The Watering Hole

Your work had me recall an idea I had a long time ago.  Considering that you're making all the circuits and hardware maybe you can tell me what you think about the idea.

Since most of the time your stomps are down at your feet, it obviously puts the knobs on the floor as well.  We sometimes used to have those rubber knob covers to allow you to turn things with your shoe, but that gets to be too crowded when you start getting a bunch of knobs and switches like some of the newer stomps have.  Rack effects units get around this since the rack can be up higher and use a pedal board for the floor, but you're stuck whatever the rack effect gives you to use.  CAE had a switcher where you kept your stomps with your rack (in a drawer or on a pull out shelf, etc.) and a generic floorboard could change between them.

Ok, so that's the past.  With what you're able to do now I was wondering was this:  Could you have the controls separate from the stomp?  I'm thinking of something that can hold the controls for multiple stomps (modular or not - maybe as if the actual stomp was put side-by-side) and this part can be screwed into a standard mic stand so it can be put up as high as someone wants, then either have them connect to a generic floorboard (like the Behringer FCB-1010) or create your own, modular, floorboard with the stomp buttons required for each unit.  The big advantage here is that you can have whichever stomps you want and be able to easily change their settings instead of living with whatever some rack effects unit provides (not that those are fun to change settings on).

In other words, you could layout the knobs and switches exactly as they would be on the stomp, but they would simply be put up higher where you can easily reach them and only the switching buttons are done on the ground.  And you still are using exotic stomps.

I realize this idea is viable when you're buying the real stomps but, when you're the one creating them, you don't have to bundle up the switch with the controls do you?

The short answer is no.  The knob is not just a knob, it is connected directly to the potentiometer, and most fx have 3 or 4 potentiometers, and they are all of different values.  The longer answer is, yes, you could conceivably drill holes, run cable through them to the board, and then have your pots and knobs disconnected from the effect.  But this is like asking for trouble in so many ways.  One broken wire, or one disconnection from the board or the pots and your fx is unusable.

I do remember someone at one point creating a system where a spring cable was used to twist knobs remotely.  I don't remember if it worked well or what is was called.  Spring wire has a lot of tension and twist resistance and can conceivably do something like twist a control that's far away.  You'll see this used on a very large scale, for example, for drill bit extensions, etc.

I've built effects into wah shells to control a parameter by foot.  Like Charger said, someone makes a pedal to mechanical turning mech for pots in pedals.  

You could build the switches separate from the controllers but you would need some kind of cable between the two units.  Depends on how much work you want to do and what you want to acheive.  Sometimes I put a second control for a paramter on an effect and add a footswitch to change between the two pots.  You could mount a stereo jack instead of a first or, if switching between two settings, a second pot and use a box with a stereo jack leading to pot and connect with a three conducter cable. If you want to control many parameters it would require more extensive jack/s and cable/s.

On a different note, you can use a Variax's knobs to control parameters on an HD500...

To clarify, imagine the stomp and all of the important electronics are still together - except mounted up where you can reach everything.  I was thinking that the break would be between the electronics and the switch (stomp button) not between the knobs and the electronics.

Hmm...  That gives me another idea...

You could just do like your rack example but have your pedal board mounted high in front of you instead of in a rack and go to an external switching box to floor controller for switching.

Here's a wiring diagram for a Big Muff:

http://www.generalguitargadgets.com/pdf/ggg_bmp_wiring.pdf?phpMyAdmin=78482479fd7e7fc3768044a841b3e85a

Each pot needs three wires.  The switch with LED uses six wires: Guit in, Guit out, Board in, Board out, Ground, LED(-)  +LED(+) back to the board if the LED is near the switch.  To run switches external you would be running power for the LED through the same cable or running separate power to the switch board.  The wire would be added to overall cable length as well.  I guess if you use electronic switching you could bring your total wires down and avoid running your signal around.

