Pedalboard cables

[mightymike]

I'm in the process of organizing all my pedals onto a pedalboard, and I'm trying to decide which cable kit to buy. There's a few brands to choose from. (Solder or Solderless)

I'm kind of leaning towards the Lava.

One thing with these kits on ebay is that they only have right angle connectors. I'm running a Boss Es-8 programable loop switcher on this board, so each cable will have a right angle jack at the pedal, and a straight jack at the switcher.

2 cables for each pedal loop

I'm going to want 20 right angle jacks and 20 straight jacks, and at least 20 feet of cable.

What say you?

[garbeaj]

I am a total idiot for many reasons, not the least of which is my inability to put together a pedalboard (my dream is a custom board by Trailer Trash or some other pro service)...so take this with a grain of salt. Lots of folks, including Eric Johnson and my tech of 30 years swear by George L's...

[mightymike]

George L's have won a lot of awards. They look about the easiest to use.

[guitar007]

I'm redoing my pedalboard as well. I went with George Ls.

[jnew]

Hmm. What about these simple 1 footers that you can buy 3 for like $15 or whatever. They have right angles on both ends. No good?

[garbeaj]

Hmm. What about these simple 1 footers that you can buy 3 for like $15 or whatever. They have right angles on both ends. No good?

The deal with cables as they relate to pedalboards is that you need to be able to fit the cables as precisely as possible...you need to have the ability to measure and cut the cables themselves and you need to have the ability to choose straight or right angle plugs or any combination thereof in order to get the neatest and shortest possible cable runs on the pedalboard. This is the primary reason.

Also, some will claim that the quality of the cheap cables that you describe as being sub-par, but that point is debatable. Certainly, some cables, even cheap cables have desirable characteristics over others. The most expensive cables are not necessarily the best.

George L's cables are pretty reasonable price-wise and they can be measured and cut and either straight or right-angled plugs can be easily attached for any pedalboard layout. When you buy a bulk length of cable, you can re-use the plugs and cut new cable lengths if you want to change the layout on your pedalboard...and believe me, you will want to change your pedalboard configuration over time. This is much more cost effective than constantly buying pre-packaged cheap cables.

[mightymike]

Someone gave me a short George L for jumping channels and it had a bad connection. So I always associate that bad experience. Then I see the Lave Tightrope Video and it looks like a strong connection.

It looks like from what I'm reading that George L is the go to brand most are using, and that maybe whoever made that cable I used didn't make it right.

[JimiJames]

"...I typically use Mogami 2524 and 2319 for the systems I build. So you will see a mix of both 2524 (the bigger diameter cable) and 2319 (the smaller stuff) on this board. FYI, I usually use 2319 for pedalboard wiring..."

[mightymike]

Thanks Jimi...

My first thought was to get a 50' roll of Magami and use the excess to make some nice guitar cords. Then I started googling and there's so many options.

Do you know what he uses for jacks? Switchcraft, Nuetrik?

[jnew]

Hmm. What about these simple 1 footers that you can buy 3 for like $15 or whatever. They have right angles on both ends. No good?

The deal with cables as they relate to pedalboards is that you need to be able to fit the cables as precisely as possible...you need to have the ability to measure and cut the cables themselves and you need to have the ability to choose straight or right angle plugs or any combination thereof in order to get the neatest and shortest possible cable runs on the pedalboard. This is the primary reason.

Also, some will claim that the quality of the cheap cables that you describe as being sub-par, but that point is debatable. Certainly, some cables, even cheap cables have desirable characteristics over others. The most expensive cables are not necessarily the best.

George L's cables are pretty reasonable price-wise and they can be measured and cut and either straight or right-angled plugs can be easily attached for any pedalboard layout. When you buy a bulk length of cable, you can re-use the plugs and cut new cable lengths if you want to change the layout on your pedalboard...and believe me, you will want to change your pedalboard configuration over time. This is much more cost effective than constantly buying pre-packaged cheap cables.

Well as far as the convenience of custom fitting lengths and angle/straight fittings. Sure, I get that. But I could make the argument that it pretty darn convenient to just buy a bunch of 1 foot cables that already have right angle fittings and be off and running. So like in most cases, no right or wrong here. Just what suits the users set up and how they want to go about it.

The other issue, which I try to keep simple, is that the point in time when the best guitar tones were created and being used, there wasn't all these gimmicks, for lack of better words. You pretty much had shielded guitar cables. Simple as that. I guess I'm just saying that there really aren't any game changers if you select one cable over another. But if purely custom lengths and fittings sing to someone building a pedal board or rack system, that's cool.

[mightymike]

The better cables have a lower capacitance of 30pf/ft or less. When you consider that there will be 2 cables for each loop (which I have 8 ), plus the guitar cables to and from the board, any excess cable can add up and roll off highs and lower signal level. One cool thing about the Boss ES-8 is the Dual Buffers to maintain signal strength.

I also want to be as noise free as possible. Hopefully the combination of clean power from the ISO brick and neatly laid out patch cables will accomplish this goal.

I'm in this deep so I might as well go all out on my cables.

Plus it looks fun.

[jnew]

[mightymike]

Hmmm.. Much higher pf/ft with the mogami according to their chart.
http://www.mogamicable.com/category/bulk/guitar/

[Doug H]

GLs are way too fussy for me, of course I never had a static pedal board per say, which I think is one potentially good place for them.

I'm more in the camp of getting a super low cap cable from board to amp. I suppose it's a matter of how low do you want to go.

[rgorke]

switchcraft 229 plugs from lava for right angle and

http://www.lavacable.com/index.php?id=159

switchcraft 380 plugs from Redco

http://www.redco.com/Switchcraft-380.html

Mogami cable from REdco

http://www.redco.com/Mogami-Instrument-Cable/

Stop asking and go buy!!!