rack mounting effect pedals

[twincities]

hey hive mind, looking for some ideas for a project i want to undertake-

i have somewhere in the range of ~100 guitar effect pedals. some small mono boss style things, some larger eventide/strymon/line6 stereo, multi switch, midi jack, unique power things, and everything in between (along with plenty of oddball, barely pedal but roughly pedal sized type stuff).

my dream is to get all of these pieces into one large unit, all wired up to a patchbay, all powered, all ready to go at a moments notice. i don't play live/bring pedals out of the house in pedal board fashion ever. i also don't really play guitar. all these would live on reamp sends for stuff from my computer, or synths.

the rack/shelves - i'm aiming for something like a pull out drawer system. i'm *probably* going to end up with a standard 19" rack mount, and pull out shelves meant for them and the existing 19" ecosystem for patchbays, power distros, cable management, etc. unfortunately i really can't find what i thought would be easier to in the wooden furniture world? i'd LOVE something more like 36"-48" wide, wooden pull out shelves (shoe racks??). charlie clouser seems to have exactly what i'm looking for going on in his studio, along with some other composers i've caught on studio tours, so it exists, unless they're all custom made furniture. if anyone has any leads for that i'm all ears. pictures of similar large setups anyone here has would also be appreciated. i'm still in the design phase so i'd love to see some working examples.

powering up pedals - i guess i'm looking at a pedal power 2+ per shelf? and then all the iec's to a single furman strip at the bottom. if i go 19" i'm probably looking at 6+ shelves. i'm not really looking forward to the idea of purchasing 6 full price pedal power's if avoidable? i know some larger solutions exist, but with the nature of pull out shelves, i don't think the cabling will work well splitting two shelves to one power distro. another situations where much larger shelves, and only needing 3 shelves would allow me to get 3 larger power supplies instead of a minimum of 6 smaller ones (realistically i'm looking to have way more than 8 pedals on some shelves, so i'll need more than a single pedal power on those).

patch bay - this one should be simple, just labor intensive. custom length cabling to and from each pedal. right angle where appropriate. cables pulled to the proper length and tied to the shelf itself at the rear, same from the patch bay to a tie bar in the back, then enough slack between those 2 tie points to extend the drawer fully. maybe some techflex around the bundle to avoid a huge knot. and lots of label maker/color coding.... lots of the more modern pedals are stereo via trs on either in+out, or just on out. figured i'd run trs full length to the patchbay and do some trs to dual ts breakouts there? then everything ultimately hitting the patchbay is ts, ts patch on the front for me. my patchbay itself will technically be trs, but i don't think i should have any issues just passing ts through the whole thing?

in/out - i'll end up living a pair of radial reamps, and a pair of decent di's on shelf. then it's just xlr in+out for my main sends from my daw. back in through the preamp of my choice. if i end up wanting to send direct from a guitar or synth i can just throw that cable into the front of the patchbay and skip the reamp boxes. easy.

midi - a handful of these pedals have midi of some kind. i'm probably only looking to to send clock for delays and loops. i don't really need CC control or program changes. i say that now, but who knows, either way the cables are there so i have the option. i'm looking for a 1 in, ~10 thru midi splitter. recommendations? then there are the pedals that only take in clock with tap/1/4" jacks. are there any simple streamlined utilities to extract clock from midi, and send out that pulse via 1/4"? i could figure it out via modular pretty easily, but i don't want my modular to need to be involved in the basic operation of this rig. that signal then needs to be multed out a handful of times.

cv/expression - a majority of these pedals have either expression or CV controls of some kind. i'd love to get them all to a patchbay as well, but i feel like i'm in for a world of hurt there with them not playing well with each other and their various formats. any tricks for making this work? things to watch out for? am i actually going to blow something up? i've always kept my pedal expression usage VERY conservative. moog pedals playing with each other. expression pedals into a singular device, etc. but if it's all living together the goal is to be able to take an lfo from mooger fooger world and send it to a boss pedal, or cloudy, or red panda, or whatever. what am i in for?





so, thoughts, ideas, examples? what dumb things am i missing? what products exist that will make my life 100x's easier? am i biting off more than one should chew? should i just sell everything and buy an axe fx?


thanks!

[manymanyhaha]

That's a lot to go through but first thought is if money is not a big hindrance, this programmable patchbay can be used with pedals https://www.gearslutz.com/board/product ... chbay.html. He also makes a 64 patch version (but very expensive).

