effects loop AND out front?

[garoflex]

greetings, i read about some of you using some pedals in front of your amp (dist.,wa, ect.) and time based pedals (chorus, delay) in the effects loop. my LSC manual says to use the shortest possible patch cords for the effect loop. do you use two pedal boards, one for in front and one for the effects loop? how long can a cord be before its gonna be a problem? i had all but givin up on delay while using channel two because of the nasty sounds untill i put it in the loop. now it sounds great but my h2o chorus/delay sits on my amp with my mxr 10 band because of the super short cords im using. advise anyone? thanx

 

[rabidinus]

I use an SKB pedalboard that allows you to route some effects to the amps effects loop and some effects to the front of the amp. I used the shortest cables I could make to connect effects on the board, but I use long cables from the board to the guitar out of necessity (front of stage to backline length).

 

[NoGlassNoClass]

While there may be *some* advantage to shorter cable lengths, IMO the quality of the cable is more important. The loop signal is line-level and buffered, so there should not be much if any level or tone loss over longer cable runs. As long as your send/return cables are not noisy, poorly soldered, or made from poor-quality cable, you should be fine.

There are certainly some advantages to racking your pedals and using MIDI-controlled loops and switching systems, but many (most?) of us working players dont need/cant afford/dont want to hassle such elaborate systems for playing a couple hours in a bar or nightclub.

The cable from your guitar to the first pedal is the most critical. As long as at least one of your front-end effects is buffered (or you use a separate buffer of some type), cable runs of 20-30 feet from your pedals to the amp, and loop send/return from amp to pedalboard and back should be plenty long enough to reach from your amp on top of cab(s) to the front of the stage without causing noticeable signal loss.

 

[zappaslaughter]

I use a LSC and an H20 pedal as well. I run the H20 in the loop with 3 foot cables. I run my wah in the front of the amp. I have no need for a board, because that is only 3 pedals with the mesa foot switch included.

I used shorter cables on the H20 to loop, and noticed no difference. I have noticed that if I have the signal setting set too high on the loop, the H20 pedal makes the amp crack and spit.