Fixed my Amp Footswitch (pix)

[Mike]

My 6100 footswitch was crapping out on me at band practise on Tuesday. It wouldn't switch from Clean to Crunch and when I stepped on Lead it was getting stuck and wouldn't come back to another channel, so I played with the amp without just on Clean with pedals or Crunch.

I decided to debug the problem yesterday and opened up teh switch:




I was hoping that it was just the lead that was fucked and not the circuitry in the switch or in the amp. It was. I tested continuity between these solder points and the 6 pins of the DIN plug and found 3/6 were fucked.

I tried cutting the cable in half several times, stripping wires at both ends and checking continuity again - turns out this cable is fucked in several places - it's 14 years old and probably got fed up of being wrapped around the pedal box. That's life.

Went to the lab today and nicked some 6core and a 6pin DIN plug.

Let's unsolder the old cable from the PCB points, making note of what goes where:



Booyah motherfucker.

I got the new cable and stripped off a shitload of the plastic screen



Stripped the wires and got those bastards back in there. I taped the wire in this loop to remove strain from those little guys



My DIN socket



That middle section comes apart from the bottom of the plug too. It's tricky as fuck but if you leave the right amount of cable and are careful you can solder this shit yourself. I tinned the wires slightly and slipped them into the ferrules and heated them slightly to solder bond them.



Then i just assembled the jack and plugged her in. Worked first time!

Sorted innit and not a penny spent - very happy!

[Doog]

Schmoove!

I love it when a plan comes together..

[Mike]

Totally.

The DIN plug was fiddly as fook and I had to have a snickers bar halfway through as my hands were shaking from low blood sugar or beer or something.

Seeing as the gauge of wire I used was thicker than the og wire, the cable strain plug didn't fit back in so it's gaffer taped for now. I'm thinking of adding a DIN socket and another DIN plug to the cable at some point...

[Mike]

Forgot the final product picture:

[More Cowbell]

Hey mike...can you take some more pics of your pedal board and post them up?


just having some fun with you, so calm down.






nice repair work btw.

[Mike]

I like to do the image posting in spurts - like the spurts from a fully loaded ketchup bottle onto a plate of heavily vinegared chips.

[Gavin]

This reminds me I have to get a soldering iron from someplace to replace the footswitch on that Shredmaster so's I can punt the fucker on the 'bay.

[Mike]

This reminds me I have to get a soldering iron from someplace to replace the footswitch on that Shredmaster so's I can punt the fucker on the 'bay.

I got this electricians toolkit from Argos for ?9.99. Soldering iron and LOADS of other useful stuff:

http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/p ... 015696.htm

# The perfect starter set for electrical repairing and DIY hobbies.

# Digital multi-meter.

# 30W soldering iron.

# Soldering iron rest.

# Soldering paste.

# Soldering wire.

# 8 inch crimping tool.

# 20 terminals in a plastic case.

# 12 hex key wrenches.

# 4 precision screwdrivers.

# 6 inch adjustable wrench.

# 6 inch long nose pliers.

# 2 insulated screwdrivers.

# Voltage tester.

# Solder sucker.

DO IT

The soldering iron is smart - nice and hot - a simple touch will melt joints.

[Gavin]

That's a well good deal, I think I'll go up the bridges today and get that from the Argos up there. Thanks for the tip off Michael.

[Mike]

No problem. It's well cheap - you couldn't buy a soldering iron for that from anywhere else.

[Doog]

Bitchin'! If I didn't have that garb already, I'd totally pick one up. That's cheap like woah.

[James]

i have a soldering iron i paid about ?7 or 8 for, but i think i may well buy that anyway. thats a well good deal.

[dots]

solid work, mike. i guess i shoulda tried that at some point with the TSL's footswitch, but meh. . .

[Mike]

I'm pretty sure with the TSL footswitches that either strain at the footswitch end of the cable or breaks from people wrapping the cable around the switch is what causes the failures. They haven't used the strongest cable. The one I replaced mine with has an extra shield and is much better than the og (which still lasted 14 years).

I only fix stuff like this myself because my Dad always drilled a work ethic into me and taught me how to take stuff apart, understand how it works and come up with a solution. And all the checking - I drove JOanna insane with the DMM continuity beeps checking I had no shorts/broken contacts during the fix.

[Gavin]

[Mike]

Good man, fix that motherfucker.

[Mike]

I reckon you should get between 60 and 80 bones for that pedal by the way - be sure to big up the Greenwood association.

[euan]

This reminds me I have to get a soldering iron from someplace to replace the footswitch on that Shredmaster so's I can punt the fucker on the 'bay.

Gavin did you manage to find an exact replacement for the footswitch? The footswitch has PCB contacts and I spent 2 months trying to track one down for my Drivemaster. I even contacted Marshall Spares department and they only had the one with solder on terminal contacts.

I ended up using on of my spare Alpha DPDT switches and bodging on some wire, but it took a bit of fidling getting everything to align properly.

Okay should have read the whole post. That looks like you've got the right switch after all. Where did you get it from?

[Doog]

Yeah, it was from my broken Marshall Bluesbreaker pedal from the same series.

[euan]

Yeah, it was from my broken Marshall Bluesbreaker pedal from the same series.

Cool. Did you eBay the rest of the pedal as a rest of the parts, or keep it?