How to Join Guitar Effects Pedals
The placement of effects makes a huge difference in your guitar tone and the strength of each effect; putting stompboxes in the "wrong" order can make your effect chain noisier and less effective. There are many ways to line up your effects, but there are also a few basic rules that can help you get on the road to pedal nirvana.
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Instructions
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Separate your effects pedals into two categories: signal conditioners and modulation/time-based effects. Signal conditioners are preamps, compressors, overdrives, distortions equalizers and wah pedals. Modulation/time based effects are digital delay pedals, chorus pedals, reverb pedals and pitch shifters. Having your pedals segregated into two groups will help you put together the order of effects.
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Place each effect about three inches apart in a straight line in this order: electric guitar, preamp, chorus, distortion (or overdrive,) wah pedal, delay, equalizer, noise gate, volume pedal, reverb and then amplifier. According to Harmony-Central.com, this is the way pedal manufacturer Boss suggests players set up guitar effects for the best-sounding set up. If you do not have all of these effects, omit the ones you do not have from the string.
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Connect the first pedal to the second pedal using a guitar patch cable. One end of the cable should be plugged into the output of the first pedal and the other end should be plugged into the input of the second effect. Patch cables, which are one foot or shorter, are designed to connect guitar effects. Due to their short length they prevent signal loss that is inherent in longer cables. Repeat this process until all effects are connected or "chained" together.
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Tips & Warnings
Experiment by moving effects in the chain--you'll notice a huge effect on the sound of the guitar.
References
- Photo Credit Guitar player #1 image by Warren Millar from Fotolia.com
