On the Road With Furman's Rugged New Pedal Board
As a musician, you know that life on the road can be hard. You have to lug all your equipment around with you from venue to venue, and then you have to set it up time after time. That's not even to mention adjusting to the unique acoustics of each location — and adjusting to each unique crowd. But no matter how tough it is on you, think of how hard it is on your equipment. From gig to gig, your equipment is set up and torn down, bumped and dinged in transport, exposed to questionable power supplies, and cowers in fear of what you do to it while onstage. That's why Furman Sound has introduced the new SPB-8C pedal board. While some of your equipment cries foul, the new SPB-8C craves the road. Designed specifically for knockin' around from gig to gig, the rugged SPB-8C is not for the timid. This fearless pedal board was built to be stomped and slammed in the most wicked of onstage performances!
|
| |
 |
Ok, so maybe you aren't one for lighting your guitar on fire onstage or smashing it against an amplifier. Nevertheless, simply using your equipment wears it out over time, and transporting it can lead to damage. Replacing it isn't cheap, so your equipment should be built to last. Featuring a solid, robust construction, the SPB-8C maintains optimum performance for years of onstage use and abuse. The durable pedal board consists of a rugged yet light polycarbonate platform with a 13.75-in. by 26.75-in Velcro™ sheet and an extruded aluminum chassis. This construction ensures secure, non-slip performance for all of your effects boxes and pedals.
For protection during transport and to facilitate setting up at each gig, the SPB-8C features a new durable polyethylene hardshell case which is large enough to accommodate the pedal board and all attached effects, allowing you to keep all pedals and stompboxes connected instead of having to reconstruct at each gig. A retractable handle and inline skate wheels allow for easy transport, while heavy-duty latches ensure the case will remain securely closed when not in use.
Another factor in the life of the traveling musician is the quality of the power supplied at the venue. When traveling from gig to gig, you never know what you are going to get when you plug in at an unfamiliar location. In many cases, AC line noise produces a hum from your amplifiers that messes with your sound. But it can get much worse. For example, the outlets available may be labeled incorrectly, providing a severe overvoltage followed by the smell of smoke as your equipment is fried. Yikes!
There is not a concert venue in the world that can guarantee pure, clean electricity free of transients or AC noise because 60% to 80% of surges are created within the facility itself! Most commonly, these surges are a result of the switching power supplies located in equipment and lighting on the stage. Ironically, it's often the very gear that you're trying to protect that is causing a problem.
As a solution to the power dilemma, the SPB-8C pedal board offers two levels of surge and short circuit protection in addition to Furman's standard RFI/EMI filtering, while providing noiseless performance. The SPB-8C powers DC pedals while eliminating hum by utilizing a high-quality toroid transformer. Each DC output is rated at 120 mA, and is individually protected against shorts, guaranteeing that if one output fails the remaining will continue to function. In addition, the DC outputs are individually isolated, eliminating noisy ground loops.
Some additional features of the SPB-8C include a stereo patch bay containing eight ¼-in. switching phone jacks that feature sturdy metal brushings, connected in two stereo loops, allowing a single guitar or instrument input to feed multiple mono and stereo effects boxes, send and return from remote effects, and feed up to two amplifiers simultaneously. The board also includes four AC outlets, spaced widely enough to accommodate bulky “wall wart” transformers.
From rowdy performances, to transport woes and electrical surges, the road is a scary place for your equipment. The SPB-8C says, “Bring it on!”
Take a closer look at Furman's Web site at www.furmansound.com.
|
