Face palm of the month...

jhaneyzz

jhaneyzz

Well-known member
I've been having persistent issues with my builds lately that seemed like bad solder joints somewhere.

I attributed it to my funky spider wiring and spent plenty of time reflowing solder and micro inspecting every component.

But last night I was experiencing it with an older build that I know has been rock solid.

Turned out to be a patch cable.... fer crying out loud...

It's always the simple, obvious, crap...
 
jhaneyzz said:
I've been having persistent issues with my builds lately that seemed like bad solder joints somewhere.

I attributed it to my funky spider wiring and spent plenty of time reflowing solder and micro inspecting every component.

But last night I was experiencing it with an older build that I know has been rock solid.

Turned out to be a patch cable.... fer crying out loud...

It's always the simple, obvious, crap...
Click to expand...
Dude same same for me...
I had the input and output reversed on my pedal...

I spent hours reflowing and cleaning up the board. Re-attaching wires, probing, burning up parts with my iron, switched out jacks...
 
The pain is real... I'd just finished up a prototype build... one of five... and I couldn't get the dang thing to turn on... then realized I'd put the polarity protection diode in backwards... checked the other four boards, they're all fine... why I flipped this ONE and then decided that was the ONE I needed to finish the full proto-build on... OI... works lovely now...
 
For the longest time I was convinced that the output jack on my Strat was broken. Then I realized it was the cable. It was completely disconnected and would only pass signal when finagled enough to physically press the ends of the signal wire together. Only took me next to forever to figure that one out…
 
I roll my own cables, and was having intermittent crackling. I took the plug apart and the solders were rock solid. Whilst I was scratching my head I heard 'clickity' come from the plug. Effing thing was unscrewed. Screwed it back in. I didn't even know they screwed...... Neutrik black nickle housing with gold plated plug - like $5 each....

grumble
 
I've only had input and output reversed once while testing a pedal and I figured it out pretty quick, but I soldered the ground and signal wires the wrong way around on three builds in a row, even when I thought "I made this mistake last time/twice now, I better pay more attention and get it right".

I still check the two prong DC jack every time with the DMM so I don't put it the wrong way around, but I've actually never made a mistake with those (thankfully).
 
I've been caught out by patch cables too. And the guitar cable. Cables wear out! Mainly through movement, and mainly near the jack. Like jhaneyzz I am often plugging/unplugging a pedal - usually the one I am testing in front of my board. So that patch cable wears out faster than the others. And I am forever tightening up the screw-on cover bit. I solder my own patches so every few months I make a new patch cable for the front of my board. Then slightly less often I'll cut the end off my guitar cable and solder the plug onto the now slightly shorter cable. Crackling gone. For a while anyway.
 
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