Pedalboards quick configuration changes : patch panels?

[kiat]

With a limited number of pedals and devices (to use in my signal paths) Pre, Post, Amp, DI, BT, IEM (band feed, bass), transmitter headphones, etc, rather than having to move and jig devices and their connections around into different configurations based on the use case: practice at home, band rehearsals, videoing, gigging, I'm thinking about audio routing with 1/4" patch panels (or other compact mono or stereo patch cables).

 

I'm thinking it might be worth the effort and sacrifice.

 

Has anyone tried this before and if so what worked/didn't etc?

[BigRedX]

In theory a decent idea.

 

However in practice, especially for live use, every additional connection adds another point of potential failure and a patch bay will add 2 for every device connected to it. Also connections that are made and broken on a regular basis tend to be the ones that fail first.

 

If you find yourself changing the routings you use on your pedal board a lot, there are two things you may want to look at:

 

1. Have your patch bay normalised so that the most commonly used configuration is hard wired into it without needing any additional patch cables.

 

2. Look at one of the MIDI controlled routing systems where all your devices are attached to a master controller unit and the various routing are made from that.

[SimonK]

My bass and acoustic pedal boards are pretty linear, but for my electric guitar pedalboard I use a 4-cable multi-core and a Bright Onion patch box so that I can easily switch pedals before and after the preamp.

[kiat]

Problem: I've got devices on my Pedalboard that I'd like to use in different configurations when gigging, when rehearsing and when practising solo. Everything is on my board: bass wireless receiver, tuner, multi effect, IEM transmitter, DI, headphone amp/mixer and battery. 

 

 

Solutions?? : my tech background prompts me to solve this with a patch panel (all audio inputs and inputs from every device would have their own port in a single patch panel. Then compact patch cables would connect these ports in any combo you want, easily changeable and no more removing of devices to change over their cables. It might be a faff, it might be impractical, unless there are micro connectors. Has anyone done this, or even just attempted it or thought it through?

[fretmeister]

Boss ES-8 is the answer.

 

Everything goes into its own loop and you can swap the order in the Boss unit that controls it all. You can set patches with different orders.