Helix LT Whammy/Pitch Shifter Expression pedal issue

[LineFever]

Hey Guys,

 

I am having issues with the expression pedal.

For some reason, I can never get it to reach 100%, it's not so bad when using it for gain/volume, wah, or when programming it to modify bass/treble levels or stuff like that.

But when using it for Pitch shift/whammy, if I am not able to reach the exact octave, it sounds terrible (as if I am always off tune)

 

I usually activate the whammy while using the expression pedal's toe switch.

 

The weird thing is this: when I turn off/on the Helix LT, at first, if I use solely the whammy, it works well... (I reach 100%)

If I turn on/off any other pedal, before or even after I use the Whammy, then when I go back to the whammy, it becomes offset to 98-99%.

I thought it was a physical issue, but it seems to be an internal midi instruction issue.

 

Anyone noticed the same thing?

[FlyingsCool]

Umm, which expression pedal?  The built in one?  An external one?

 

If you turn on/off what other pedal?  Do you mean blocks in your preset, or do you have pedals in your send/return loops?

 

What does midi have to do with it?  Do you have midi pedals or things in your set up?

 

Sorry for all the questions, but your setup is not obvious from your description.  I've never had a problem with the range of the internal expression pedal, on any of my line 6 stuff.  But since you mention other pedals and midi, I can't tell what's going on.

 

If the LT expression pedal jack is the same as the Helix, remember that it's a TS jack, and many external expression pedals expect TRS.  But if that were your problem, it would typically not show up with the symptoms you describe (i.e. usually it would go 0 - 100 - 0 through the range with 100 in the middle).

 

If it's the internal pedal, sounds like there's an issue with it and you should probably open a ticket.

 

I have run into issues where I accidentally assigned my pedal to a stomp and it caused weirdness.  Maybe you accidentally assigned the pedal to a stomp and set it's range?

 

We'll need more detail about exactly what your preset setup is like.

[LineFever]

Umm, which expression pedal?  The built in one?  An external one?

 

If you turn on/off what other pedal?  Do you mean blocks in your preset, or do you have pedals in your send/return loops?

 

What does midi have to do with it?  Do you have midi pedals or things in your set up?

 

 

The internal one.

Turning on/off blocks... nothing external, no send/return

I mentioned midi, because I am thinking that in order for the internal expression to be programmable in so many ways, it could only happen if it was sending midi instructions (+ it's supposed to be self-calibrating I heard...)

 

Where/how do I open a ticket?

[wvpv]

I have a similar issue with my original helix. When I use the built in expression pedal with the whammy block it only goes to 99% unless I hold my foot on it hard enough to almost switch the block off. As soon as I remove my foot it drops to 98 or 99% making everything horribly out of tune.

[FlyingsCool]

The internal one.

Turning on/off blocks... nothing external, no send/return

I mentioned midi, because I am thinking that in order for the internal expression to be programmable in so many ways, it could only happen if it was sending midi instructions (+ it's supposed to be self-calibrating I heard...)

 

Where/how do I open a ticket?

 

www.line6.com and go to the support page

[jbuhajla]

The expression pedal probably needs some mechanical adjustment. Some people have had success in loosening the tensioning bolt on the built in expression pedal to remedy this (If the LT has the same bolt has the full floor version). 

[LineFever]

I have a similar issue with my original helix. When I use the built in expression pedal with the whammy block it only goes to 99% unless I hold my foot on it hard enough to almost switch the block off. As soon as I remove my foot it drops to 98 or 99% making everything horribly out of tune.

 

 

So how did you get this resolved?

[wvpv]

Mine ended up being a mechanical problem. Tightening the expression pedal bolt sorted it out.

[Josh_guitarreiru]

I have the same problem here and have just opened a ticket. Did you find any solution to it?

I've tried to adjust the expression pedal bolt but it didn't help.

 

Cheers

[LineFever]

No I haven't.

I did notice it happens mostly when I add external pedals through the send/return inputs.

Eventually, I had to return the unit, the new one works fine, but I did not have time to change with the exact same setup if the same thing happens.

I believe it could be resolved with a firmware update, but Line 6 says it's a hardware issue.

Loosening/tightening the pedal notch won't make any difference.

 

Hope this helps

[Josh_guitarreiru]

Thanks for your answer LineFever,

 

It seems that now I can reach the 100% position (don't know what has changed) but I have to exert a little bit of pressure on the expression pedal.

Lets say I reach the 100% position, if  then I remove my foot from the expression pedal the value it will come back to 99%.

Does this happen to you all? Could anybody check it for me?

I still can ask for a change of unit, but I want to make sure that it is a hardware issue of mine.

 

Thanks beforehand!

[Josh_guitarreiru]

Hi all,

 

I asked for unit replacement and recieved the new one today. I still have the built in expression pedal issue! I can reach 100% value, but when I remove my foot from the pedal it returns to 97 - 99 %!

 

Could everybody check if that happens as well and post it here?

