Drop pedals' input Z — too bright when activated

[Guitarist]

Hey, I got two stereo pedals at the end of my pedalboard. One is a Hardwire Biyang Tri-Reverb RV10 and the other a Hardwire DL-8. Both really brighten and the Reverb boosts as well. I thinking that the 1Meg input impedance is WAY higher than what it needs to be seeing. I has this issue with my MXR Phaser and paralleled a resistor with the effect-in. This worked as it was easy'ish to find that spot. With the others being nano parts I'm sort of screwed. Anybody got schematics? I may have to wire up a tone inject and poke it into the circuit (yikes). I emailed Biyang yesterday.

I was thinking of wiring these in parallel with perhaps even the Marshall chorus which is quasi-stereo and then mixing/summing the outputs through 5K resistors. This way the input Z get divided by three, I think anyways;\

[Mark Hammer]

If the Digitech Hardwire is true bypass, then all that is really required is to identify the pins on the stompswitch that correspond to the input jack and effect input. Run a suitable resistor from the effect input pin to the nearest identifiable ground point, and that should be enough. The difficulty comes when the pedal uses some form of internal electronic switching and the same input buffer is used for both effect and bypass. You don't want to load down the bypass, just the effect.

[Guitarist]

I tried to locate the effect in on the Biyang to no avail. I did tap into some bright nodes by an OPAmp but there was voltage and I just wanted to add a resistor, so passed. I then tried a pair of 220pF caps to ground from effects' sends, this kinda worked, but lost the shimmer, so I put it back to stock. The pedal does sound amazing though. As good as cheaper old Lexicons and the NovaVerb I have. I always leave it on anyways.

Had better luck with the Hardwire DL-8 Delay. Near the relays, with my probe, found the path towards effects. I added (dang can't remember now) around 50K or less and it behaves perfectly. The green input caps made a good contact point.

Now I have a Marshall Supervibe SV-1 that I'd like to try and tame. It boosts and brightens too. I'm down to 22k on R6 and R7 but it does little. Any ideas?

[David Schwab]

I thinking that the 1Meg input impedance is WAY higher than what it needs to be seeing.

That's probably the same input impedance as your amp. It's pretty much the standard. What you have going on is that other things in your signal chain are loading down your guitar making it sound darker. That pedal is restoring the actual tone. If you run a buffer before all the pedals, you will retain the true tone from your guitar. Then you can EQ the high end to taste.

This is why I often dislike "true bypass" pedals.

[Guitarist]

The rig is really sounding sound great, to me anyways. It almost too hi-fi but the clarity would made most players happy. I'll try and record some tones for the record. Another issue now is the EH Phase90 is very sensitive to distorting at the input. So it goes first. I called MXR and got confirmation from one tech there anyways. From talking, I'd be good to up the voltage (18V?) but then should rebias the transistor, and so having many turn-pots here, would love to sub one in—but where?

I haven't been on here lately as I was planning to move to Hawaii or LA but ended up in another lovely small town where wonderful things are happening. But now having setup the iron and studio will be back here much more...