the Fly Clone Project

I was under the impression the piezo doesn’t work on wireless systems. I’m using the same wireless for all of my Parker’s. The other night, I just flipped the switch to piezo just because…and it worked. Doesn’t work with my fly or p38…I even checked the volume knobs to be sure I had the settings right. All of the switches work, knobs, etc.
New batteries in each one of them too.

Hi @Ondoid—this sounds like a limitation of your wireless system, which likely expects a TS input from the guitar output whereas the Fishman preamp uses a TRS output. In my experience, many wireless systems have a certain ways of a defeating a TRS signal whereby one signal will come through but not another. Your mileage may vary, but that’s almost certainly in the realm of what’s going on.

Ondoid wrote: ↑Mon Oct 24, 2022 12:18 pm I was under the impression the piezo doesn’t work on wireless systems. I’m using the same wireless for all of my Parker’s. The other night, I just flipped the switch to piezo just because…and it worked. Doesn’t work with my fly or p38…I even checked the volume knobs to be sure I had the settings right. All of the switches work, knobs, etc.
New batteries in each one of them too.

Piezo on Mojo should work if you use a mono 1/4" cable. I dont remember if the mono/stereo is auto-sensing or uses a button like on the pre-refined, but my wireless could handle mag and piezo on the mojo.

What's your wireless system?

Piggybacking on VJ and Pat’s posts: The Fishman Powerchip and Graphtech Acoustiphonic boards automatically switch between mono (summed) and stereo (buffered mag and piezo signals in parallel) output based on the type of cable inserted into the jack (provided a TRS-compatible jack is being used and has been wired up properly - I don’t know whether any corners cut on the import models included using modified TS jacks with the Powerchip).

The ‘90s Fly circuitry required this to be done manually with the red push-button switch. Most wireless units are mono/TS (the Powerchip should output mag/summed mix/piezo in mono with any TS cable, assuming the wireless circuit itself isn’t quirky enough to cause issues).

However, even with this board-dictated functionality at the jack established, there’s plenty that can go wrong further up the signal chain (faulty mag/piezo selector switch bleeding one signal into another, faulty mag or piezo volume pot not sending 100% of the signal to ground, etc.).

Disclaimer: I never use mag/mix/piezo functionality or stereo-switching in my Flys (I have outboard gear I/O for that); and therefore may be overlooking something obvious to those who do.