 

Thanks!

 

PS: I have Helix LT

[soblivion]

Are you using the pedal to switch the effect on and off? When I did this I had the same issue. I set the effect to "auto-engage" at 1% and no longer have the problem. Actually have added an external pedal for pitch and wah set the same way. It seems the auto calibrate only measures 100% when the pedal is pushed forward enough to activate the switch.

[SLICK_strain]

I have the same issue. Intermittent and it always goes away on reset.

Interesting that LineFever mentioned it happens more often when external pedals are connected as I usually have an EHX POG2 In loop 1.

I’ll be looking out for that in the future.

[LineFever]

I still have the built in expression pedal issue! I can reach 100% value, but when I remove my foot from the pedal it returns to 97 - 99 %!

 

Line 6 denies that it could be a calibration/software issue, instead they are convinced it's only hardware BUT

 

The problem with the Helix LT is that the full "Toe" position can be configured so that your parameter can have a value between of 0-100%, but always maintaining that max position.

So it doesn't work for the whammy or pitch shift, cause if you are offset by 1%, and say you want to reach a full octave, you never actually do and sound off-key.

 

There is a very simple way to resolve this issue, which is a feature available on the Pod HD, which allows to determine at which point of the heel/toe position can you reach that 0 or 100% value.

So say my value I wish to reach is +12 (1 full octave), the "Position" should allow to determine at which point of your expression pedal do you want to reach that value.

So say you are 3/4 through the full toe position, you could say... that's my +12 (100% of the value)... and then all the way through to the max position, it would keep that max value...

Voilà! Resolved!

 

Instead, we can only say we want the max toe position to be +12, or +13 or +11, but cannot determine where/when the max toe position is reached.

 

Bad programming. And I am surprised no one notices.

[gunpointmetal]

It's not bad programming, because not all units are plagued with this. I've had mine for a long time now, and my expression functions as it should. Sounds like something is off by 1/2mm under the board on some units. 

[Josh_guitarreiru]

Thank you all for your comments.

 

I agree with LineFever, I also envisaged that method as an easy way to overcome this issue. Don't understand why they have not implemented it yet as it seems that there are many units out there which suffer from this problem. 

 

Interestingly my problem has gone away after updating the firmware in this new Helix LT and reinstalling my ols presets :) . Can't understand why though. In the old unit the problem was persistent.

Well, I hope it won't pop up again so I can enjoy playing with Helix. 

 

Cheers!

[Josh_guitarreiru]

Well, it seems that the problem strikes back! I guess that I was fortunate last time with the auto calibration. It could help if they apply a kind of a safety factor in the auto-calibration saving 1% at both ends (i.e. 1% of pedal position corresponds to 0% value,  99% of pedal position corresponds to 100% value). In that way by only sacrificing 2% of the pedal range mobility (which is negligible) all those problems will probably go away.

[LineFever]

Well, it seems that the problem strikes back! I guess that I was fortunate last time with the auto calibration. It could help if they apply a kind of a safety factor in the auto-calibration saving 1% at both ends (i.e. 1% of pedal position corresponds to 0% value,  99% of pedal position corresponds to 100% value). In that way by only sacrificing 2% of the pedal range mobility (which is negligible) all those problems will probably go away.

 

 

Hey Josh,

 

Since that's an existing feature on the Pod HD ( you can determine  at which position of the pedal position you reach your 100% value for toe and 0% for heel) I wrote to Line 6 about it... 

I am not sure they understood exactly, it seemed clear to me.

I think maybe it's just a different team of engineering or something...

Still awaiting an answer, I'll keep you posted

[Josh_guitarreiru]

Very appreciated LineFever. I think it should be clear, it's not difficult to understand. However it may be possible that they have programmed the automatic calibration in order to: 1) offer a more user friendly approach (no need to understand parameters) and 2) to ensure correct usage/ compatibility with external expression pedals. If for any reason they don't consider feasible to include the user programable option, changing the automatic calibration algorithm to save 1% at both end pedal positions would probably solve most of this problems and possibly super easy to implement.

[Thenizze]

On ‎6‎/‎9‎/‎2017 at 10:17 AM, LineFever said:

Hey Guys,

 

I am having issues with the expression pedal.

For some reason, I can never get it to reach 100%, it's not so bad when using it for gain/volume, wah, or when programming it to modify bass/treble levels or stuff like that.

But when using it for Pitch shift/whammy, if I am not able to reach the exact octave, it sounds terrible (as if I am always off tune)

 

I usually activate the whammy while using the expression pedal's toe switch.

 

The weird thing is this: when I turn off/on the Helix LT, at first, if I use solely the whammy, it works well... (I reach 100%)

If I turn on/off any other pedal, before or even after I use the Whammy, then when I go back to the whammy, it becomes offset to 98-99%.

I thought it was a physical issue, but it seems to be an internal midi instruction issue.

 

Anyone noticed the same thing?