[twincities]

That's a lot to go through but first thought is if money is not a big hindrance, this programmable patchbay can be used with pedals https://www.gearslutz.com/board/product ... chbay.html. He also makes a 64 patch version (but very expensive).

hah, yeah sorry for the wall of text. lot of options to think through and i'm a rambler!

so i'm familiar with the xpatch stuff (actually i'm familiar with the flock audio version, but they're nearly identical). *if* budget wasn't an issue i'd be looking more in that direction for sure. but alas, budget is a concern, at least when it comes to $2000 patchbays (obviously this project will cost me a few bucks, but i'm looking to cut back where reasonable).

for patchbays i'm probably sticking to the much more economically friendly, $100 neutrik trs patchbays. i already have one sitting here for this and will probably end up with a few more of the same.

[K2000]

My friend did something like this. I don't have a photo but he converted his garage to a studio/office. He built the shelves so that they angled down slightly (with a lip at the bottom) to make it easier to see the face of the pedal, knob labels etc. Not 45 degrees but maybe like 25 degrees? A noticeable angle but not radical. He had 3 or 4 amps in the room too, that he could switch between. There was probably a direct route into the computer too, besides going through mics on the amps . He is deceased now, so I can't get him to chime in here. But your project sounds great, I'm all for it.

[DannDubbleEwe]

[youtube][/youtube]

Start at 7:45 in to get to his take on this, although the whole video is great. Also I love Adrian Belew. Also props on him for having a Driving Notion. Also totally dig this idea and hopefully that’ll give you a little inspiration!

[K2000]

Heres an amp selector pedal I made, "The Decider"...for some reason the decals got a little grainy on this one, i think my printer was kind of dying at this point. This pedal routes a bassman, showman and marshall to their respective cabinets so I dont have ton unlug anything to switch amp heads in my studio.

[manymanyhaha]

hah, yeah sorry for the wall of text. lot of options to think through and i'm a rambler!

so i'm familiar with the xpatch stuff (actually i'm familiar with the flock audio version, but they're nearly identical). *if* budget wasn't an issue i'd be looking more in that direction for sure. but alas, budget is a concern, at least when it comes to $2000 patchbays (obviously this project will cost me a few bucks, but i'm looking to cut back where reasonable).

for patchbays i'm probably sticking to the much more economically friendly, $100 neutrik trs patchbays. i already have one sitting here for this and will probably end up with a few more of the same.

Just to be clear, for anyone who might ever be looking into those two options: The CB Audio Xpatch will do +4/-10 per channel whereas Flock audio doesn't. At least not yet.

But yeah, I briefly fantasized about getting the Xpatch before seeing the price tag and then that thought perished instantly

[twincities]

impressive project, you could check out the last years biggest pedal board BILF winners to steal some ideas.

embarrassing as it is to say, i wasn't seeing anything nearly as big as what i'm talking. was there a category that isn't pedal board sized that i missed

My friend did something like this. I don't have a photo but he converted his garage to a studio/office. He built the shelves so that they angled down slightly (with a lip at the bottom) to make it easier to see the face of the pedal, knob labels etc. Not 45 degrees but maybe like 25 degrees? A noticeable angle but not radical. He had 3 or 4 amps in the room too, that he could switch between. There was probably a direct route into the computer too, besides going through mics on the amps . He is deceased now, so I can't get him to chime in here. But your project sounds great, I'm all for it.

so that's roughly what i'm thinking, except i'm not so handy so i was hoping to purchase a ready made piece of furniture somewhere. dresser/shoerack/mapdrawer kinda thing. i was thinking pull out drawers vs. static shelves just because i think i'll fit more into a usable space that way, but the right slant could get around that! i just think that might require more height per shelf as well to fit the same amount of stuff? but it's something i'll look into, thanks!

[youtube][/youtube]

Start at 7:45 in to get to his take on this, although the whole video is great. Also I love Adrian Belew. Also props on him for having a Driving Notion. Also totally dig this idea and hopefully that’ll give you a little inspiration!

love adrian, but i'm hoping for something a bit more elegant honestly (really just cause i don't have an entire walk in closet to spare in my studio for it ). a lot of those shelves are just one row of pedals, i'm hoping to go more like pedal board style packing on each shelf, 2-3 deep, right angle cables to maximize space, tetris'd together, etc. i'm attaching some photos of chalie clouser's rig that i referenced originally. i've seen a few composers with similar-ish ideas of varying sizes and complexities.


it's living underneath the modular on the right

[Bartimaeus]

do you have any sort of setup like this? if not, you may want to try building something on a smaller scale to give yourself some experience on what does and doesn't work. that can save you from some real headaches down the road.

