Basswitch Sonic Spark Manual - Ruppert Musical Instruments
Contents
1. is absorbed by the actuator button and the housing preserving th circuit board from mechanical stress The design is as robust as possib and the actuator button mounted in a special socket making for easy an silent operation Inside the Basswitch Sonic Spark the impulse from the pushbutton ac tivates special gold plated relays via discrete logic circuitry This way the switching is done only via high quality relays and thus guaranteeing absolutely reliable and loss free switching of very sensitive signals The switching technology and the gold plated relays in the Basswitch Sonic Spark are designed to operate for up to two million switching cycles oD Eve OD o C 390 g 14 9 cm 6 0 cm 4 4 cm 9 15 V AC DC 9 V DC max 60 mA DC 15 V DC max 65 mA DC 20 Hz 75kHz 0 5 3 dB re 10 dBu lt 0 2 re 10 dBu input signal 22 Hz 22 kHz max Gain intensity and deep bright pots in 12h position enhance pot in 7h position 3 2 MOhm 1 kHz 58 Ohm 1 kHz lt 78 dBu 22 Hz 22 kHz unweighted all pots in 12h position 16dBu lt 1 THD 1 kHz gain 14 dB 15 VDC 14 15 dB lt 0 1 THD 1 kHz2. Ruppert Musical Instruments SONIC SPARK User Manual Ruppert Musical Instruments e 20a rue de Bascharage e 4995 Schouweiler e Luxembourg Tel Fax 00 352 691 379050 e Web www rmi lu e E Mail jacques rmi lu Congratulations 4 e Basswitch Sonic Spark combines a harmonic overtone generator and a omplex EQ section with a high end preamp in one super compact pedal and gives the confidence to be adequately prepared for any situation be it a live performance or in a recording studio Pei gt When developing the Basswitch Sonic Spark we focused on the needs and wishes of the professional bass player who is not willing to compromise on either sound or the technical quality of the equipment The Basswitch Sonic Spark is manufactured assembled and tested in Germany to the highest quality standards using only the best brand components available to ensure optimal treatment of the electrical signal from your instrument Please take your time to read this user manual carefully before you start using your Basswitch Sonic Spark You will find lots of useful information Summary Introduction Description Tech Talk Technical data Introduction The Basswitch Sonic Spark combines a complex tonescale type EQ with a harmonic overtone generator and a high end preamp and is designed to process the whole frequency range of a bass instrument from very deep fundamentals e g 30 87 Hz for low B or 41 20 Hz for low E on an electric ba
3. ck Should something be missing please contact your authorised dealer The Basswitch Sonic Spark is built to last but if you nonetheless experience problems or have any questions do not hesitate to contact us wish you every success with your Basswitch Sonic Spark Yours Jacques Ruppert Es w Pr Pr Additional features Lehle True Sound Technology for details please consult the chapter Tech Talk Specially designed to protect the controls from damage and to prevent inadvertent changes to the settings The design of the housing permits easy installation the ultra flat base and removable rubber feet allow the unit to be securely attached to the pedal board using Velcro or similar Description 1 Input IN Connect your first instrument here This is the standard input for all instruments The input is designed to accept active and passive instruments 2 Output OUT Connect your bass amp or power amplifier or active monitor here If the Basswitch Sonic Spark is used in its function as sonic expander upstream of a bass amps it should be in straight through mode LED lights white when the settings for the basic sound are made on the am plifier Only then the tone enhancing settings should be done with the Basswitch Sonic Spark When using the Basswitch Sonic Spark with a power amp an active mon itor an active bass cab or an in ear system the Sonic Spark should be activated LED lights blue T
4. h only one aim in view to transmit the sound and the char acter of the instrument without altering it The voltage supplied to the Basswitch Sonic Spark is internally rectified filtered and stabilized and then brought to almost 18 V This gives enough headroom to guarantee an open and dynamic sound in all situations with out losing any detail even when confronted with pickup power peaks from plus 7 to minus 7 volts The buffers are designed to effortlessly handle signals reaching the megahertz range At the output the frequency bandwidth is limited to the audible frequency range to prevent HF interference disturbing the elec tronic circuitry This guarantees optimal transient response by the circuitry and is key to obtaining a sound that is transparent and above all cuts through For switching Lehle True Sound Technology uses exclusively gold plated contact relays and or gold plated switches The decaying signal from a string is so weak that contact materials with lower conductivity have a negative impact on the sound Ordinary footswitches use contact materi als developed to switch high voltages e g electrical power tools as this is their main field of application This can be heard for example when after a switch has been in use for some time a decaying tone starts to break off abruptly Relays and switches with gold plated contacts do not have this problem and even the smallest electrical signals can be transmitted for years with
5. he settings of the basic sound are made by the Basswitch Sonic Spark s preamp We recommend to set up the Sonic Spark as follows 1 Use the gain control to set the desired volume level also refer to point 3 2 Set the Enhance control to zero all the way counter clockwise 3 Set the Intensity control to max all the way clockwise 4 Use the Bright Deep control to adjust the sound of the Sonic Spark the basic setting is around 12 o clock 5 The Enhance control lets you add the amount of overtones you want 6 For higher volume levels adjust the basic sound by using the Intensity control Note The overtonegenerator can be used seperately To do so set the Intensity control to zero all the way counterclockwise 3 External power supply Connect your external power supply here 9 15 V min 65 mA with a standard 5 5 x 2 1 mm connector Because of the uncompromising design the quality of the components and the switching technology used the power consumption of the Bass witch Sonic Spark is too high to run it satisfactorily on batteries The exter nal power supply should provide not less than 9 V and not more than 15 V Either alternating AC or direct current DC sources can be used and the polarity is not relevant The voltage supplied is internally rectified filtered stabilised and then brought to 18 V Note To get the best out of your pedal set up we recommend that you use high quality power supplies with isolated o
