Good volume pedal with minimum volume setting?

[topfencer]

Did a search on this, but didn't find exactly what I was looking for. Looking to get a volume pedal for my board, and I'd like to get one with a minimum volume setting. I would ESPECIALLY love to get some feedback from people who have actually owned these:

Morley Little Alligator (how is the sweep/feel?)
Morley Volume Plus
Boss FV-500L/H (think this may be too big a footprint for me)
Boss FV50L/H (really interested in this...anyone used it?)
Alesis F2 (again sounds very cool, but durability? anyone used?)

Any pedals I'm missing that will do this (if it could also be used as a pedal for the Line 6 M9 that would be gravy...)? Among these, what would you all get? Thanks!

 

[s360guitarist]

Have never had a problem with the Morely Volume Pedal Plus.

I just hit a budget crunch and sold my trem pedals and guess what, that minimum control can be used as a volume waiver...but not in a sine/square kind of way.

The big thing for me on volume pedals is when you bring it from zero volume at the heel back position, as you roll forward you should never hear the volume just 'come on'. It should be gradual all the way not from zero to 100..not push down and all of a sudden you are on 10 on your way to 100.

 

[Once Far Off]

I saw a guy one time who took an Ernie Ball VP and gaff taped a cap from a water bottle under the heel of the pedal to make a minimum volume setting. Seemed to work great. We was constantly going from clean to crunchy with the pedal.

 

[djy8131]

I use the pfeiffer leveler volume pedal http://www.pfeifferelectronics.com/products/leveler_volume_pedal.aspx

 

[ibanart300]

+ 1 to the Morley's great pedals! The sweep on them is also really good.

 

[x-ray specs]

Don't buy the Alesis F2. It broke on me very quickly is not built to last. Boss is better. Dunlop dvp1 is a good choice also.

 

[walterw]

i rigged my own

i put a 10kΩ audio taper pot in the otherwise worthless "tuner out" jack, with two legs wired between the main pot's ground tab and ground, interrupting the ground connection.

turned all the way down, the minimum vol knob's legs short together, giving me stock behavior; as i turn it up, it adds resistance between the volume pot's ground tab and ground, making the pot less effective and leaving signal in.

with the minimum knob all the way up, there's still a volume drop when i kick the pedal back, but it's not huge. i use it this way for rhythm/lead levels on my guitar (after dirt pedals and compressors, into a cleanish blackface fender.)

obviously, you'd want a 25k pedal like this to be after a buffer (like my pedals) or in an amp's buffered effects loop.

 

[topfencer]

Thanks, guys.

@s360guitarist: How smooth is the pedal? Went to GC yesterday and checked out the optical volume (only one they had), but it seemed to jump a lot from really quite to almost full volume. The EB was much smoother. I've heard that people have had to adjust the LED though. What has your experience been?

@walterw: VERY cool. I've often wondered if that was possible. Do you happen to have a schematic? Did you lose any smoothness in the pedal sweep? Really thinking about doing this, as I love the feel of the EB's and the fact that the 25kers could be used with an M9 (on my list...). Any other quirks I should know about?

@xray_specs: Thanks for the tip! It looked like a great deal, but there was part of me that was thinking, "Too good to be true..." Glad to find out now rather than $50 later.

@djy 8131: Cool looking pedal, but really need one with a hinge so I can do swells.

Anybody else have a volume pedal they love (or hate...happy to skip one that sucks)?

 

[hendrixstrat]

I saw a guy one time who took an Ernie Ball VP and gaff taped a cap from a water bottle under the heel of the pedal to make a minimum volume setting. Seemed to work great. We was constantly going from clean to crunchy with the pedal.

I need to try this..Sounds like a really cheap/easy fix..

 

[walterw]

@walterw: Did you lose any smoothness in the pedal sweep? Really thinking about doing this, as I love the feel of the EB's and the fact that the 25kers could be used with an M9 (on my list...). Any other quirks I should know about?

quite the opposite; even the 25k pedal being fed an active signal dropped off a little too fast from full-up. the minimum volume brings up the lowest end of the sweep when used, flattening the curve and making the drop-off less dramatic. (to be fair, i also slapped a 10K resistor across the two hot lugs of the primary volume pot, which also flattens the response.)

sorry, no schematics, but it's conceptually pretty simple, anybody good with wiring should be able to figure it out:

tuner out jack gets removed from board; 10k audio mini pot gets installed in the hole.

ground lug of volume pot gets disconnected from ground (it's the counterclockwise one looking at the back of the pot);

ground lug instead gets connected to center lug of new pot; counterclockwise lug of new pot goes to the original ground connection. 3rd lug of new pot is unused.