If you put the electronics up high, or just the effects themselves with an external switching box/floor controller,  I would make sure that shit is super stable.  (Atlas stand...  heh heh)


http://www.voodoolab.com/gcx.htm
http://www.voodoolab.com/gcontrolpro.htm

Simple answer.  If my fat ass can bend down to twist knobs then so can you ya lazy bastard! HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

I always thought this was a neat idea
http://i204.photobucket.com/albums/bb134/p6x_photos/AT_DFW_2007/FX_ElectroHarmonix_MM.jpg
makes it easy to change the delay times.  just a bar wrapped around a knob. out of the way and way easier to hit with a big old foot.

I just thought it might be cool if you could easily reach the stomps for adjustments while having the switches still on the floor.  Unlike what Bingewood was describing, all the electronics AND the signal path would go to the stomps mounted on the mic stand - only the switching would be done on the floor.

I guess what I used to have (sold three years ago) was probably the best solution...  

I was saying that in a traditional mech switch setup in an effect, the signal flows through the switch.  If you put the mech switches on the ground, you will be running the signal down to the switch and back up to the electronics.  

If you use Boss/Ibanez style electronic switching, you can run just the switching remote without the signal needing to run around.

http://www.geofex.com/Article_Folders/bosstech.pdf

"Mods
There’s always something more to add. Here are some suggested mods.
1. Remote footswitch: Easy-peasey. Find a spot in the case where you can put a jack into it
to connect a remote footswitch pedal. Something like a 3.5mm / 1/8th inch mono jack would work
fine. Put in the jack, and run two wires from the jack tip and sleeve to the same place where the
wires from the internal tactile switch from the footswitch in the enclosure connects.  Plug in a
remote cable to the jack going to a pedal with a momentary switch in it. Bingo, remote footswitch.
Notice that this can be an remote footswitch too. You have to watch polarity, but
you can sub in an NPN with its emitter going to the grounded side of the tactile switch and its
collector tied to the more-positive side of the internal footswitch. Then you can blast the NPN
base with a blip of current (limited, please! 1ma is more than enough) and it will make the
bypassing flip states."



The type of loop box/switcher you had is the easiest way and makes it easy to add/remove effects on your pedalboard.

The ground control is not what you described, but does what you really seem to be asking.  Here are your options...

• You can build an effect and then stick it in a lightweight box and then mount that on something like a mic stand, and then use a box with a switch on the floor to turn it on or off--there are many switching schemes that will allow you to use a single pole momentary switch to switch the effect on or off.  Not with a true bypass, though, as far as I know.
  
• You could stick all of your pedals in front of you on a table, run them all to a true bypass "looper" box on the floor, and turn them on or off with the footswitch.  
  
• You can just not be fucking lazy.
  

*Imitates Craig*

Guitar is HARD.  You gotta bend down and stuff to twist those knobs.  It's so fucking hard to do that.  Then once you twist the knob on your pedal you gotta stand back up. That's hard man.  What if I didn't get the sound I want?  Then I gotta do all that shit all over again.  Man that's harder than an armidilla in Stratman's back yard.

"oh my aching back!"  

it'd be kinda nice to have controls available at waist height for some things. ring mod, filters... stuff like that.

I've seen Reeves Gabrels rock a Kaoss Pad on a stand for wild swiping fun.





and Belew used to blast noise wif an effect on a stick.


http://youtu.be/HLQhLcKyGs8

Even better for me is expression pedal control.  I can get into that.  I don't normally want to take my hands off the guitar when I want to sweep stuff like filter depth or phaser speed.  But 9 times out of 10 I can set the pedal to what I want with a brief touch of the knobs...

I dig foot control for the most part, but it's fun to set delay parameters to Variax knobs for a dub out.  

Too bad I have the oldest Variax so you can't remove the knobs normal guitar functions... Hmmm, wonder if you can set the tone knob in workbench to be non-responsive in general...

Craig, how about this? (and 16 6' patch cables...)

http://www.roadrageprogear.com/8-loop_bf_true_bypass_pedal.html

Looks easy enough to build.  Good find!

The Joyo switcher is the one I've been lusting after--8 true bypass inputs, but with 32 banks of your 8 effects.  It's like those Bradshaw switching rigs that the pros used to have that cost thousands of dollars...  For $160.

http://www.amazon.com/Joyo-PXL-8-Multi-effects-Individual-Selector/dp/B008SLWY6G/

Now yer talkin'!