Just completely fell in love with my Splawn

[gtrjunior]

So, many of you know that I've had a little struggle getting my QR to sound how i'd like it to. I bought a new Cab, speakers, tubes...the list goes on. I liked it enough but was not 100% sold.
About a month or 2 ago Sweetwater was blowing out the Blackstar HT-Studio 20 heads for cheap....I bought one and have been using it for a small band project. I gigged withbit for the first time last weekend and was amazed at how good it sounded and I was wondering why I couldn't get my QR to sound THAT good.
Well tonight I decided to unplug everything and go direct into the amp...guitar straight to amp.
Well....

HOLY CRAP!!!! Amazing tone straight in. I need to carefully analyze my pedal board and figure out what is inhibiting the true tone I just got. I suspect it's either my eq or something causing "tone suck"...
Maybe I need to re-locate my buffer.
Idk, but I was just completely blown away by this amp...

[briman]

You need to plug one pedal in at a time and compare straight in vs each pedal you add and determine what is tone sucking. From my experience, boss eq pedal is worst tone sucker ever. Tuners can do it too.
Right now I have 5 pedals in front and 2 in the loop and there is no difference in tone vs straight in. I have got rid of pedals because of tone suck and i also find some pedals suck tone with one amp but not so much with another. Has alot to do with chain set up too i believe.
Good luck! My friend who is a great player and very experienced in studio and touring always preaches to me......less pedals = better tone.

[gtrjunior]

Sounds like solid advice.

[splawndude]

Can you list out everything in your signal?

Guitar > tuner > OD > etc

With the brand name?

For example mine is: Guitar > MXR A/B/Y box > MXR ZW OD > Splawn > loop is MXR Carbon Copy > Danelctro 6 band EQ > Digitech HW Reverb > amp > speaker cab

[briman]

Guitar - Tuner Boss - Dunlop Crybaby (modded) - EVH Flanger - EVH Phase 90 - Boss Noise Supressor- Quick Rod

Loop is Boss DD20 - MXR Analog Chorus -return



I have a Boss DD3 in loop and noise supressor in front of my other Quick Rod downstairs.

[gtrjunior]

So it goes like this:
In front:
Guitar>
Shure GLDX 16 tuner/wireless>
PedalMonsters Ninja Buffer>
Dunlop Crybaby 95Q wah>
Digitech Drop pedal.

In the loop:
Boss NS-2 noise suppressor>
MXR 10 band EQ>
TC Electronic Flashback Delay>
G Lab Reverb

I know the drop pedal is a tone sucker when engaged but I believe it's true bypass, so it shouldn't affect tone when off...am I incorrect about that? I think this one is coming off, since I've got my guitars set up to play in the tunings I need (std, 1/2, and full step).
And I believe I read that the EQ when engaged is buffered (may be wrong about that) but not when disengaged. In any case I think I'm taking the EQ out since I'm loving the tone without it.

I've never really been sure where to put a buffer, I've read so many different opinions. If I'm being truthful, I'm not sure if any of the other pedals are actually buffered, which would eliminate the need for a separate buffer in the first place.
When I gigged with the Blackstar the only pedals I had were a tuner, clean boost in front and a MXR micro amp and ISP noise deximator (gate) in the loop. The Blackstar sounded killer. Pronounced mids and it cut right through the mix easily. That's what got me thinking about how my QR wasn't even sounding that way.
Once I disconnected all my crap from the QR....BOOM!!! The amp came alive!! Thundering lows and crisp cutting mids. Just like it should.
All this time that I've been posting about my tone, there has been a "grainy" quality to the mids in the QR. I just attributed it to "that's what greenbacks (small blocks) sound like" or "that's just what a Splawn sounds like". I've read a lot about people saying that you either like the Splawn sound or don't. I just thought "that" was the Splawn sound. Now that the amp is sounding like it does now, I realize that all along it's been ME and not the amp. Right now this amp is everything I wanted it to be and more.

[briman]

I suggest you take out the drop pedal and put the noise supressor at the end of front of the amp not in the loop. Try that. I would also take out the eq. Not needed with a Splawn!! I used one in loop of my DSL's to give it more mids but I find Splawn can go from A to Z without eq.
I was going to get a drop or pitch pedal a while back but decided not and just have one of my guitars tuned half step down.

So glad you found the beauty in your Splawn!!! After 3 years of using a clean boost with my Splawns......i realized it was taking colour out of the "Splawn voice" and sold the boosts. Never been happier with my QR"s! Tone is so pure now and gives me ear orgasms lol.

