Home › Forums › Help/Technical Questions › Help using a 1 spot and Damage from wrong polarity question

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  • July 15, 2010 at 10:11 pm #80505
    Maiden Metal Muff
    Member

    Hi guys, need a little help here, I got myself a 1spot after deciding I was going to cheap out on the power supply for my pedal board after laughing at spending whatever silly sum was asked for the DC brick. After doing a quick search I found many positive responses to the 1spot, so I went ahead and got one. My humble pedal board comprises of a Metal Muff, a small stone, doctor Q, marshall supervivbe chorus pedal, and a Boss Digital Delay 7, in that order, I also got myself the vintage stlye converters for the Q and the stone and in an excited rush I hooked them all up without thinking about anything other than sticking plugs into the pedals, I gave each pedal a click and hurray all of the LED’s came to life! I plugged in one of my strats, and found myself bemused as to why no sound was coming out, quickly giving one of the pedals a click on, by hand I felt a very subtle amount of shock coming through, and at that moment I whipped out the 1spot and realised after checking closely the Muff and the vibe were reverse polarity to that of the 1spot unit, I quickly hooked my vibe and the muff one at a time to the my marshall adaptor of the correct polarity, and both pedals seemed to work as before this noob act, no smells no smoke. I realise now that I need to use the 1spot polarity converter.

    My question to you guys is, using my marshall adaptor if my pedals seem to work, sound and smell fine, could they still possibly be damaged beyond my ears or is there a diode that protects them from idiots like me? or maybe Im lucky this time.

    Also are the small stone and doctor Q also reverse polarity? after reading the pedals manual and casing I could not find any mention of it or the symbol that indicates it. Any help will be much appreciated, and I have learnt my lesson :facepalm:

    Cheers guys, look forward to hearing from you all :)

    July 16, 2010 at 12:15 am #110262
    ranjam
    Member

    If you feel comfortable doing this, peek inside each pedal, especially around the DC jack. Usually, there will be something like a diode, a series resistor/parallel capacitor acting as a filter, maybe a zener, whatever. Sometimes those will get burnt very badly, but the pedal will still work, especially if the part was in parallel. I had a Pigtronix Philosopher’s Tone that had the wrong adaptor plugged in, and it smoked a series resistor. Of course the pedal didn’t work until that resistor was replaced. But if you are getting a signal through, and you don’t smell anything, you are likely OK. Just on the off chance you took out a parallel diode or something, check anyway.

    July 16, 2010 at 12:33 am #110263
    Maiden Metal Muff
    Member
    Quote:
    If you feel comfortable doing this, peek inside each pedal, especially around the DC jack. Usually, there will be something like a diode, a series resistor/parallel capacitor acting as a filter, maybe a zener, whatever. Sometimes those will get burnt very badly, but the pedal will still work, especially if the part was in parallel. I had a Pigtronix Philosopher’s Tone that had the wrong adaptor plugged in, and it smoked a series resistor. Of course the pedal didn’t work until that resistor was replaced. But if you are getting a signal through, and you don’t smell anything, you are likely OK. Just on the off chance you took out a parallel diode or something, check anyway.

    you know what Im such a noob I realised all of my pedals except for the stone and the Q which Im unsre of, are centre negative polarity, same as the 1spot, so I have no idea why nothing is working, with the 1spot, do you know if the classic Doctor Q and small stone are centre negative polairty? I have no problem with opening up pedals, I do plenty of work and overhauls on guitars, Im just ignorant and dont pay attention to small but important details. However now im confussed as to why my pedals would not work with the 1spot, other than the Q and the stone possibly being reverse pol?

    July 16, 2010 at 3:48 pm #110283
    SanquiFlerb
    Member

    If you daysichain pedals with different polarities you’ll fry the pedals. Plus, don’t mix digital pedals with analog ones on the daysichain, digitals won’t work. read this thread for more info on powering up pedals: http://www.ehx.com/forums/viewthread/2957

    July 16, 2010 at 5:12 pm #110289
    julian
    Moderator
    Quote:
    If you daysichain pedals with different polarities you’ll fry the pedals. Plus, don’t mix digital pedals with analog ones on the daysichain, digitals won’t work. read this thread for more info on powering up pedals: http://www.ehx.com/forums/viewthread/2957

    I’ll agree with you on the 2nd point, but the 1st point is misleading.

    If a pedal has a center positive jack, it doesn’t mean that it won’t work with a daisy chained pedal, it just means that it requires the positive power to be at the center. Thus you use a reverse polarity adapter. Most EHX and DOD pedals with the old 1/8″ style power will work daisy chained with boss style power jacks, given you get the correct adapter. Those 1/8″ guys are center positive. It actually makes boatloads of sense to be center positive because then you don’t have to shield the bushing from the chassis of the pedal.

    I daisy chain my Sovtek Small Stone, DOD-250, and my DOD FX-17 which are all center positive with typical center negative pedals all the time.

    THE PROBLEM comes when you have pedals that have positive ground and negative ground daisy chained together.

