It is currently Mon Mar 16, 2020 8:11 pm

All times are UTC - 7 hours



Post new topic Reply to topic  [ 27 posts ]  Go to page Previous  1, 2
Go to page Previous  1, 2
Author Message
Post subject: Re: DID I FRY MY MUSTANG?
Posted: Mon Oct 14, 2013 3:09 pm
Offline
Hobbyist
Hobbyist

Joined: Thu Jan 10, 2013 2:41 pm
Posts: 66
I allways use a surge suppressor caus that has happened to my m3 before but not since. hope this helps.


Top
Profile
Fender Play Winter Sale 2020
Post subject: Re: DID I FRY MY MUSTANG?
Posted: Mon Oct 14, 2013 3:20 pm
Offline
Amateur
Amateur

Joined: Sat Apr 21, 2012 6:39 pm
Posts: 154
Her Wanna wrote:
Could it be because the TC distortion pedal "ramps up the voltage to 3 times a normal pedal?"

Also, again, at the precise moment this happened, I did not have any of the pedals engaged (but I had been using them for 30 minutes prior).

Did I fry the mustang so this could happen again?


If it still works, you didn't "fry" it.

Since the pedals were not active when it happened, it's doubtful that the pedals had anything to do with it. It was probably a line voltage spike, or noise on the line. Are you using a power filter/UPS? A slight drop in line voltage could possibly do something like this, even though it may not have lasted long enough to notice it in your room lights. Static electricity could also be the culprit.

3x the input voltage is not all that unreasonable. Consider that an active preamp and/or active pickups can easily put out 3 times the voltage that a passive instrument cant, especially if you are running it at 18v.

Keep in mind that an OD pedal that prides itself on an 18dB amplification means that it is intended on being used in front of a tube first stage to overdrive the preamp. You don't need to do that with the Mustangs.

_________________
1963 Princeton
1965 Twin Reverb
1968 Bandmaster
1970 Champ
1983 (?) Musicmaster
2012 Mustang III
West Grande (x2)
Acoustic G60-T
Marshall JTM 60


Top
Profile
Post subject: Re: DID I FRY MY MUSTANG?
Posted: Mon Oct 14, 2013 5:39 pm
Offline
Amateur
Amateur

Joined: Sun Apr 07, 2013 11:25 am
Posts: 107
Did/does the behavior occur when no foot switches are connected to your M4?

Paj
8^?


Top
Profile
Post subject: Re: DID I FRY MY MUSTANG?
Posted: Tue Oct 15, 2013 10:31 am
Offline
Aspiring Musician
Aspiring Musician

Joined: Thu Dec 13, 2012 12:58 pm
Posts: 739
PajFender wrote:
Did/does the behavior occur when no foot switches are connected to your M4?

Paj
8^?


never tried that, but the behavior has happened once and only once--immediately after I ran a supercharged analog overdrive pedal through it.


Top
Profile
Post subject: Re: DID I FRY MY MUSTANG?
Posted: Mon Oct 21, 2013 9:50 am
Offline
Aspiring Musician
Aspiring Musician

Joined: Thu Dec 13, 2012 12:58 pm
Posts: 739
Sorry to bump this one more time. I'm trying to decide whether to keep the TC Electronics Dark Matter distortion (all analog) pedal--the one I talk about in the OP.

It brags about upping the voltage to 3X what a normal overdrive pedal does.

Are you guys saying this is okay with my M4v1 or should it be okay if I use it only as a dirty tone shaper with the level way down?

In other words, I could put the "level" on the pedal at 9 o'clock and the "gain" at 3 or 4 o'clock or whatever. (or, just using numbers to describe what I'm talking about--"level" way down at 2 or 3 and "gain" at 6 to 8 )

Should that not mean that I'm not super-boosting the signal going through the amp, but merely making a dirtier "crunch" tone? It's kind of like the "level" parameter is controlling how much "influence" the pedal has on the amp, but the "gain" parameter is kind of like gain on our mustangs....just a "shaper" of the crunchiness of the tone.

(I know the pedal does this. On a tube amp it would mean that there is not a huge boost in volume, just a change to a dirty tone. My question is whether this is not going to hurt my mustang SS amp.)

Thanks.


Last edited by Her Wanna on Mon Oct 21, 2013 9:57 am, edited 1 time in total.

