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Helix LT broken EXP pedal for the second time


scoot13
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10 minutes ago, scoot13 said:

Well done Vlad!  Way to be pro-active!  I didn't trust the LT build anymore and paid extra for the Floor but this looks like it will last!

 

There's nothing wrong with the LT build in and of itself. The expression pedal assembly is very similar to previous Line 6 boards such as the XTL and HD500(X). There are tons of those that have been operation for many years. The particular fault that is causing the breaks is something that looks like it wouldn't be a big deal, but it actually causes a huge difference when not done right.

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2 hours ago, phil_m said:

 

There's nothing wrong with the LT build in and of itself. The expression pedal assembly is very similar to previous Line 6 boards such as the XTL and HD500(X). There are tons of those that have been operation for many years. The particular fault that is causing the breaks is something that looks like it wouldn't be a big deal, but it actually causes a huge difference when not done right.

 

Yeah, of course, keep singing your song pretty bird, it sounds nice but has no meaning. Internet is swarming with LT broken exp.pedal cases. Who knows how many are there but not reported?

 

How many 500 and/or 500x broken pedals have you heard of? How about senior HELIX model? Correct. None.

 

I have seen couple people selling LT with broken pedals on AVITO(Russian EBAY) not knowing how to deal with the problem becuase A&T Trade - your distributor doesn't react as fast and friendly as LINE6 does for american customers. So they decide to get rid of it, because not everyone has the skill and knowledge to open up the body of the unit and see what is going on.

 

Admit it, you made lollipop design for LT expression pedal chassi. Otherwise it is a good unit for it's price.

 

(Sorry for sloppy english)

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21 minutes ago, vladimir_ara said:

 

Yeah, of course, keep singing your song pretty bird, it sounds nice but has no meaning. Internet is swarming with LT broken exp.pedal cases. Who knows how many are there but not reported?

 

How many 500 and/or 500x broken pedals have you heard of? How about senior HELIX model? Correct. None.

 

I have seen couple people selling LT with broken pedals on AVITO(Russian EBAY) not knowing how to deal with the problem becuase A&T Trade - your distributor doesn't react as fast and friendly as LINE6 does for american customers. So they decide to get rid of it, because not everyone has the skill and knowledge to open up the body of the unit and see what is going on.

 

Admit it, you made lollipop design for LT expression pedal chassi. Otherwise it is a good unit for it's price.

 

(Sorry for sloppy english)

 

No need to attack me. I don't work for Line 6, btw. But the reason the pedal is breaking is because the housing for the broken units was stamped incorrectly. You just got one from those batches. Had you contacted Line 6 directly by opening up a support ticket, they most likely would have sent you a replacement.

 

The fact that they are breaking has nothing to do with the design and everything with being built incorrectly. Sorry, you're incorrect on this one, old sport...

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11 minutes ago, phil_m said:

 

No need to attack me. I don't work for Line 6, btw. But the reason the pedal is breaking is because the housing for the broken units was stamped incorrectly. You just got one from those batches. Had you contacted Line 6 directly by opening up a support ticket, they most likely would have sent you a replacement.

 

The fact that they are breaking has nothing to do with the design and everything with being built incorrectly. Sorry, your wrong on this one, old sport...

Sorry I didn't want to attack you.

I opened a ticket but they redirect me to local distributor as I described before.

 

And I was confused by "line6 expert", that is why I considered you as their employee.

 

But I still believe it is a poor design after all. They told me in the ticket correspondence they have changed the design of chassi for the latest LT batches

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16 minutes ago, vladimir_ara said:

Sorry I didn't want to attack you.

I opened a ticket but they redirect me to local distributor as I described before.

 

And I was confused by "line6 expert", that is why I considered you as their employee.

 

But I still believe it is a poor design after all. They told me in the ticket correspondence they have changed the design of chassi for the latest LT batches

 

They didn't change the design per Frank Ritchotte, Line 6's Sr. Director of Operations on Facebook. If you're on Facebook, you should look him up and send him a PM. He will take care of you. It sounds like there was some miscommunication somewhere in your case.

 

The defect is at the stamped profile where the little tabs bend down. The corners of that tab in the defective one weren't stamped correctly, so the weight isn't transferred to the housing correctly. That's why it shears right off at the location, and that why the defective ones always break in exactly the same spot.

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7 hours ago, phil_m said:

 

There's nothing wrong with the LT build in and of itself. The expression pedal assembly is very similar to previous Line 6 boards such as the XTL and HD500(X). There are tons of those that have been operation for many years. The particular fault that is causing the breaks is something that looks like it wouldn't be a big deal, but it actually causes a huge difference when not done right.

