

 

If you want to be able to run the amp's distortion maxed out, or if you want to be able to use the same delay settings regardless of if the distortion channel is on or off, you will need to run it in the loop.