[gtrjunior]

The only point I'm not sure about is putting the gate in front. I've got it in the loop to silence the preamp hiss. Do you find that it takes care of that for you in front? When I gigged the Blackstar, I had a gate in the loop without issue...that little amp was screaming!
That said, I was even thinking of taking it out of the chain altogether. The QR completed to my old JVM is relatively quiet.
The eq and Drop are as good as gone!!

[briman]

I am no expert but most of the noise coming into signal is from pickups of guitar. If i stand next to my computer, i get crazy hiss and noise and same thing if i stand near lamps. The wiring and current of your house can effect it. That's why noise gate should be at end of guitar signal. But again....i am no expert and these are all things i have experienced and been told but other guitarists with more experience than myself.

[gtrjunior]

I too get some noise from pickups but the humbuckers I have are pretty quiet. The single coils in my Tele on the other hand...
If I used my ISP noise gate, it functions both in the loop and in the signal path. So there's that option too. I'm gonna try both ways though so I'm sure. Thanks for the advice!!

[gtrjunior]

Ok, so I just took off the drop pedal and eq. I have the board set up with the wireless and the wah in front and a delay and Reverb in the loop. I set up the isp noise gate first in the loop as well.
briman...I think you have a good point about the gate in front. Compared to my JVM, the QR is pretty quiet considering the capable amount of gain it has. I did notice that the pickups can easily transmit various noises in the room etc... My humbuckers are quiet enough that I could remove the noise gate and be happy with the small amount of noise I hear. For a single coil guitar I suppose the hum debugger pedal could help there. I only have 1 guitar with single coils so I'm not in dire need of fixing the noise from it. It's not my main guitar.
I did just learn a valuable lesson about isolating the power supplies...I was plugging all of the pedals into a non-isolated supply and was getting a ton of noise. It took me a little while but it dawned on me that my wireless was the culprit. So I plugged in the power supply that came with it and it solved the problem.
I have rehearsal tonite so I'll see how it sounds in a few hours. Right now my ears are a bit fatigued from experimenting.

[gtrjunior]

Upon further experimentation on e discovered my wah is not true bypass...that's causing an issue too
Apparently the QR does not play nice with non true bypass pedals!!

[splawndude]

Looks like you know what you are doing.

(and now I read again that you put your wireless back on it's own supply)

I don't have much to add outside of what Brian said.

I'm not an expert on pedals but yeah, I know it is suggested often to have a buffered pedal in strategic places.

My amp is pretty damn quiet so I've never really wanted a noise suppressor. A gate might fun for the chugga chugs but not not too kill noise in my case. My amp hums but it is a 'normal' electronic amp kind of hum. No hiss.

When I hear about hiss in an amp like a Quick Rod I immediately think of either pedals or preamp tubes. I think you ended up landing on some preamp tubes that work well for you so I'll assume you don't get hiss from those. But yeah, if your home environment causes hiss in the amp but not at your gigs, then don't use one.

I didn't mention my wah or my MXR P90 because they are plugged into the Rectoverb right now but they don't add any noise that I am aware of either.

What I have read is that if you have noise going into the front end of your amp then put the noise suppressor at the end of those front end pedals. Last thing before going into amp. If the noise is from the amp (preamp) then put the noise suppressor at the end of the chain in the loop. Basically at the end of chain either in front or loop.

Again, I had a MXR SmartGate at one point in time but it was a long time ago and literally have zero personal experience because I never felt I needed it.

Try your amp in a different room. Isolate the power supplies like it looks you have done. Keep your cell phone away. Keep florescent lights away. Etc Etc.

[briman]

Lol yeah lights and lamps......i sometimes play while sitting at my pc to watch lessons or tabs etc and there is an led lamp on desk beside me and when i turn the lamp on or off.....there is a pop sound coming out of my cab! Also get hum from the lamp and pc. But if i spin around in my desk chair and face the other way.....the hum goes away.

[gtrjunior]

When I had my JVM the preamp hiss was like a waterfall....it was SO loud. I started using a noise gate in the loop with that amp and it worked great.
Now with the QR I initially had one set up with it too but like I said the noise (as I've discovered) was not necessarily preamp noise. There is a small amount of preamp hiss but it's nothing compared to the JVM. When I was A/B-ing the pedals the other day I realized my noise issues weren't from the amp.
As it is right now I have only the wireless in front of the amp. I ordered a new wah that is true bypass. From now on I'll be sure to use only true bypass pedals. All of the other Fx I want to add in will most likely go in the loop. Ive got a chorus, phase and a flange to add and that should cover all my bases.
The only other pedal I may add in front is a low gain dirt pedal for the lighter stuff.
My electrical in the house is relatively quiet. We had it redone about a year ago. There are fluorescent light in the basement but they don't cause too much of a problem.
I also have a buffer pedal which I can always add in if needed.