Tuner noise with 6166 volume pedal...

[Chad]

Whenever I have a tuner hooked up to my 6166 volume pedal, there is always a distorted sound. If I shut the tuner off, then the sound goes away. Is this normal?

BTW, I'm using quality tuners. I alternate between using a Boss TU-12H and a Peterson VS-1.

 

[beej]

That's the 250k pedal? So your signal path is passive?

Might be the added impedance from your tuner loading down your guitar. If so, you'll need a buffer/pre-amp before the pedal. Of course ... you'll need the 25k pedal if you go that route ... Or find a way to shut off the tuner for normal playing (A/B box).

 

[Chad]

According to the EB site, the pedal is 250K. All of my guitars are passive and the pedal is the first thing in my signal chain.

 

[beej]

Right, but the guitar sees the impedance of the tuner from the split in the vol pedal. My guess is it's affecting your signal.

 

[Chad]

As far as I know the noise appears with every guitar I play through it whether a guitar has hot HBs or low output single coils. So do you think this is a pedal problem or a tuner problem? At this point it seems like a rather dumb option to put on a pedal if it's gonna cause problems like this.

 

[beej]

I think the culprit is the tuner.

The tuner is always on in your signal path, whereas the output to your amp is variable from the pedal. The tuner, when on, affects the your signal (added resistance of it's input buffer, etc.). If you pull the tuner out and the vol pedal works fine, then there ya go.

So you have a couple of choices: lose the tuner, go active by using a buffer before the vol pedal (and get a 25k pedal) and then the split won't have any effect on your signal, or get a tuner that you can turn off/on - i.e. Strobostomp or the like.

Any pedal you put in your signal path is going to have an effect on your signal. Excess cable adds capacitance, sucking up highs (this can be a good thing). Effects like Tuners and Wahs have a big effect if you can't turn them off (what they call "true bypass").

But the acid test is what you like the sound of. And it sounds like this doesn't sound good.

 

[skabassist13]

Mine does that to. I just turn off the tuner.