also, if you sell ~20-30 pedals, you can probably fund that xpatch-64, and you'd also get closer to its max number of channels. imho, having more control over the pedals you use is more important than having as many options as possible. especially if you have a computer as the center of your setup, rather than playing guitar, it seems like a waste to skimp on the switching side of things. i'd much rather be able to instantly switch between preset configurations of 64 pedals on my computer, compared to fiddling with cables and 200 patch points.

i'm not sure how you can power 100 pedals with just six pp2+ units (48 output jacks total), unless you do a lot of daisy chaining for the analog units? maybe you could build some simple distribution boxes to add extra power jacks per shelf: https://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/ ... msg1184925

[twincities]

do you have any sort of setup like this? if not, you may want to try building something on a smaller scale to give yourself some experience on what does and doesn't work. that can save you from some real headaches down the road.

also, if you sell ~20-30 pedals, you can probably fund that xpatch-64, and you'd also get closer to its max number of channels. imho, having more control over the pedals you use is more important than having as many options as possible. especially if you have a computer as the center of your setup, rather than playing guitar, it seems like a waste to skimp on the switching side of things. i'd much rather be able to instantly switch between preset configurations of 64 pedals on my computer, compared to fiddling with cables and 200 patch points.

i'm not sure how you can power 100 pedals with just six pp2+ units (48 output jacks total), unless you do a lot of daisy chaining for the analog units? maybe you could build some simple distribution boxes to add extra power jacks per shelf: https://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/ ... msg1184925

i mean, i have the pedals, and regularly run them on inserts from my computer rig. i'm also very familiar with patching systems. so while no i don't have some mini pedal patch system that i'm looking to size up, i'm not going in blind on any of the tech behind it (well, minus some specific midi/cv toys). building it twice at two different scales doesn't seem like fun.

ultimately i'm just sick of the pause, go find the shelf/drawer/pile on the floor with the pedal i want, find the right power supply for it, patch it, and hope it's doing what you want, other wise put that one away and start again. there's also the inevitable "pedal of the month" thing that happens when i get too lazy to go grab a different delay so the one i've got plugged in already will do.

the pedal power thing was just spitballing numbers while i typed. if i do find a way to fit/choose to patch up all ~100 then no, it'll be more like 10 pedal powers and a handful of proprietary bricks for some oddballs. or some combination of mondo's and other various sizes they make depending the shelf size i end up with. though i may play around with some daisy chaining/distro boxes for some of the less interesting items and see if there's any noise going on.

as for the xpatch stuff, yes they're cool, no i don't think it's worth it for my uses. yes it'll maybe save me some time patching/let me make presets, but that only really helps if the settings on the actual pedals never change, otherwise it's not much of a preset. i also don't really need presets. this isn't a pedal board meant to play through songs with a band where a midi switching system makes sense to recall what you did it practice. it's a studio writing/mixing set up. once the sound is made, i don't need it again, or really want it again. hell, if i wanted a tool i had total control over/recallability i'd reach for a plugin, ya know?

[manymanyhaha]

It's a cool project and that photo of that dude's studio is pretty amazing.

You can very easily make your own slide out shelves using heavy duty drawer slides and 2x4's and plywood, which would be easiest to work with. You can even put it on heavy duty casters, if you might want to slide it around some. Don't know if this is helpful but this is a mockup of a road case I am about to build. Basically it is sort of the same idea but to travel and play live:



For power, I have found Strymon Zuma's more favorable than PP2+'s, because of the 500ma per channel. Don't have to worry as much about which pedal is hooked up to which source, and they are also expandable. The ZUMA does not power 100% of everything but most everything. For anything it does not power, there are others to fill the gaps, like the DC7 from Cioks or the TruTone boxes. But to power 100 pedals, you are buying a lot of boxes. If you want to buy over time, there is always the temporary solution of daisy chaining with One Spots.

So you can do this with off-the-shelf patchbays? I don't know why but for some reason I thought there might be problems doing that.

[crochambeau]

the rack/shelves - i'm aiming for something like a pull out drawer system. i'm *probably* going to end up with a standard 19" rack mount, and pull out shelves meant for them and the existing 19" ecosystem for patchbays, power distros, cable management, etc. unfortunately i really can't find what i thought would be easier to in the wooden furniture world? i'd LOVE something more like 36"-48" wide, wooden pull out shelves (shoe racks??). charlie clouser seems to have exactly what i'm looking for going on in his studio, along with some other composers i've caught on studio tours, so it exists, unless they're all custom made furniture. if anyone has any leads for that i'm all ears. pictures of similar large setups anyone here has would also be appreciated. i'm still in the design phase so i'd love to see some working examples.