Top
Profile
Post subject: Re: DID I FRY MY MUSTANG?
Posted: Mon Oct 21, 2013 9:57 am
Offline
Professional Musician
Professional Musician
User avatar

Joined: Mon Feb 01, 2010 3:38 pm
Posts: 1744
if you dial it in do you like the sound?

From what i understand its in the Rat type distortion family so if it were me, i'd most certainly keep it. I find it handy to have an extra stomp if you want to have say OD with compressor or whatever.

I got a Joyo Ultimate Drive for 30 bucks and you know what... i friggin love that pedal. Does exactly what i want it to do which is take a mildly driven preset and push it harder. Best 30 bucks i ever spent.

_________________
YMMV

Chont's Mustang Presets


Top
Profile
Post subject: Re: DID I FRY MY MUSTANG?
Posted: Mon Oct 21, 2013 10:05 am
Offline
Aspiring Musician
Aspiring Musician

Joined: Thu Dec 13, 2012 12:58 pm
Posts: 739
captainc wrote:
if you dial it in do you like the sound?

From what i understand its in the Rat type distortion family so if it were me, i'd most certainly keep it. I find it handy to have an extra stomp if you want to have say OD with compressor or whatever.

I got a Joyo Ultimate Drive for 30 bucks and you know what... i friggin love that pedal. Does exactly what i want it to do which is take a mildly driven preset and push it harder. Best 30 bucks i ever spent.


I do like the sound. I'm concerned about whether this particular pedal is too much "boost" for the mustang amp--hurting the amp, I mean. I like the sound.

So much so that I'm GASing bigtime and trying to consider whether to get a Princeton Reverb as a second amp to use real pedals with. Like for little coffee shop solo gigs/open mics.

I have learned that the M4--which I still like and I'm glad I own it--can be waaaaaay louder than I need at a small pup type thing, especially when it's me solo not competing with a drummer or anyone else. And it's heavy. (yet the M4 can still do "bedroom" levels--great amp for what it is)

I have this plan to do little solo gigs with my looper pedal--would love to be in a band with others but can't seem to find anyone--...and was thinking a real Princeton would be cool. I like simplicity, and I'd have my OD/distortion, the chorus/tremelo pedal, the amp's reverb, plus my crybaby....and would be cool with that setup. Even the Princeton with it's 15 tube W and 10" speaker can get way louder than what anyone would let me play in the scenarios I'm envisioning. Heck, my $99 Line 6 Spider 15W 8" speaker gets way louder than anyone wants to hear me play.

Honesty, what's giving me pause re: buying a Princeton or Deluxe reissue is reading about all the problems these amps seem to have, reading over at the "tube amp" section of this website. LOL. I feel like--and I'm kinda preaching to the choir here in the mustang section of this forum--there is a reason modern technology changed. Seems like tube amps are fragile and unreliable. But I feel like I can't learn from others' experience and I have to experience the princeton or deluxe for myself....before I end up being one of these guys who actually likes the MIIIv2 better, even for gigging.

Another thing is that I like really clean cleans, and then really distorted crunch tone for contrast (Nirvana style)..... it is sort of a vote against the mustang if I can't really use this pedal, because I do this looper pedal thing and I need the cleans to stay clean....need a real pedal in front of the looper.


Top
Profile
Post subject: Re: DID I FRY MY MUSTANG?
Posted: Mon Oct 21, 2013 11:23 pm
Offline
Aspiring Musician
Aspiring Musician
User avatar

Joined: Tue May 15, 2012 2:49 am
Posts: 560
Location: Perth, Australia
I don't know what your hang up about the pedal is, but the LEVEL control merely controls the output level of the pedal and not it's sound shaping, as a bonus for tube amp users is that the LEVEL can go right up (3x) to drive the first valve stage of a tube amp. In your scenario just keep the Crunch/Overdrive sound level at the same level as your guitar's clean sound as when the pedal is bypassed, (or slightly louder).

_________________
GUITAR: Fender USA JazzMaster.
BASS: Fender USA 58'AVRI
AMP: Fender USA SuperSonicTwin - Blonde.
Image


Top
Profile
Post subject: Re: DID I FRY MY MUSTANG?
Posted: Tue Oct 22, 2013 8:57 am
Offline
Aspiring Musician
Aspiring Musician

Joined: Sun Feb 03, 2013 6:30 am
Posts: 375
Yes, get the Princeton. Because it sounds good!

