Moog EP-3 Expression Pedal

[kithara]

@Dom,

I bought a Moog EP-3 from Amazon about a week ago. I hooked it up to my SS2 and didn't bother to calibrate or play with modlines at first. When I saw the results in an Ableton device macro I was puzzled; the encoder hardly moved for most of the range of the pedal then raced up quickly to max values. I then played with calibration in the pedal tab of settings. What I saw there matched my impression in Ableton even after the calibration.

Next I turned to my trusty Midi Monitor app (for Mac I checked it on Virus Total). When I looked at the MIDI CC values coming out of there it matched what I was seeing in Ableton and SS advanced editor. There were long gaps in cc from 0 to 50 or so then closely packed values from there to 127. Put another way, when I go from pedal all the way to heel and about 80% to toe I reach around 50. Then from there to 100% toe it goes very quickly through the range of 50-127 in that small space.

I don't see this as a calibration problem but a potentiometer-equal distribution of output cc # problem. I suppose one can learn to make very fine adjustments over that 20% of pedal range to get the detail I want but I would be a twitching wreck pretty soon.

Speaking of twitchy - the pedal emits cc # changes even when i take my foot off the pedal.

I also played with the adjustment knob and for me that just lobbed off the top range of CC values.

I don't know if this is the norm for pedals. I just ordered a Mission Engineering EP-1 pedal - red to see if the higher price range yields more evenly distributed range of cc. I am likely to return the Moog but I want to do a side by side comparison.

[Briggy]

I did mess with the modline for the pedal but hasn't really helped that much. Plus the constant data spitting is not so good. I miss the exp pedals on the old tank of the FCB1010. Don't miss the weight though.

[Briggy]

Came across this regardsing Expresion pedals today


FYI

http://missionengineering.com/?page_id=738

I would like to stop the EP3 from constantly spitting out DATA when not being moved - no luck yet. Am beginning to suspect it is crashing Ableton I have the pedal controlling variable controls in a couple of VST effects)

[Briggy]

apologies to keep bumping this thread.

Anyway: I connected the Ep3 pedal via my midi keyboard, instead of the Softstep, to see if the behaviour was the same. Yep.

At the extreme ends of pedal travel - no random data. But in the middle of pedal travel, I was getting the same constant emission of CC messages.
But when I backed off slightly on the pot on the side of the pedal, the random data pretty much stopped - there is still one area of pedal travel that gives trouble, but much easier to live with. As long as I don't want 0>127, I guess.

However, vis á vis linear response: by connecting the pedal via another piece of hardware, I also noticed that the pedal travel was MUCH more linear (tested as a vol fader in Ableton) than when connected via the SS.