pablo5150 Posted September 12, 2014 Share Posted September 12, 2014 Hi all! I have a variax 700 which is about 6 years old. During a gig the 4th,5th and 6th sting suddenly produced no sound, the first three, however, are fine. At first, I thought the pick-ups were at fault, but for three pickups together to fail at once seems a bit strange? Any thoughts ? Thanks in Advance Paul Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charlie_Watt Posted September 12, 2014 Share Posted September 12, 2014 Most likely the A/D or amplifier chip for those three strings failed. I agree that three Piezos don't fail at once. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pablo5150 Posted September 12, 2014 Author Share Posted September 12, 2014 Thanks Charlie Would this be a repair i could do myself? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charlie_Watt Posted September 12, 2014 Share Posted September 12, 2014 Depends on your skills. (both debug and desolder / solder) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clay-man Posted September 12, 2014 Share Posted September 12, 2014 Maybe check the plug to the PCB as well if it's loose. Make sure it's all the way in and secure. I agree with Charlie, no way 3 piezos would die at once. Hope you can resolve your issue. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eenymason Posted September 12, 2014 Share Posted September 12, 2014 Hi all! I have a variax 700 which is about 6 years old. During a gig the 4th,5th and 6th sting suddenly produced no sound, the first three, however, are fine. At first, I thought the pick-ups were at fault, but for three pickups together to fail at once seems a bit strange? Any thoughts ? Thanks in Advance Paul I have an old 300 (bought 2nd hand) which had a couple of issues when I bought it. One issue was that the E and B strings would not produce any audible sound when first plugged in, then after a while (maybe minutes), they would change their minds, and play ball - wierd! Even weirder, they would be picked up by the tuner, and I could tune them, but I still couldn't hear anything. I replaced the piezos with Graphtech Ghost pickups, and the problem appeared resolved. However, twelve or so months later the problem has re-appeared. I am lucky that it's a momentary thing, and I use it as a back-up incase of failure/string breakage on my first player when gigging. I plug it in for a while while setting up gear, and it normally remains active on all strings for the night. I have asked about this before on this forum, but had no reply, and would love to resolve it for once and for all. Well - until next time anyway...... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eenymason Posted September 12, 2014 Share Posted September 12, 2014 Depends on your skills. (both debug and desolder / solder) Hi Charlie_Watt, I wonder would you be so kind as to shed a little more light on this? How do I recognise what to debug and desolder/solder, and what skill level would I need - I have a (very basic) line 6 service agent about 50 km away, and the Australian distributor/service centre about 90 km away, so if I CAN fix this problem myself, that would be great. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charlie_Watt Posted September 13, 2014 Share Posted September 13, 2014 All I can tell you is that there is an amplifier circuit and A/D converters for each string but I believe that they are using a multiple A/D chip that may handle three strings. I am an EE and I would feel comfortable troubleshooting this problem myself but I am not recommending that unless you have an understanding of electronics and the tools to troubleshoot the board. I would start by swapping the piezo inputs and see for sure that the problem does not follow the piezos. After that, you have to determine which chip to replace on the board, find a replacement, and go about replacing it. Not for someone not experienced in this kind of work. If you can isolate the problem to the board, you could try to find a replacement. Maybe Line6 would allow you to send them just the board for repair / replacement but I would not count on that. Sorry I can't help more. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eenymason Posted September 16, 2014 Share Posted September 16, 2014 All I can tell you is that there is an amplifier circuit and A/D converters for each string but I believe that they are using a multiple A/D chip that may handle three strings. I am an EE and I would feel comfortable troubleshooting this problem myself but I am not recommending that unless you have an understanding of electronics and the tools to troubleshoot the board. I would start by swapping the piezo inputs and see for sure that the problem does not follow the piezos. After that, you have to determine which chip to replace on the board, find a replacement, and go about replacing it. Not for someone not experienced in this kind of work. If you can isolate the problem to the board, you could try to find a replacement. Maybe Line6 would allow you to send them just the board for repair / replacement but I would not count on that. Sorry I can't help more. Thanks for that info. One more question for you or anyone else.... Why would the tuner register there's a string being plucked, yet I hear no sound from the strings in question. I can tune all 6 strings, but only hear 4 when switching the tuner off (in the Pod HD500). Surely this is key to the problem, and may well point at the A/D converters I'm guessing.... cheers again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charlie_Watt Posted September 16, 2014 Share Posted September 16, 2014 There may be some crosstalk between piezos that gives the tuner enough signal to tune to. How are you connecting your Variax to the Pod? VDI or 1/4 inch? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eenymason Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 There may be some crosstalk between piezos that gives the tuner enough signal to tune to. How are you connecting your Variax to the Pod? VDI or 1/4 inch? Always VDI. I guess I could go into Workbench and lower all the string volumes apart from the two problem strings to count that in or out as the reason for that curiosity. Thanks for all your info! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pablo5150 Posted September 25, 2014 Author Share Posted September 25, 2014 Hello again! Just to let you know I fixed the problem. It was due to the small white ribbon cable that connects the pickups in the saddle to the small motherboard which had become loose. Thanks for your help anyway!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charlie_Watt Posted September 25, 2014 Share Posted September 25, 2014 That is great news! Good job! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clay-man Posted September 25, 2014 Share Posted September 25, 2014 Hello again! Just to let you know I fixed the problem. It was due to the small white ribbon cable that connects the pickups in the saddle to the small motherboard which had become loose. Thanks for your help anyway!! Awesome! I was hoping it was that. I had the same problem one time when trying to fix a piezo. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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