Shrink wrapping my pedal board audio cables with AC...

[Guite Lectrique]

Hi,

I'm getting tired of always having the cables of my pedal board mixed up in nodes so I want to shrink wrap them. I was just wondering if shrink wrapping the AC cord with my footswitch cable and audio cable would cause hums in the signal?

The cables are 30' long and the AC is a regular AC extension cord (like the one for your lawnmower).

Thanks.

Gui

[Processaurus]

That sounds tempting, but hum could definitely be an issue, wires running parallel to each other are more and more prone to picking up crosstalk the longer they are next to each other, and 30' is pretty long, and 110v is pretty big.  Who knows though, until you test it?  You may get away with it if you use nice audio cable with the woven shield, like the Canare GS-6 (or generic equivalent).  You could also drive the cable with something like Jack Orman's Super Buffer, I think its called, its a quad opamp with all the opamps wired as buffers in parallel, for super low output impedance, which would be key in keeping crosstalk down, maybe even more than the nice cable.  Also how much gain you use on the amp would be a factor, because then the hum would get amplified along with the guitar.

You could use a bunch of little zip ties to tie the cables together, that might be easier than shrink wrap.

[grapefruit]

Running the AC line right next to unbalanced low level audio for 30' is asking for trouble, but you won't know how bad it is unless you try it. Personally I don't like to ask for trouble. I get in enough as it is!

You could shrink or tie the audio and footswitch cables together and keep the AC seperate, or put your DC supply up near the amp and run DC down with the other cables. Just make sure you use thick enough cable to avoid voltage drop. If you are only powering analog pedals the current draw should be low enough that it won't be a problem.

Cheers,
Stew.

[ADR]

Build yerself a cable snake with a DC extension cable instead of AC. Move yer wallwart to a powerstrip shared with yer amp.

Then wrap the bundle in some spiral binding you can get at an electronic store.

I have done this, and the DC poses no crosstalk whatsoever that I can hear.

In fact, there is a commercial product like this called pedalsnake (just search on musiciansfriend.com for it).

[Guite Lectrique]

Of course!!!

Thanks all for the advice and wisdom! After speaking with some people I had decided to not shrink wrap the AC cord. But I will instead make an extension for the Wall wart. This will be smaller for the snake and way more convenient!! Thanks ADR.

Guite