I didn't say there was... I said that after having two in a row break on me, neither lasting even 4 gigs, I no longer trusted the design. 

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Hey everyone,

 

Well I had this same issue & just returned the 2nd unit & just bit the bullet & upgraded. I play out quite a lot & am on the road a lot. Can't afford to have my gear malfunction so easily.   Purchased mine at the local Guitar Center & had their 'Pro' warranty on the unit which enabled me to exchange & upgrade to the other unit . I really like the HELIX. Feel its a shame that whatever the issue is with the pedal on the LT, paying 1K for ANY piece of gear should last longer that 3-4 months.  Hope L6 gets it right eventually. Been an L6 fanboy for a while & like their stuff. I also have a Fractal FX8 & opted for the HELIX instead of the AX8 btw.

 

DT

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I've just had this issue, I think. I didn't open it up yet to investigate, but while playing with it, I heard a loud crack. The pedal is now slightly not square, not much side to side play, but I can see the bolt from the side shifting around as I rock the pedal from front to back by hand. Seems like, from this thread, this isn't too uncommon an issue. Mine is only about 3 months old, never gigged and most of my playing is done barefoot in my basement - so not too heavy duty with my stomping...

I've opened a ticket and we'll see where things go. I bought from Sweetwater so I've also got that warranty option as well - not sure which is the better route.

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Is this still an issue with current units then? Each time I see this thread show up I feel uneasy about investing in the LT. I appreciate there is fantastic support from Line 6 for US customers but generally where I live it is expected a unit under warranty is sent away to be assessed before being repaired/replaced; a process that can take up to two weeks. 

As much as I would love to buy the Helix Floor, I cannot justify a 60% price increase where the build quality would be the only benefit (for me) of upgrading. 

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17 hours ago, BoogieV said:

Is this still an issue with current units then? Each time I see this thread show up I feel uneasy about investing in the LT. I appreciate there is fantastic support from Line 6 for US customers but generally where I live it is expected a unit under warranty is sent away to be assessed before being repaired/replaced; a process that can take up to two weeks. 

As much as I would love to buy the Helix Floor, I cannot justify a 60% price increase where the build quality would be the only benefit (for me) of upgrading. 

I was going to get the floor model but after looking at the specs I determined that I didn’t need some of the features as long as the software architecture was the same. But after returning 2 units with the exact same issue in a short time frame well, I should have just followed my instinct in the first place.  I agree with Scoot13 in that I absolutely do not trust the build design of the LT & would recommend against anyone spending $$ on it. Just get the floor instead.The build quality of the floor does seem to be a LOT better. I’ll see how it hold up after some use...it better last more that 3-4 months though...

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17 hours ago, BoogieV said:

Is this still an issue with current units then? Each time I see this thread show up I feel uneasy about investing in the LT. I appreciate there is fantastic support from Line 6 for US customers but generally where I live it is expected a unit under warranty is sent away to be assessed before being repaired/replaced; a process that can take up to two weeks. 

As much as I would love to buy the Helix Floor, I cannot justify a 60% price increase where the build quality would be the only benefit (for me) of upgrading. 

 

No, it isn't an issue with unit currently being produced. It was an issue with the first batch. The plant where the LT is made uses a bunch of metal stamping machines (I forget the actual number offhand), and one of them was stamping the housings incorrectly for that batch. It was quickly diagnosed after the first defective units came in, but unfortunately, there is no easy way to tell which ones from that batch will be affected. So there's still a small chance that are some unsold one out there or ones that haven't broken yet and eventually will, but they all should be filtered out pretty soon. Just anecdotally, it seems like the rate of people reporting the failure has really decreased in the last few months. The actual number of defective units is around 100 or so out of 15,000+ units sold from what Frank has reported.

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  • 1 month later...

Hey Guys, Just had this dreadful thing happen to me. Anyone know of the process for those living abroad? Coming from Malaysia, we only have one sole dealer of these units. Should I contact them first, or just open a support ticket? 

 

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Sorry this has happened to you. How long have you had it? If not long then maybe check with the dealer to see about exchanging it out first? If not then open a support ticket with L6. I’m sure they would make good on it someway but I don’t know about turnaround in Malaysia. 

 

Personally, I’d look to upgrade to the Helix Floor. That’s what I did after this happening to me on 2 different units li less than 2 months & I couldn’t be happier. The Floor unit is just built better IMO.

 

Good luck bro. Interested to know what happened.

 

DT

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  • 2 weeks later...

