any suggetions?

[Chuck H]

Like Enzo and Dude said. There's not a problem until there's a problem. It's conscientious to want to avoid problems, but in THIS case these devices are designed to be connected together in front of the amp and be powered by a shared source. You may find there's no problem at all. So start by doing as Dude suggested and just hook everything up. Then power the pedals with batteries. If the batteries are quieter you can start troubleshooting the power supply then. But why do it before that?

[Mark Hammer]

It is quite technically possible to filter the power line, even when daisy chaining. Ideally, this would be a short extension that accepts the male plug from the daisy-chain cable, and sticks a suitable-value choke in series before plugging into the power-jack of the pedal. The choke serves to block any spikes on the power line so that they don't get "shared".

I've been buddies with Truetone's chief engineer RG Keen since around 1992. He s a former long-time hardware engineer for IBM, before moving to Truetone, back in the Visual Sound days. As the designer of the One-Spot (and I believe the bricks they make as well), he makes a point of collecting reports of all instances of difficulties users experience with the supply, including both breakdown reports and noise reports.

Truetone does sell a number of adapters for the One-Spot - 1 SPOT Accessories ? Truetone - but I'm not seeing any line-noise adapters in there. Perhaps someone else sells them. Or else Bob Weil figured that if people needed cleaner, more isolated, power they would opt for a power brick with separately regulated outputs, rather than deal with cumbersome adaptors.

[daz]

I put the board together today but one more pedal is to go on it which is out for delivery and should arrive any second. I wired it like my old one with a female power jack for an adaper but i also use it with a single 9v that i made a cable for with a 9v clip on one end and plug same as my wall wart on the other. I use a 9v when playing out anywhere. So i checked it with both once i got it done and the wall wart has some low hum. Nothing bad but i was wondering....would one with better filtering help and if so how would i determine what DOES have better filtering? I have a 12v one thats probably really good since it;s for a digital processor, so will 12v be ok with 9v pedals?

[The Dude]

I find that the Boss supplies are well filtered. In fact, many Boss pedals expect that well filtered supply and don't work worth a hoot with a generic supply. I've also added filtering to existing pedals or supplies to get rid of that hum. Simple as slapping a cap across the supply input/output.

[daz]

I find that the Boss supplies are well filtered. In fact, many Boss pedals expect that well filtered supply and don't work worth a hoot with a generic supply. I've also added filtering to existing pedals or supplies to get rid of that hum. Simple as slapping a cap across the supply input/output.

Just a cap from - to + ? I just pulled the chorus out of the mailbox and plugged it into the wiring i already had ready for it. When it's on theres a pretty loud hum so i will need to try that because i tried what should have been a better PSU than the tascam i was using, a roland 300ma 9v one and it hummed WAY louder to the point of being unusable. So battery=quiet, tascam PSU=hum, roland PSU=unusably loud hum.

[bob p]

Fulltone pedals are notoriously bad if they're connected to a noisy supply. As in a wall-wart that will work with just about anything just produces more hum than signal with something like an OCD. So you have to go the extra mile in assuring that you have a quiet PSU to use with them.

To me that's a sign of a cheap-ass design that skimps on filtering parts, which is something that you should not have to deal with when you're buying expensive boutique pedals. It's just crazy. But then I've heard Mike Fulton swear at customers and call them dumb asses for not using his own branded PSU, and going so far as to invalidate warranties, claiming that a noisy PSU damaged his pedals. Weird.

[daz]

Oh, and with even a battery and the chorus OFF you can hear the clicking of the chorus rate. And it's true bypass so thats riding on the power supply i guess. It's supposedly analog but that makes me wonder. Gonna have to try and return it i suppose.

[Chuck H]

Well, daz...

Sort of up your alley,.. There are literally dozens of schematics and DIY projects for building a regulated, filtered 9V supply for your pedal board available with very little searching. Ready made special weshial supplies are a little spendy, some aren't bad, but I wonder how effective they are.

For that matter, we don't know what's causing the hum. Is it 60Hz or 120Hz? You can usually tell just by listening. 60Hz would probably be a ground loop due to pedal design and 120Hz would be a shitty power supply. (corrections accepted here).

I was changing pedals now and then so I used rechargeable 9V's and stayed conscientious before gigs that they were off a fresh charge. NBD. So I never had to troubleshoot noisy power supplies. I would think that anything you have already has a cap from + to - though that doesn't prevent you from adding another one. But since there should, at the very least, be a big uf electrolytic there already you could parallel a .1uf cap with it to improve it's HF impedance. This would only help if the noise is 120Hz or some other buzz.

If it's 60Hz then your original ideal could work. If the problem is an AC ground loop that the power supply is coupling then you should be able to send the - from the power supply to one pedal only. Since I don't know how the pedals are wired I can't promise it will work. So try to proto it in a way that doesn't ruin your power supplies in the process.

[rjb]

...you can hear the clicking of the chorus rate.... It's supposedly analog but that makes me wonder.

Analog bucket brigades do have clocks.
https://www.electrosmash.com/

-rb

[Chuck H]

Analog bucket brigades do have clocks.
https://www.electrosmash.com/

-rb

Yes, but "true bypass" (lying?). Must be coupling through the power supply.

[daz]

I did try this.......i sent only the + to the chorus letting the signal ground carry the -. Didn't help. But since i discovered the clock ticking thing is there even when powering the chorus with it's own 9v battery with the PSU powering everything else, i realized it's got to go back. That ticking will obviously be there no matter what. Crappy design. I just hope they don't try and stick me with shipping for this POS.

Well, daz...

Sort of up your alley,.. There are literally dozens of schematics and DIY projects for building a regulated, filtered 9V supply for your pedal board available with very little searching. Ready made special weshial supplies are a little spendy, some aren't bad, but I wonder how effective they are.

For that matter, we don't know what's causing the hum. Is it 60Hz or 120Hz? You can usually tell just by listening. 60Hz would probably be a ground loop due to pedal design and 120Hz would be a shitty power supply. (corrections accepted here).

I was changing pedals now and then so I used rechargeable 9V's and stayed conscientious before gigs that they were off a fresh charge. NBD. So I never had to troubleshoot noisy power supplies. I would think that anything you have already has a cap from + to - though that doesn't prevent you from adding another one. But since there should, at the very least, be a big uf electrolytic there already you could parallel a .1uf cap with it to improve it's HF impedance. This would only help if the noise is 120Hz or some other buzz.

If it's 60Hz then your original ideal could work. If the problem is an AC ground loop that the power supply is coupling then you should be able to send the - from the power supply to one pedal only. Since I don't know how the pedals are wired I can't promise it will work. So try to proto it in a way that doesn't ruin your power supplies in the process.

[daz]

Yes, but "true bypass" (lying?). Must be coupling through the power supply.

Definately true bypass because with the chorus off it passing signal perfectly normally with no power to the chorus. Same with my other 2 pedals.

[Chuck H]

Definately true bypass because with the chorus off it passing signal perfectly normally with no power to the chorus. Same with my other 2 pedals.

So why is the LFO audible when the unit is powered by a battery and switched off? Not true enough bypass apparently.?.

[daz]

yep. It is true bypass in that it passes the full signal with no power. But it;s one flawed design because i even tried guitar.chorus.amp without the pedalboard and a battery and i can still hear the clock.

[Chuck H]

The term "true bypass" means that when the pedal is off the guitars signal is isolated from the pedal circuitry entirely. I don't think I need to explain beyond this.