6. nment Bass Amp Box and changes the basic setting of the EQ over all fre quencies 8 Footswitch Push this switch to activate the Sonic Spark Pressing the footswitch turns the Sonic Spark on or into straight through mode Re LED please read point 9 9 Status LED This LED willlight up in blue when the Sonic Spark is activated and whilte in bypass mode Tech Talk True Bypass and True Sound Today more and more effect pedals feature true bypass switching to com pletely bypass the pedal in the signal routing when the pedal is switched off The target of this design is to ensure that the pedal does not affect the electrical signal when it is switched off This way the sound is left unaltered in theory In practice however connecting several pedals featuring a true bypass design in series does not improve the sound or keep it unaltered at all Long runs of cable and multiple connections lead to a weak and lifeless sound On large pedalboards the overall length of the cable is enough for the capacitance of the cable to have a negative effect on the sound The capacitance of the cable acts as a low pass filter the low frequencies pass through the filter while the high frequencies are filtered out The price and quality of the cable you are using will not change this physical phenomenon A solution would be to use only devices with buffered bypass design in stead of true bypass This however is only a good solution if the b
7. out being negatively affected In addition the relays used in the Basswitch Sonic Spark have a lifetime about 100 times as long as those used in ordinary footswitches Technical Data Weight Length Width Height Current consumption Frequency response THD N Input impedance Output impedance Residual noise Max output level Max gain Together with typical Lehle electronic circuitry to reduce the switching pop of relays the combination of the above design features represents today s state of the art solution for an uncompromising preservation of the sig nal and hence the sound and character of the instrument Working principle of the Basswitch Sonic Spark footswitches Footswitches are pressed thousands of times during their long lifetimes sometimes sensitively but some times more brutally depending on the situation and the musician s temperament An ordinary footswitch will switch up to 20 000 times before wearing out mechanically or electrically which means that either it will stop working altogether or the signal will start to lose transparency and dynamics The Basswitch Sonic Spark is equipped with high quality Lehle footswitches Here the foot of the musician does not press an ordinary footswitch but an actuator button that activates a pushbutton inside th Basswitch Sonic Spark via a metal lever Because the actuator button an the internal pushbutton are not directly connected the load exerted by th foot
8. ss to very high overtones that have a crucial impact on the timbre of the bass instrument even though they are approaching the upper limits of the audible spectrum from 18 Hz to 20 kHz On top of this bass instruments have a characteristic attack with a very steep initial transient followed by a weak electrical signal The Basswitch Sonic Spark creates a very alive and characteristic sound like a high quality tube amp with only a few controls Functions and applications overview Basswitch Sonic Spark as a sonic enhancer The Basswitch Sonic Spark s primary application is sonic enhancing The Basswitch Sonic Spark provides a characteristic sound and if needed a higher volume level for the connected instrument via footswitch Note The Basswitch Sonic Spark s gain control has a cut and boost function to enable a perfect match of sound levels Basswitch Sonic Spark as a high end preamp The Basswitch Sonic Spark features a high end preamp and a complex tonescale type EQ with a harmonic overtonegenerator As stand alone preamp the Basswitch Sonic Spark can drive a power amp an active monitor an active bass cab or an in ear monitoring system on the pedal and the various ways it can be used Keep this user manual carefully so that you can consult it at any time Your Basswitch Sonic Spark package contains the following items Basswitch Sonic Spark User manual Please check that all these items are there as soon as you unpa
9. uffer is of very high quality If several units with buffered bypass are connected in series it only needs one buffer to be noisy to cut the dynamics of the sound signal or to negatively affect the sound in any other way for the sound of the whole effect chain to be spoilt As the saying goes a chain is only as strong as its weakest link In addition the noise of the individual buffers adds up to produce audible noise It is a fact that every buffer produces some noise even if it cannot be heard when only a single buffer is used The ideal solution is to have a very high quality buffer at the beginning of the chain that brings the signal down to a very low impedance This makes the signal insensitive to the length of the cable It is important however that this buffer is of the highest quality with the dynamic range and headroom necessary to ensure that all the details of the bass signal stay are retained unaltered The effect pedals in the downstream should then ideally have true bypass so that they will not have a negative effect on the now buffered signal as the true bypass design does not reduce dynamics and headroom or produce any noise Conclusion Having a True Sound Lehle buffer at the beginning of your effect chain combined with good true bypass equipped effects in the loop guarantees the best sound What is Lehle True Sound Technology Lehle True Sound Technology is a combination of several electrical design measures wit
10. utput sections in your set up Warning The Lehle power supply item no 7014 with the connector acc to DIN 45323 is not suitable 4 GAIN Control Use this control to adjust the volume of your Sonic Spark To permit optimal matching of signals this control enables you to boost and to cut the signal the neutral position is at 12 o clock The high end preamp of the Basswitch Sonic Spark allows you to connect the Basswitch Sonic Spark directly to a power amp see also point 2 5 Enhance Control Controls the amount of overtones This control serves to adjust the amount of overtones generated by the Basswitch Sonic Spark The control technology used here allows sustain ing a good sound even when re shaping the sound drastically Nevertheless we recommend to use this control with caution and sensitiv ity when adjusting the sound 6 Intensity Control Use this control to set the ratio between direct sound and the Sonic Spark This control allows adjustment of the amount of sound of the Sonic Spark of the overall sound progressively from 0 100 This can be very useful for big volume changes Basically the rule applies the more volume the less participation of the Sonic Spark to the overall tone The control technology used here allows sustaining a good sound even when re shaping the sound drastically 7 Bright Deep Control Adjust the sound of the Sonic Spark This control allows adjustment of the Sonic Spark to the enviro
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