Home Forums Help/Technical Questions Mel9, B9, Key9 Zuma Power Issues

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  • #84928

    I could not get any sound out of my B9 last night at my gig. The Mel9 was working fine. Today, I was trying to troubleshoot the problem. If I run them off the EHX power supply they work fine. It is rated 9.6v @ 200 Mah. The Zuma is 9v @ 500 Mah. When they are plugged into the Zuma they light up fine, but no sound is heard.

    I can get the Mel9 to work sometimes by clicking the footswitch a lot. When it isn’t working the footswitch pops very loudly. Then after 4 or 5 presses the footswitch is quiet and the pedal works.

    The B9 very rarely works with the Zuma, but I got it working a few times.

    If I switch the power cord from the Zuma that makes the Mel9 work and plug it into the B9, the B9 doesn’t work.

    One thing I have noticed is if you plug both pedals in, they make two pops at startup. If they make two pops the pedal will work. If they only make one pop, they won’t work.

    Also, both pedals work fine when I use my Truetone CS-7 power supply.

    Is the Zuma not sending enough volts at startup?

    #122930
    EHX STAFF
    Keymaster

    the power supply might have a slow ramp up to full voltage and that can stall the operation of the 9 pedals.
    Try turning the supply on and after a few seconds plug the 9 pedal in.
    if all is good it is a start up issue with your power supply

    #122933

    In case someone else has this problem. Here is what Strymon said.

    The issue here actually is due to the way EHX deals with something called reset timing.

    When the Zuma is first connected, it ramps up power as a self-protection scheme. Digital pedals that are then connected see the low power at first and do not power on. A reset timer tells the internal processor to re-try powering on after a period of time. If this is too short, or not done at all, the pedal will never realize that the current has ramped up and is adequate to power on the pedal.

    We have found that running the pedals off a current doubler (NOT voltage) will provide enough immediate current to power the Mel9 (so, it should work for the others as well). However, this does mean you would need 6 outputs for all three. The other thing we have tested successfully is, you can take one current doubler across two outputs, and then daisy chain the pedals off the current doubler. This does work, but could introduce some noise depending on the pedals. But, it does keep the amount of outputs used down to two, which is a gain from having to power all three individually.

    #122937
    2mix
    Participant

    > In case someone else has this problem.

    It is a known issue that the supplied EHX adapter must be used for any ‘9’ series.

    There was a previous posting about this and I’ve experienced what you encountered using none EHX power supply.

    #122958
    claxor
    Participant

    Other than using a current doubler, is the other way around this issue, just powering on the Strymon Zuma without the EHX “9” pedals connected, wait a few seconds, then connect the EHX “9” pedals? (I’m trying to avoid buying more power connectors)

    #122959
    2mix
    Participant
    Quote:
    Other than using a current doubler, is the other way around this issue, just powering on the Strymon Zuma without the EHX “9” pedals connected, wait a few seconds, then connect the EHX “9” pedals? (I’m trying to avoid buying more power connectors)

    Powering up a none EHX adapter, wait, then connect the ‘9’ will work also. But you probably don’t want to do that once you have setup your pedal board. Btw, the EHX 9.6 volts adapter came as a package together with the ‘9’.

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