dirt in the fx loop

[John Matrix]

Lately I've been enjoying my DOD 250 at the end after my reverbs and stuff. Sounds good on my practice rig for lo fi sounds. However...when playing out of my real rig I put all those effects in the loop. I tried that out today and it sounded totally different. Almost no dirt at all, acted more like a boost. Any idea why? I know there are a few different kinds of loops that behave in different ways. Any recs for options that might act the way I want?

[fcknoise]

The metal zone is discussed in rooms where taste and Good Tone is I served as being very good in the fx-loop, i.e., using it as a pre-amp. The 250 might not have enough gain to push the power amp section to get the desired dirt. Why not put it in front of the amp? Annoying to have it all on two chains I suppose but then... why not run everything in front of the amp?

[John Matrix]

I rely on the pre-amp gain of the amp a lot. It's a VTM 60 (JCM 800) and I use dirt pedal in front of the high gain input. The ambient effects sound like doo doo (imo) in front of the amp and the dirt pedals sound cheap in the clean input. So I use 2chainz...dirt in front, ambient in the loop. I just wanted one final mild OD at the end to make it sound like a shitty broken radio sometimes. Demos of the SS/BS mini make it seem perfect but if it is gonna act dumb in the loop I don't wanna waste my money.

[John Matrix]

Well after doing some research on line and trying different things out I learned that the culprit is the VTM's unusual effects loop. The effects loop out actually lowers the volume of the signal and it is brought up again after the loop return. I guess this was done to be more pedal friendly with an instrument level signal instead of line level. In reality the signal is significantly lower than instrument level, at least low enough so that distortion effects don't distort that much. Even my Elements with the gain maxed out sounded like a mild OD at best. If I bypass the preamp all together and just plug into the loop return the signal is way louder and the pedals work the way they should. Anyway, I guess that closes the book on this mystery. bummer.

[coldbrightsunlight]

ah that sucks. Guess you could stack a boost in there too? But maybe that's too much hassle

[friendship]

Or velcro a Di to the back of the amp, that would convert the loop's output into a line level signal before hitting your effects

[John Matrix]

ah that sucks. Guess you could stack a boost in there too? But maybe that's too much hassle

Actually I do have an eq pedal at the end for lead boosting...I'll try putting the drive after that. I feel silly for not thinking of that since it's already on my board haha.

[coldbrightsunlight]

Or velcro a Di to the back of the amp, that would convert the loop's output into a line level signal before hitting your effects

genius amp hack

[fcknoise]

Well after doing some research on line and trying different things out I learned that the culprit is the VTM's unusual effects loop. The effects loop out actually lowers the volume of the signal and it is brought up again after the loop return. I guess this was done to be more pedal friendly with an instrument level signal instead of line level. In reality the signal is significantly lower than instrument level, at least low enough so that distortion effects don't distort that much. Even my Elements with the gain maxed out sounded like a mild OD at best. If I bypass the preamp all together and just plug into the loop return the signal is way louder and the pedals work the way they should. Anyway, I guess that closes the book on this mystery. bummer.

This is a strange thing. But it is good knowledge to have, because the VTM has always been an amp on my wishlist.

[John Matrix]

This is a strange thing. But it is good knowledge to have, because the VTM has always been an amp on my wishlist.

Besides this one issue I have no complaints with the way the loop works. I don't have much technical knowledge about the way different designs work but compared to my other two amps (Sunn solid state amps) the fx loop on the VTM works way better.