SOLVED ONLY works with cable plugged into input jack.

This is a weird one, and I can't find the information I'm looking for anywhere. I built an Oasis (Dunes) pedal. It only turns on when it's plugged into my 1 Spot Current Reader/Cable Tester. I put it on my board, which uses isolated power (Truetone 1 SPOT PRO CS12 12-output Isolated Guitar Pedal Power Supply), and it didn't power up. Then I tried it by itself using a 1 Spot 9v. Still, it didnt power up. I put it back on the 1 Spot Current Reader/Cable Tester, and voila, like magic, it turns on.
One more quirk: It only works if a cable is plugged into the input jack. (Of course, I did this with my other experiments, but it only powered up with the 1 Spot Cable Tester/Current Reader.)
 
Solution
Definitely a ground issue then. Loss of ground specifically, since the pedal (only) works when it has a secondary ground path.

I'd look closely at your DC jack. Maybe the center pin isn't the correct diameter or is damaged in some way? Unless that's a genuine Lumberg that style of jack is known to be troublesome.

If you have a DC cable (male/male or male/female) plug it into the DC jack of the pedal and check for continuity between the center barrel of the opposite end of the cable and the sleeve of your 1/4" jacks.

If you don't have a cable or DMM to make the measurement my blind guess would be to replace that DC jack.
The problem I had with the Tayda ones were that the screw threading was wrong. Tighten them up and they would jut release. I threw them all out.
literally the same thing happened to me last year with the tayda dc connectors... threw about 25-30 of them in the garbage.. I use the ones from SBP with better luck...
 
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