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Pedal repair (power jack)


tomteriffic

Question

I've got a pedal that works fine on batteries, but with a wall wart power supply, no soap.  I've swapped out supplies repeatedly and it's definitely the pedal.  A peek down the jack seems to indicated that the "finger" that should contact the sleeve of the plug is too short/misplaced/just not making contact.  It MAY be possible for me to get in there with something like a dental pick and bend the contact finger, but it may be that the jack just needs to be replaced.

I'm just old enough that my eyes probably won't let me do the work.  And I'm old enough to know when I'm in over my head.  Anybody here work on pedals?  For somebody that knows what they're doing it should be an easy fix.   And cheap.

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4 answers to this question

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What Model and Brand of pedal is it?  Did it ever work with a wall-wart?  There are some brands that, just to be jerks, use the opposite polarity of everyone else in their pedal power socket.

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49 minutes ago, tbonesullivan said:

What Model and Brand of pedal is it?  Did it ever work with a wall-wart?  There are some brands that, just to be jerks, use the opposite polarity of everyone else in their pedal power socket.

It never worked with a wall wart AFAIK.  I'm the second owner and the first always used a battery. I double checked voltage and polarity and that's all as it should be.

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You are correct, if the jack is bad that should be an easy fix. Usually you can tell by feel while plugging the adapter into the pedal if the connection is not being made.

 

I have also seen cases where the solder connection from the jack to the PC board is cracked. This usually leads to an intermittent connection but if the PC board is single sided it can just lead to no connection at all. Most effects also use the power jack to switch the battery out so in those designs the pedal probably wouldn't work with the adapter or the battery.

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14 hours ago, gtrdaddy said:

It is possible that your device requires negative voltage power, requiring center pin positive plugs. A device using germanium transistors will require a center-pin positive plug. 

Nope, center negative, per the unit's instructions.

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