Noisy FX loop - just deal with it?

LaCathedrale_UK

I've got a Friedman Runt which is whisper quiet until I plug something into the FX loop, at which point it hums like mad. This is not affected by which pedals, pedal settings or amp dial tweaking.

Is it something to just deal with? After a while I tune it out, but certainly it's loud enough to be noticeable.

ICBM

It shouldn't be so on such an expensive amp.

Does it still hum if you just plug a cable in from send to return? If so there's something wrong with the amp.

If not, does it still hum if the pedal in the loop is battery-powered? If not, it's a power supply issue of some sort.

Collings

There have been a few people complaining of hum on the loop of the Runt's on Dave F's the Racksystems forum, Often it is overcome by making sure the connecting cables are routed to the input side of the amp (I assume away from the transformers field).

 "Just route towards the input side of the amp. Sorry, there is a ton of gain in the return stage of the amp and it makes it prone to noise".

LaCathedrale_UK

Hm, a patch cable between the send/return cuts down the hum significantly.  I will investigate my pedal chain, then...

Roland

Are you using battery or mains power for your pedals? I’ve had problems with amps where there’s a mains ripple between the earth of the Input and the FX loop (an amp power supply problem), or between the earths of pedal board and FX return (could be amp or pedal board supply).

LaCathedrale_UK

Ah-ha! So I've narrowed it down to the Catalinbread Talisman. Doing some research it seems as though it's designed to go into the front end, but I'm not sure if that's still to be expected or not. I guess I'll keep poking around!