You don't have to get a tube amp to use pedals with- the Mustang will handle pedals just fine. I primarily use pedals to color my Mustang's tone, simply because it's easier for me to work with physical knobs. Dirt pedals work best, on SS amps like the Mustang, when you use them to color the tone, not to kick the amp in the teeth.

I have used an OD pedal to drive a distortion in my MIII and it sounded bad $@!.

So, I would say if you're really worried about the Dark Matter hurting your amp, just be careful with the level/volume knob. There are no tubes to drive, and thus no need to "push" the amp with a big input level boost. The amp has a limiter to prevent this sort of damage to the digi processor anyhow.

I'm currently GASsing for a Classic 30 amp- simply because the sound "does it" for me. Like most Peaveys, it's obnoxiously loud, but hey- we all have our crosses to bear, right? :lol:


Top
Profile
Post subject: Re: DID I FRY MY MUSTANG?
Posted: Tue Nov 05, 2013 12:39 pm
Offline
Aspiring Musician
Aspiring Musician

Joined: Thu Dec 13, 2012 12:58 pm
Posts: 739
Well here's the offending TC Electronics "Dark Matter" pedal through my new M3v2. I'm still scared of this pedal as far as using it through my SS mustangs. This is crap playing, but I kind of like how the solo sort of comes out of nowhere. This is really my first time using a real overdrive pedal so the rhythm track stays clean (as I use a looper pedal as my lo-tech recording method). All my other vids have the Mustang amp changed to some overdriven setting for the solo, meaning the rhythm tracks too so it often turns to mush, or, on the other hand, the entire thing stays clean with only the wah pedal adding any boost and the solo is often not out front enough. Anyway.... having fun with my toys is all I'm doing anyway.

I still feel like this pedal is abusing the amp. It's noisy and I just don't like the whole thing about boosting the voltage. But I'm trusting y'all's advice so this is with the "level" way down...not kicking the amp in the teeth with a level boost...just the gain knob up to color the tone. So this means that the amp literally does not "know" or care whether I have an all analog pedal like this--keeping level down means it is not kicking the amp in the teeth, so to speak? Level was at about 11 o'clock because below that it actually got quieter than the clean sound. So with this it's like not much of a volume boost over the clean tone.

BTW if anyone is wondering, IMO this pedal is very "metal". Kind of harsh. Sounds literally like metal on metal clashing. Not really my thing--although I do think the tone below is kind of cool--but I bought the pedal because I like the TC Electronics looper pedal so much that I decided to go with TC Electronics figuring they seem to know what they are doing. And I like being different than everyone else who of course have the same 5 pedals. (the cork sniffers, that is)



Top
Profile
Post subject: Re: DID I FRY MY MUSTANG?
Posted: Tue Nov 05, 2013 9:09 pm
Offline
Aspiring Musician
Aspiring Musician
User avatar

Joined: Tue May 15, 2012 2:49 am
Posts: 560
Location: Perth, Australia
I can only get a heavy grunge sound out of my DarkMatter pedal at full gain, and I don't get metal-on-metal clashing sounds. If anything I get a more bass filled sound. I do think the output of your guitars pickups makes the difference. I use low output singles on my strat and low output humbuckers on my Jazzy.

_________________
GUITAR: Fender USA JazzMaster.
BASS: Fender USA 58'AVRI
AMP: Fender USA SuperSonicTwin - Blonde.
Image


Top
Profile
Post subject: Re: DID I FRY MY MUSTANG?
Posted: Sat Dec 07, 2013 10:13 pm
Offline
Hobbyist
Hobbyist

Joined: Sat Dec 07, 2013 9:49 pm
Posts: 3
I also run a TC Dark Matter and while it does have the capability of delivering high levels of boost I think the main point of the internal V ramp (from 9V to 24V) is to provide headroom for situations where you run Active pups and/or a Fuzz pedal into the Dark Matter. My understanding is the 24V provides for greater dynamic range with the guitars volume knob (and pick attack) before clipping the circuit and making it sound (and feel) compressed. A low output passive single coil can probably maintain decent dynamics with 9V max whereas a hot active humbucker might clip a 9V circuit...especially with the guit vol dimed and heavy strumming


Top
Profile
Display posts from previous:  Sort by  
Post new topic Reply to topic  [ 27 posts ]  Go to page Previous  1, 2
Go to page Previous  1, 2

All times are UTC - 7 hours

Fender Play Winter Sale 2020

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 2 guests


You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum

Search for:
Jump to: