Who's using a wet-dry-wet setup?

[rsm]

What is your WDW configuration?

I'd like to create a small WDW rig, and I have most of what I need (I think).

How're you doing this?

 

[Anonymous]

I use a mixer - the MarkL Dual Stereo Line Mixer. With this unit, you basically have two stages of effects with the first stage (and dry signal) being fed into the second stage. I put my Eventide PitchFactor and Strymon El Capistan in the first stage, feeding two mono Roland SDE-3000s in the second stage (250ms L/500ms R with a few repeats). Dry signal is present and mixed in both stages. I had to completely re-wire my rack, so I made custom size GeorgeL cables to use throughout, which really cleaned up the rack a lot.

The Mix 1 control sets the level of the summed Mix 1 wet and dry signal. In other words, you set it so that you are getting a proper signal to your Mix 2 effects without overloading them. The Mix 2 control sets the output of the combined signals to your power amp. It's interesting in that the Mix controls do not set the volume of the effects with reference to the dry signal, which is intuitively what I thought they would do. The only way to adjust the amount of wet signal vs. dry is via the effects themselves if they have an output control. The PitchFactor and SDE-3000s do, the El Cap does not. I'd rather have the El Cap in the Mix 2 section, but because it is mono input that wouldn't work - it would only get one side of the pitch shifting effect of the PitchFactor. I would need two El Caps to make it work right in Mix 2 even though it is stereo out.

BOTTOM LINE IF YOU DON"T LIKE READING ALL THIS - I've been running it with just the El Cap, or just the two SDE3000s w/modulation, or with the PitchFactor (micropitchshift) and the two SDE-3000s w/o modulation and I'm blown away at how much better the rig sounds with the mixer at ANY volume from bedroom to gig. I really didn't think a mixer would make THAT much of a difference, but it really does. The mix of the effects and the dry signal is much more discernable and the dry signal is much clearer and present in the wet cabinets. The MarkL unit cost me about $350 or so, which IMO isn't much for what it does and the significant improvement in the sound. If you are running W/D/W, I highly recommend a mixer of some kind - it is a noticeable improvement for not that much money.

So the rig is Guitar - pedal board - Henning Bottle Rocket amp --> Center Henning 4 x 12 w/30th Anniversary G12H30s

Henning Bottle Rocket amp --> Suhr Iso Line Out --> MarkL Dual Stereo Line Mixer (effects connected to the MarkL as per above) --> Matrix GT 800FX power amp --> Left and Right Henning 4 x 12 cabs w/30th Anniversary G12H30s

Any questions, fire away and I'll answer them if I can...

Pics:

Steve

 

[Chester Nimitz]

I use a wet/dry/wet but the left Marshall is dry, middle combo wet [for cleans] and right Marshall wet.

So on the gain channels its dry/wet.

They all work great.

 

[rsm]

Sweet! Thanks for the detailed info Steve! Seems more complex than I'd hoped.

Back to thinking about how to do this with what I have and what I'll need; based on the information you provided.

 

[JMMP]

What do you have? W/D/W rigs can be incredibly complicated, or VERY simple.

 

[ZachMN]

Main head dry with no reverb or anything into cabinet
Line out ---->into modulating effects in my case a Boss Flanger which has stereo outs into an Alesis Midiverb then that signal into a Lee Jackson Perfect Connection Power amp into separate 2x12's on either side of the half stack. I love the sound. I am probably going to run an eq before the power amp however to tweak the wet sound somewhat.

The way it was explained to me years ago was no matter what having an effects loop alters the tone. WDW is more expensive and cumbersome but in your 24x24 basement it sounds great! Now I have the Fryette Power station to attenuate the volume of my main head so I can jam with no ear plugs as I can dial in the wet part of the setup easy peasy. Was just messing with it all and it is a fun way to add effects.

I see Steve ( Hey Steve!!) has a more complex set up than mine and probably quieter. Mine was quick and dirty and to be honest I've had a lot of other issues in my life so tweaking this hasn't been a priority but it does sound HUGE! So you can do something like mine and see what the potential can be. Its nice when your sound is in stereo and surrounding you like your in water.....just my .02

And to be fair I've only used it once live when we did an outdoor show in the street other wise I play the single halfstack due to ease of setup and the fact that the WDW takes up a lot of space and sometimes you have none....

 

[Ventura]

Oh, shit... Sorry, came in here thinking this was about chicks.

 

[SQUAREHEAD]

Oh, shit... Sorry, came in here thinking this was about chicks.

 

[mdc1mdc11]

So the rig is Guitar - pedal board - Henning Bottle Rocket amp --> Center Henning 4 x 12 w/30th Anniversary G12H30s

Henning Bottle Rocket amp --> Suhr Iso Line Out --> MarkL Dual Stereo Line Mixer (effects connected to the MarkL as per above) --> Matrix GT 800FX power amp --> Left and Right Henning 4 x 12 cabs w/30th Anniversary G12H30s

A

Steve

Timely post. Thanks for the design. I am actually setting mine up right now with the same gear slightly tweaked....

Ampete 444 speaker cabinet port --Line-Out-Box-->MarkL DSLM --> Matrix GT1000FX --> Left and Right Cab


Steve. Question, for the Mix 2 Outputs on the MarkL, they both connect directly to the 2 inputs on the Matrix Amp correct? DId you use those Female XLR and 1/4 cables?

Pretty excited about avoiding those amp effects loops and making that mixer do the work.

 

[Anonymous]

Steve. Question, for the Mix 2 Outputs on the MarkL, they both connect directly to the 2 inputs on the Matrix Amp correct? DId you use those Female XLR and 1/4 cables?

Correct, both go to the Matrix inputs and no, I just used normal 1/4" patch cables...

Steve

 

[mentoneman]

wdw here -done virtually in ear/headphones.

i feed dry mono from amp-rocktron juice extractor/cab emulator w/parametric eq line out into mix 1 / input 1/2 as dual mono into a rocktron rack interface's 8 stereo channel mixer (or dual 4 st. ch mix1-mix 2)

Mix 2 receives the output from 3 stereo fx units in parallel, and then mix 1 dry amp feeds into mix 2 in parallel.
If i turn up mix 1 and turn down mix 2 i only get dry output.

So mix 1 volume is dry level only, mix 2 is fx level + dry mix 1 blended in

 

[RedB4Black]

I use a mixer - the MarkL Dual Stereo Line Mixer.

snip

If you are running W/D/W, I highly recommend a mixer of some kind - it is a noticeable improvement for not that much money.

Steve

Do you have a picture of the back of you rack or can you better explain how things are routed. I looked at the manual for that mixer and it's a little confusing on they way they show the routings on their diagram. That and the English translation of the manual make it difficult to follow what the in and outs are for.

Why would using a mixer sound different/better than a set-up liked this...

Amp Line-Out (in my case Wizard MTL) --> FX in (in my case Eventide H9 & Nuenaber WET) --> FX out --> FX return on slave amp or input of SS power amp --> Wet Cab
Amp Speaker-Out --> Dry Cab

If the effects units have their own mix controls, why would I want a separate line mixer?

 

[RedB4Black]

I use a mixer - the MarkL Dual Stereo Line Mixer.

snip

If you are running W/D/W, I highly recommend a mixer of some kind - it is a noticeable improvement for not that much money.

Steve

Do you have a picture of the back of you rack or can you better explain how things are routed. I looked at the manual for that mixer and it's a little confusing on they way they show the routings on their diagram. That and the English translation of the manual make it difficult to follow what the in and outs are for.

Why would using a mixer sound different/better than a set-up liked this...

Amp Line-Out (in my case Wizard MTL) --> FX in (in my case Eventide H9 & Nuenaber WET) --> FX out --> FX return on slave amp or input of SS power amp --> Wet Cab
Amp Speaker-Out --> Dry Cab

If the effects units have their own mix controls, why would I want a separate line mixer?

Thinking a little more, I'm guessing the mixer allows you to still keep some dry signal going to your wet cabs without going through the FX unit's AD/DA conversion

 

[Racerxrated]

I run guitar-pedalboard-2C+ - 1960 cab w/65s. Line out of the C+ -- Intellifex-into a Strategy 400, out into 2 V30 cabs. Huge and devastating.

 

[mentoneman]

zachman's rig is great sounding with the atomica dry amp as the core tone

 

[Bronco]

I use a mixer - the MarkL Dual Stereo Line Mixer.

snip

If you are running W/D/W, I highly recommend a mixer of some kind - it is a noticeable improvement for not that much money.

Steve

Do you have a picture of the back of you rack or can you better explain how things are routed. I looked at the manual for that mixer and it's a little confusing on they way they show the routings on their diagram. That and the English translation of the manual make it difficult to follow what the in and outs are for.

Why would using a mixer sound different/better than a set-up liked this...

Amp Line-Out (in my case Wizard MTL) --> FX in (in my case Eventide H9 & Nuenaber WET) --> FX out --> FX return on slave amp or input of SS power amp --> Wet Cab
Amp Speaker-Out --> Dry Cab

If the effects units have their own mix controls, why would I want a separate line mixer?