Add me to the list of pedal failures. I have owned mine for 18 months.  It will be very hard for me to feel confident in getting another LT knowing that this issue exists or existed when seeing this thread pop up.  Whether it is a design flaw or a manufacturing error, until I see an announcement from Line 6 regarding HOW they repaired the issue and WHAT the design flaw was, I can have no confidence in this product.  This is their forum.  If they are discussing it on other forums, why are they not discussing it on their own.  I would appreciate a response from a Line 6 representative if this issue has been resolved.  Otherwise I will be upgrading to something that is more reliable.  This thread has been here for over a year with no response from Line 6 so anything reported on here by anyone other than Line 6 is hearsay.  No-one other than Line 6 can be held accountable for latent defects in their product.

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10 minutes ago, bigolsparky said:

I am glad I got the pro warranty from GC.  It was the first time I ever purchased one. (Warranty)

 

If you're in the US, the standard warranty for the LT is two years, so you'd be good. I also believe that this pedal issue is such that Line 6 will replace your unit regardless of its warranty state.

 

All that just to say it's up to you which way to handle it. If GC has another one in stock and can replace your unit, just do that. If they say they want to try to repair it, I'd open up a ticket with Line 6. I think the nature of this flaw is that it's not realistic to repair it, so they just have been sending replacements.

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2 minutes ago, phil_m said:

 

If you're in the US, the standard warranty for the LT is two years, so you'd be good. I also believe that this pedal issue is such that Line 6 will replace your unit regardless of its warranty state.

 

All that just to say it's up to you which way to handle it. If GC has another one in stock and can replace your unit, just do that. If they say they want to try to repair it, I'd open up a ticket with Line 6. I think the nature of this flaw is that it's not realistic to repair it, so they just have been sending replacements.

The Pro warranty reflects immediate replacement, which is good since this is the only unit I use.  Waiting for a replacement or repair would not resolve this issue in time for a performance.  I believe you could be correct as far as Line 6 replacing the units with faulty pedals, but until LINE 6 actually says that, I am only relying on your opinion, and I don't believe I can hold you accountable for anything.

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15 minutes ago, bigolsparky said:

The Pro warranty reflects immediate replacement, which is good since this is the only unit I use.  Waiting for a replacement or repair would not resolve this issue in time for a performance.  I believe you could be correct as far as Line 6 replacing the units with faulty pedals, but until LINE 6 actually says that, I am only relying on your opinion, and I don't believe I can hold you accountable for anything.

 

Well, it's true I'm not a Line 6 employee, so nothing I say should be taken a statement from Line 6 or anything like that. But I'm just speaking from what I've seen from people who've had this issue here, on the TGP and on Facebook. It seems that in most cases, at least in the US, Line 6 has overnighted people replacements. But it sounds like GC will take care of it for you, so that's the way to go.

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On 8/9/2018 at 2:36 AM, marcusleong said:

Same issue, mine broke for the second time. Broke my expression pedal on my previous unit last year in september, was replaced with a new unit then. But this unit broke again just yesterday during rehearsal. Am from Malaysia too btw.

This tells me that there is a design flaw with this unit that Line 6 has not addressed.  If a replacement unit has the same failure, they have not fixed the issue.  This also tells me that everyone who has an LT and uses the expression pedal will eventually have a failure.  A tell-tale sign that your pedal is about to fail is stiffness, then it will free up and be very loose, then pop.  Line 6 has a mess on their hands with this one.

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8 hours ago, bigolsparky said:

This tells me that there is a design flaw with this unit that Line 6 has not addressed.  If a replacement unit has the same failure, they have not fixed the issue.  This also tells me that everyone who has an LT and uses the expression pedal will eventually have a failure.  A tell-tale sign that your pedal is about to fail is stiffness, then it will free up and be very loose, then pop.  Line 6 has a mess on their hands with this one.

 

 Not true... The faulty units have a defect that the non-faulty ones don’t have. There are tens of thousands of LTs out there now. The fact that some have been unlucky multiple doesn’t mean anything than just that. The laws of probability dictate that such things will happen. The issue is the way the defective housings were stamped. There’s a clear delineation between the faulty and non-faulty ones.

 

The popping you’re talking about is the defective metal reaching the top of the stress yield curve and goes into plastic failure mode (the housing snaps). If this were truly something that affected every LT, there would be way more reports of it happening. As it stands now, the reports have become very sporadic.

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I did reach out to Frank Ritchotte, on TGP and I have to admit, he is a class act.  He was responding to forum posts on Saturday and Sunday and represents Line 6 very well.  Based on his comments, units with the expression pedal issue will be covered beyond the terms of the normal warranty.  He didn't exactly say how long but was very proactive in trying to resolve my issue.  I will be replacing my LT with another LT and feel fairly confident that Line 6 will do the right thing.