Same problem here. I play Killing in the name off, RATM. The solo is pitch whammy. Heel pos 0, toe position -24. When I acitvate the expression pedal (signed to exp 1) it starts with -24, when I use the pedal it goes only to -23. Well, thats not 2 octaves. And as you mentioned, sometimes the problem is gone. Don't know why, and then it occurs again. No idea what the f. to do about it. I have a Whammy pedal, so, thinking bout connecting it.

[LineFever]

 

2 hours ago, Thenizze said:

Same problem here. I play Killing in the name off, RATM. The solo is pitch whammy. Heel pos 0, toe position -24. When I acitvate the expression pedal (signed to exp 1) it starts with -24, when I use the pedal it goes only to -23. Well, thats not 2 octaves. And as you mentioned, sometimes the problem is gone. Don't know why, and then it occurs again. No idea what the f. to do about it. I have a Whammy pedal, so, thinking bout connecting it.

 

I wish I could help you man, but unfortunately this never got resolved. It still does the same thing today, I believe it's an algorithm issue (they could program the HELIX so that the toe and heel positions are not too much at the end of the roll-off) but unfortunately I am not getting support from Line6 on this one, they keep saying it's a defective unit (physical issue).

 

Guess what, I had my Helix replaced, and the new unit does the same thing.

 

Now I just use my Whammy V instead, at least it's polyphonic, so it does sound better. 

Helix is great, but it ain't perfect!

 

 

[Thenizze]

14 hours ago, LineFever said:

 

 

I wish I could help you man, but unfortunately this never got resolved. It still does the same thing today, I believe it's an algorithm issue (they could program the HELIX so that the toe and heel positions are not too much at the end of the roll-off) but unfortunately I am not getting support from Line6 on this one, they keep saying it's a defective unit (physical issue).

 

Guess what, I had my Helix replaced, and the new unit does the same thing.

 

Now I just use my Whammy V instead, at least it's polyphonic, so it does sound better. 

Helix is great, but it ain't perfect!

 

 

Hi LineFever, thanks for your reaction. I noticed you did mention the issue at Line6, but they never solved the problem. Same as you, I use my Digitech Whammy. Too bad, I bought the Helix so I don't have to drag all other stuff with me...…...

[themetallikid]

I had this issue with my LT.  It drove me nuts....it would work fine at practice/home, then get to the gig and only read 0-94 or 95 or 93 or 97.  I inverted the heel/toe for auto engage (I mainly used it for wah), which helped, but still did not allow me full use of pitch/whammy. 

 

Ultimately I ended up creating a support ticket, I sent it in to be repaired, got it back, it worked for about 2 days until it came back.  They immediately replied to send it in and they will replace it.  Havent had an issue with the new one....so far.

[DarthHollis]

When using an expression pedal the most important thing you need to do is save the preset/snapshot with the expression pedal at the % you want it to start at.  

 

Not sure if this will fix your problem, but because you are saying after a "reset" it works, it sound like this may fix it.

 

So make sure the exp pedal is at 100% when you save the preset.  I like mine set at 0% for wah and whammy.  I turn on the whammy via a snapshopt or a stomp button and if it's at the 0% then it's almost like it's off even if the pedal has moved.  I also make sure that put the exp pedals at heel down 0% before I start playing, just in case.

 

Hopefully this helps a little.

[themetallikid]

For my issues I had, nothing could 'fix' the issue.  Even restarting the Helix.  And it wouldn't affect preset.  When I was enduring this, I had 3 banks of 8 presets, basically 6 rhythms, 6 leads and then copies of them grouped in to genre banks for me.  It would affect my Clean preset in Bank 1, but not Banks 2 or 3.  It would affect the clean in Bank 1, but not the other 7 presets in Bank 1.  I could turn it off and back on and sometimes it would resolve the issue, other times it would not.  Sometimes it would resolve it for bank 1 preset 1, but then affect 3 other presets that were fine before. 

 

There really was not reasoning to why it was happening or not happening.  No programming/resetting could resolve the issue that I could see. 

 

My only advice would be to start the support ticket process and explain what is happening, you can even have them reference the tickets under my name as it sounds like the same issues I was having.

[aklein]

*FIXED IT*

I had this exact same issue, even after the 2.82 update.

after talking with Tom from Yamaha Australia, i backed up all my settings using Line-6 Edit and then turned off the unit.

I held down Foot Switches 9&10 which, is the bottom row, middle 2 switches. I held those switches down whilst I powered up the unit and did a factory-reset.

It deleted everything however, it FIXED this exact issue and then i just restord my backup.

All done!

the system must re-query the pedal on initalisation.

 

Anyway, try it. You have nothing to lose like I did.

[constantcosta2]

### correction - just restarted my unit AFTER restoring backup. Also loosened and tightened the expression pedal before I rebooted. Reboot forces helix to rebuild the patches, and now the issue is corrected!

:)

[IIRDII]

Old thread - but had this very issue.
I rebooted, and the Helix rebuild the presets - and the issue was gone.