I assume you have hunted in keyboard/synthesizer circles as well. I would also assume any such fixture is a custom manufactured job. I built out a sliding shelf for my main mixing console:



Please forgive my copious use of 'murican freedom units in describing dimensions; unless you're in the U.S., then we have too many other things to be sorry about to be bothered with such nonsense.

It sits in a space 42 inches wide. The shelf is 39 inches wide by 24 inches deep, and I've got about 22 inches of pull before my wiring loom starts giving resistance (I think my slides are supposed to be 24 inch pull, but I'm not interested in proving that).



I believe my slides are Knape & Vogt 6300 series, good to 100 pounds. They come in various sizes, and my out of pocket at the local hardware store was really close to the prices listed here: https://www.knapeandvogt.com/6300?

You will notice I ran metal angle around the perimeter of the shelf, this is critical for rigidity purposes, plus it gave me something to bolt to since drawer pulls are designed to mount to a vertical surface.


Extended showing a little deflection on the rail, but in use it seems far sturdier than say, a folding table. You can see a wooden plate fixed to the wall, this was done because I did not have a good line-up of studs to secure the slider to, for the purposes here that could be considered the "side of the box".


I fashioned the side carriages from some scrap metal shelving posts. The built in holes made the sides an easy going no-drill process.


These heads JUST clear the rail while retracting, so, if in doubt hunt out some recessed heads.


I think some hardware came with it, but it was designed to screw into a wooden shelf wall so I had to roll my own.

I know you said you're not really handy, but a project of this caliber is a pretty decent place to start working those muscles (if you're so inclined to want). I would expect a nicely built cabinet with decent pulls and a pretty finish to cost a pretty penny once everything is said and done. My advice, if you do want to take a stab at rolling your own, is to cut (or have cut) the shelves last, once you know the rest of your dimensions.

[twincities]

It's a cool project and that photo of that dude's studio is pretty amazing.

You can very easily make your own slide out shelves using heavy duty drawer slides and 2x4's and plywood, which would be easiest to work with. You can even put it on heavy duty casters, if you might want to slide it around some. Don't know if this is helpful but this is a mockup of a road case I am about to build. Basically it is sort of the same idea but to travel and play live:



For power, I have found Strymon Zuma's more favorable than PP2+'s, because of the 500ma per channel. Don't have to worry as much about which pedal is hooked up to which source, and they are also expandable. The ZUMA does not power 100% of everything but most everything. For anything it does not power, there are others to fill the gaps, like the DC7 from Cioks or the TruTone boxes. But to power 100 pedals, you are buying a lot of boxes. If you want to buy over time, there is always the temporary solution of daisy chaining with One Spots.

So you can do this with off-the-shelf patchbays? I don't know why but for some reason I thought there might be problems doing that.

that looks great, basically the 4 shelf version of that is what i'm looking to achieve. the more i look into this, the more i think i'm going to get forced down the DIY route to some degree.

noted on the zuma and others. i just happen to have 2 pedal power2+'s around here already that i've had foryears, but once i know what size shelves i'm working with and which pedals are getting slapped where, i did plan on doing a kind of "price per pedal" comparison between some brands and sizes, figure out who makes sense to leave on a wall wart vs finding a supply that can handle that pedals specifics if it isn't just boss style, etc

yeah, off the shelf patchbays will be fine. don't need any normaling for a setup like this so everything will just live out>in on top of themselves. TS patchbays do exist, but i'll be using trs. cables will still be TS of course, and it will be unbalanced till it hits a DI on the final output, but as long as everything is skipping the ring connector it should be fine. the guy whose studio i posted and i'm kind of jacking this idea from uses them himself and claims to never have issues. problems with that stuff only really pop up when you start mixing and matching ts + trs, which i'll purposefully be avoiding.

[twincities]

I know you said you're not really handy, but a project of this caliber is a pretty decent place to start working those muscles (if you're so inclined to want). I would expect a nicely built cabinet with decent pulls and a pretty finish to cost a pretty penny once everything is said and done. My advice, if you do want to take a stab at rolling your own, is to cut (or have cut) the shelves last, once you know the rest of your dimensions.

ohh i appreciate all the detail, thank you. day by day it is looking like this may be forced into a DIY project so i'll be coming back to this post in detail if that happens!

yeah i've looked into the kind of synth drawers you see people with as well, but again, i think they're usually custom units. i actually wanted one for my synth stuff as well but just ended up with a jasper rack instead.

[dunbine]

https://www.instagram.com/y_kontrol/ has an interesting pedal wall solution with patch bays & power supplies, etc. It might be mounted on casters? Not exactly what you're looking for, but the other pics may generate ideas. Dangerous & expensive ideas.