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  • 2 months later...
43 minutes ago, xxjohnboy said:

Yep mine broke and now I have no wah for a big Melbourne cup gig tomorrow! Not only that I was getting buzz from my 1/4 inch output too, so needless to say I'm pretty bummed. If I'm going to go external wah I might as well get the ax8

 

Open up a support ticket. Line 6 will replace it.

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  • 1 month later...
  • 1 month later...

Hi i I'm a bit confused-

Is this really just a confirmed bad production run? ( so  it could be avoided by making sure your serial number etc is a later one) or is there just widespread failure? I am having real concerns about going ahead with LT. I know there is a two year warranty, but I don't want to deal with that in the first place if it can be avoided. 

Any official word from Line 6? There are quite a lot of "LT pedal broken" search results,  but nothing ( that i could see) from Line 6 themselves directly addressing it.

 

thanks! 

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5 hours ago, zoogy said:

Hi i I'm a bit confused-

Is this really just a confirmed bad production run? ( so  it could be avoided by making sure your serial number etc is a later one) or is there just widespread failure? I am having real concerns about going ahead with LT. I know there is a two year warranty, but I don't want to deal with that in the first place if it can be avoided. 

Any official word from Line 6? There are quite a lot of "LT pedal broken" search results,  but nothing ( that i could see) from Line 6 themselves directly addressing it.

 

thanks! 

 

This defect affected the first two production batches, but only a certain percentage in each of those batches. One of the metal stamping machines was stamping the housing incorrectly, so that is why the ones that are failing are failing. It seems that most of them have been sold and have been broken by now, but there's always a chance of it popping simply because old stock being sold or someone not using the expression pedal very much. In any case, there is a lifetime warranty for this issue, beyond the standard two year warranty. The simple fact is if you have an LT that experiences this failure, Line 6 will replace it.

 

Here is the official statement from Line 6 support:

 

"Line 6 has determined that a very small percentage of the expression pedals in the Helix LT guitar processor have broken during use. Although they have made adjustments to the manufacturing process that will eliminate this issue going forward, if you own a Helix LT and encounter this problem at any time (in the past, now, or in the future) please know that Line 6 has your back! In order to fix the problem as quickly as humanly possible, they have decided to simply replace the entire unit free of charge. Just let them know if you encounter this issue by opening a support ticket at https://line6.com/support/tickets/ and they will take it from there."

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Hi -

Well I went and bought one. The helix LT I have is shipped with ver 2.3  so that puts it around Dec 2017 build i would think. - Does anyone who has had pedal failure recall if their helix shipped with 2.3 or was it only earlier runs?

Just trying to figure if i dodged the bad ones- 

 

thanks! 

-b 

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I just returned my unit cause of a similar issue, my pedal was resting on the chassis on the side, they are currently replacing it no questions asked!

Check your serial number, if there is the number "67" then it means the unit was produced in 2017 (68 -> 2018, 69 -> 2019) but that doesn't necessary mean it was part of the bad batch. 

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  • 1 month later...

One thing that might help is if the toe switch did not require so much pressure to trigger between the 2 modes. My friend has a brand new Helix LT and says that he has to practically stand on it to activate the switch. This only contributes to the likelihood of the hardware cracking as described above.  Can anyone explain how this "switch" is designed or where it's located? Any ideas on addressing this to trigger with less pressure? Is it a mechanical switch or is it some kind of sensor, pressure plate, beam, any idea?

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The problem is the design itself people are horsing the pedal and breaking them - I didnt look into the functionality of the pedal until after I bought it who would have thought this would have been an issue - should have been a switch like most pedals - the design is flawed from the get go - sorry Line6 is what it is - the bar under the pedal is suppose to contact whatever the heck that is on the Helix 

 

You have to push down way to hard to engage and I didnt not going to break it - so I just use it for volume blocks and a Misson for wah - only way I can deal with it - the big brother Helix is doing something inside the unit so assuming its a better situation 

 

On the LT you have this area that needs to react with the bar under foot pedal and its silly - ok done with the ranting - anyone wanting to slam this thing to get it to work is going going to break the pedal at some point so as stated I luv the unit and will avoid its dual functionality - the only thing that does bug me is if I did want to sell it someday what do I tell the next buyer

 

Heres pics of interaction or lack of - should have been a no muss switch under that pedal - doesnt make sense to me

 

p1.jpg

 

p3.jpg

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Plot thickens not sure how this exp change is suppose to work but I am assuming the bar is suppose to make some sort of contact with that recessed area but noticed on mine the rubber feet area bottoming out before the bar has a chance to get into the recessed area - not sure how this is suppose to work maybe someone can enlighten me of the functionality