Thinking a little more, I'm guessing the mixer allows you to still keep some dry signal going to your wet cabs without going through the FX unit's AD/DA conversion

Yeah, plus with a mixer you're also running the FX in parallel vice series, which is cool. Doing it this way lets you run FX 100% wet and add dry signal to taste. Really though, I've tried both ways and it really comes down to user preference.

 

[mentoneman]

the A/D - D/A of your dry tone through any fx in the wet cabs is a tricky one and i have really been focusing recently at eliminating that from my effects/rig.
it becomes very apparent when you have a headphone/in ears monitoring capability while dialing in effects, just how annoying digital conversion of the analog dry tone can be. it manifests itself as a subtle phasing of your dry sound--thin and brittle--and sometimes really hard to detect.

the drawback of wdw is found in if you rely on your wet cabs for certain things like tremolo, phase and preset stereo chorus effects, and certain pitch effects, where the middle dry tends to neutralize the fx impact and the rig isn't equipped with a dry mute switch. the easy answer is running those types of effects in front of the dry amp using pedals where the entire sound gets effected.

the more tedious answer is to "roll your own" custom effects

and not all mixers are created equal

i have a rocktron rack interface for convenience but when i had a small desktop mixer with balanced capabilities, level metering, flexible routing, and eq doing special duty for a while the sound improved quite a bit.
i throw away headroom running my balanced fx unbalanced currently

 

[Anonymous]

Several people asked me via PM how to setup the MarkL (it's pretty complicated actually), so I thought I'd post exactly how mine is setup so I don't lose this and I can send other people here to read it...

Anyway, here goes (mhenson42 this is for you too!

"OK, I finally worked my way through the spaghetti of writing...

Here is how my setup is wired with the MarkL. IT works great and sounds great. Note that my Eventide PitchFactor and El Capistan Echo are in MIX 1, which gets sent to MIX 2. I then have two Roland SDE 3000s in Mix 2 Left and Right. If I just want the SDE-3000s, I turn off the PitchFactor and El Capistan OFF on the pedals. Most times I run just the two SDE-3000s with modulation on both. Sometimes I run the two SDE-3000s with no modulation and the PitchFactor on and set for stereo micropitchshift. You just adjust Mix1 and Mix 2 knobs to get the right signal to each effect unit and your power amp. The MIX 1 knob adjusts how much signal goes to your MIX 2 effects and the MIX 2 knob adjust the overall signal level to your power amp. I run my SDE-3000s pretty well into the red and with UNIGAIN on -20dbm and the DELAY TIME on the back set to x15. These setting are REALLY important to make the 3000 sound great. I hardly ever use the El Capistan in this setup anymore...

Any, here is how it is setup starting from left to right on the back of the MarkL:

EXT IN L --> El Capistan Input
EXT IN R --> PitchFactor Input
MIX1 IN 1R --> Suhr Iso Line Out (This is your amps line out or your attenuator line out if your amp doesn't have one - this is where your dry amp goes into the system)
MIX1 IN 2L --> PitchFactor Output 1 (Left)
MIX1 IN 2R --> PitchFactor Output 2 (Right)
MIX1 IN 3L --> El Capistan Left Output
MIX1 IN 3R --> El Capistan Right Output
MIX1 OUT 1L --> SDE 3000 Input (Unit 1)
MIX1 OUT 1R --> SDE 3000 Input (Unit 2)
MIX2 IN 2L --> SDE 3000 Output (DELAY NOT MIXED) (Unit 1)
MIX2 IN 2R --> SDE 3000 Output (DELAY NOT MIXED) (Unit 1)
MIX2 OUT L --> Matrix GT800FX Power Amp Left Input
MIX2 OUT R --> Matrix GT800FX Power Amp Right Input

That's it! Ask any questions, or just try it. Works awesome for me and the dry sounds much better than going through the effects. Remember to set your MIX1 effects units to KILLDRY. The SDE3000 DELAY output on the back of the unit only sends the effected signal, which is what you want mixed with the dry coming straight from your amp line out..."

Steve

 

[Anonymous]

the A/D - D/A of your dry tone through any fx in the wet cabs is a tricky one and i have really been focusing recently at eliminating that from my effects/rig.
it becomes very apparent when you have a headphone/in ears monitoring capability while dialing in effects, just how annoying digital conversion of the analog dry tone can be. it manifests itself as a subtle phasing of your dry sound--thin and brittle--and sometimes really hard to detect.

Get a mixer like the MarkL and eliminate this issue forever. Pristine dry amp sound mixed with your 100% wet effects...

Steve

 

[rsm]

Great info in this thread, thanks everyone!


...maybe this will be my first sticky thread here