    PNP transistor based pedals all have positive ground. If on your daisy chain you have both positive and negative as ground, then you’ve got a ground loop and you’ve got a problem.

    The easiest way to check the polarity inside a pedal would be to check which part of the battery is connect to ground. If – is connected to ground, it’s normal. If + is connected to ground, it’s different and needs to powered separately.

    July 16, 2010 at 5:14 pm #110290
    SanquiFlerb
    Member
    Quote:
    THE PROBLEM comes when you have pedals that have positive ground and negative ground daisy chained together.

    This is what I ment.

    July 16, 2010 at 5:15 pm #110291
    Mr.Grim
    Member

    yeah what they sed! the 1/4 phono adapters for the 1Spot should convert the polarity on there own, i use them allot. but also the comment on “dont mix digital and analog pedals on a power chain depends on your settup. i have a huge chain on my 3 1Spots, and my SMMH has no issues being involed, so i guess its trial and error, but most of the time that comment is true.

    July 16, 2010 at 5:31 pm #110292
    SanquiFlerb
    Member

    FU I’m having trouble editing my post, so ignore this.

    July 16, 2010 at 5:36 pm #110294
    Mr.Grim
    Member

    what? why the hostility sanquiflerb?

    July 16, 2010 at 6:43 pm #110297
    SanquiFlerb
    Member
    Quote:
    what? why the hostility sanquiflerb?

    Which hostility? you mean with ignore this? maybe I should have said “ignore this post”. Instead of editing my first post I clicked on quote, and I quote myself, so the second post is surplus.

    July 17, 2010 at 4:26 am #110305
    Mr.Grim
    Member

    i was just a little confused, you sed “FU” i didn’t know who or what you were pertaining to.

    July 17, 2010 at 11:46 am #110309
    electro-melx
    Moderator
    Quote:
    yeah what they sed! the 1/4 phono adapters for the 1Spot should convert the polarity on there own, i use them allot.

    yeah, the mini jack coverters you get with the one spot are correct to use with the Big Muff (and other old type ehx) you don’t need ‘reverse polarity’ connectors.

    July 17, 2010 at 1:38 pm #110310
    Kevin Demuth
    Member
    Quote:
    If you daysichain pedals with different polarities you’ll fry the pedals. Plus, don’t mix digital pedals with analog ones on the daysichain, digitals won’t work. read this thread for more info on powering up pedals: http://www.ehx.com/forums/viewthread/2957

    Not true.

    Quote:
    yeah what they sed! the 1/4 phono adapters for the 1Spot should convert the polarity on there own, i use them allot. but also the comment on “dont mix digital and analog pedals on a power chain depends on your settup. i have a huge chain on my 3 1Spots, and my SMMH has no issues being involed, so i guess its trial and error, but most of the time that comment is true.

    True.

    I’ve used well over 100 pedals in daisy chain set-ups (not all at the same time though), and analogue or digital honestly doesn’t make much difference in my experience – as long as the power supply has enough output to power all the pedals that are hooked up, of course; having a few high current draw, modern digital pedals can easily put a strain on a One Spot.

    The only problems I’ve had with certain pedals has been increased noise (often a high-pitched whine) but it seems more to do with specific combinations than an individual pedal… e.g. My SMMw/H works perfectly (with no noise whatsoever) when daisy chained, as long as I’m not using the Germanium OD…
    in fact, thinking about it now, I have had more problems with analogue pedals not liking to be daisy chained.

    July 17, 2010 at 4:02 pm #110313
    SanquiFlerb
    Member
    Quote:
    i was just a little confused, you sed “FU” i didn’t know who or what you were pertaining to.

    It’s ok :)

    Quote:
    analogue or digital honestly doesn’t make much difference in my experience – as long as the power supply has enough output to power all the pedals that are hooked up, of course; having a few high current draw, modern digital pedals can easily put a strain on a One Spot

    this. sometimes I summarize (if that’s the word) too much and I make a few omisions on what I say. I apologize guys.

    July 18, 2010 at 12:03 am #110317
    Maiden Metal Muff
    Member

    My head is spinning, so from the above I have gathered not to mix analogue and digital, daisy chaining pedals in the wrong polarity will fry them, and the 1spot vintage adaptors also reverse polarity. Ok im a tad confused, my pedal rig was setup in the following order: my metal muff into my doctor Q to my small stone (both classic versions) running into my marshall supervibe, and finally my boss DD7, the boss, marshall and metal muff are all centre negative, and I was obviously using the 1spot vintage adaptors for the stone and the Q, as I mentioned in my first post the setup was not working, but also the LED’s were lighting up, and a very small amount of charge was coming through the pedal casings. I have actually proceeded to purchase 1spot polarity converter assuming I would need to put them in front of the vintage adaptors, however mentioned in this thread the vintage adaptors already reverse polarity, so have any of you guys got any idea as to why my rig is not working is it the digital boss being in the setup or do I need to have a separate 1spot for these reverse polarity pedals, I was getting the assumption from mr.grim that he runs many of pedals occasionally of a 1spot, im guessing including of both polarity, please help me with these queries friends :)

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