 

If in fact the bar is suppose to contact the recessed area no wonder its not working

 

 

p4.jpg

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4 hours ago, Petes63Strat said:

One thing that might help is if the toe switch did not require so much pressure to trigger between the 2 modes. My friend has a brand new Helix LT and says that he has to practically stand on it to activate the switch. This only contributes to the likelihood of the hardware cracking as described above.  Can anyone explain how this "switch" is designed or where it's located? Any ideas on addressing this to trigger with less pressure? Is it a mechanical switch or is it some kind of sensor, pressure plate, beam, any idea?

 

1 hour ago, rsvette12 said:

The problem is the design itself people are horsing the pedal and breaking them - I didnt look into the functionality of the pedal until after I bought it who would have thought this would have been an issue - should have been a switch like most pedals - the design is flawed from the get go - sorry Line6 is what it is - the bar under the pedal is suppose to contact whatever the heck that is on the Helix 

 

You have to push down way to hard to engage and I didnt not going to break it - so I just use it for volume blocks and a Misson for wah - only way I can deal with it - the big brother Helix is doing something inside the unit so assuming its a better situation 

 

On the LT you have this area that needs to react with the bar under foot pedal and its silly - ok done with the ranting - anyone wanting to slam this thing to get it to work is going going to break the pedal at some point so as stated I luv the unit and will avoid its dual functionality - the only thing that does bug me is if I did want to sell it someday what do I tell the next buyer

 

Heres pics of interaction or lack of - should have been a no muss switch under that pedal - doesnt make sense to me

 

p1.jpg

 

p3.jpg

 

16 minutes ago, rsvette12 said:

Plot thickens not sure how this exp change is suppose to work but I am assuming the bar is suppose to make some sort of contact with that recessed area but noticed on mine the rubber feet area bottoming out before the bar has a chance to get into the recessed area - not sure how this is suppose to work maybe someone can enlighten me of the functionality

 

If in fact the bar is suppose to contact the recessed area no wonder its not working

 

 

p4.jpg

 

The toe switch isn't the reason the defective pedals are breaking. That doesn't have anything to do with it, really. It has to do with a flaw in the way the housing is stamped causing a structural weakness at two critical points. Those points are designed to withstand the sort of sheer stress normally encountered when activating the toe switch when stamped correctly. With the housing stamped incorrectly, those points will fail. And, really, if a unit has the flawed housing, it's a matter of when, not if, the housing will fail. If you look at the pictures of the failed units, they've all failed exactly in the same place.

 

As far as the toe switch, I believe it's intentional that the rubber touches the housing before the toe switch hits the plunger (actuator). The rubber is there to give some resistance to the pedal.

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More info seems the bar is not aligned right if I push the pedal to the left and push it very hard it goes into recess and I hear click so that said I think it is what it is very hard to push in even if it was not a faulty unit so looks like I have to live with it - getting another one would still be very hard to engage the switch - I can use my work around not a big deal - is what it is

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Thanks Phil I hear yah on stamping - that said even a perfectly aligned version I will bet its very hard to make the switch it is what it is - I dont want to beat a dead horse at least I know what I am dealing with after investigating it - thanks Phil 

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1 minute ago, rsvette12 said:

More info seems the bar is not aligned right if I push the pedal to the left and push it very hard it goes into recess and I hear click so that said I think it is what it is very hard to push in even if it was not a faulty unit so looks like i have to live with it - getting another one would still be very hard to engage the switch - I can use my work around not a big deal - is what it is

 

Well, if it's not working correctly, there's no reason to simply accept it like that. It should be a little hard to click, but it shouldn't be overly difficult. It's worth opening a ticket over.

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59 minutes ago, phil_m said:

 

Well, if it's not working correctly, there's no reason to simply accept it like that. It should be a little hard to click, but it shouldn't be overly difficult. It's worth opening a ticket over.

 

Thanks Buddy I did and now just referred line6 to my post - I sent them a ticket week ago - going a bit slow for some reason 

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"The toe switch isn't the reason the defective pedals are breaking. That doesn't have anything to do with it...".

 

Really?  I understand that there is a flaw in the design of the metal stamped panel or perhaps the way in which the pedal's pivoting assembly is attached to this panel. However, if the toe switch is also defective, in that it requires more force to trigger this switch than was originally intended (designed for) one could reasonably conclude that this additional DOWNWARD FORCE would translate to additional stress on the pedal's pivot point which might contribute to an early failure of this assembly. But that's just me. 

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