Tapestry Bloomery - Expression

aaronf

Member
As the title suggest I am attempting to use a Tapestry Bloomery as my expression pedal on my Mastermind LT. I use one for my main volume pedal so I am used to it's sweep and love the small size.

Straight out of the box I set the dipswitches to 'expression' according to the Tapestry manual and plugged it in using the dedicated expression out. I found that after attempting to calibrate the Bloomery the heel down position still allows a bit of bleed (using as a volume control on my Infinity), and it jumps from minimun to approx 90% at some point in the first 10% of the pedals travel, no sweep occurring just a straight jump.
Changing the dipswitches back to normal volume mode made no difference.

For testing purposes I set it back to volume and put it in my signal chain and it works just fine as a volume pedal.

I contacted Tapestry and they informed me the Bloomery is set to 250K and may not be compatible with the Mastermind however the 'Expression Pedal Compatibility' page from Mastermind Editor guide says anywhere from 10k to 250k should work fine.

I am using a normal TRS to TRS cable and dedicated Bloomery expression out and I am sure I have tried the 'Invert Position Switch' on the expression pedal page of the editor.

Do I need to made a special cable or is there a setting on the editor somewhere I may have missed?
I am really hoping to get it working and so it can be added to the 'Compatible Pedals' side of the Editor Guide page.

I would be happy to provide a video if necessary.
Thank you for your help!
 
I've never heard of this pedal, but it sounds like you need to use a cable to invert the polarity of the pedal. It needs to be TRS to TRS with the tip and ring wires swapped at one end. Custom cable builders like Best-tronics can build this for you.
 
Thanks for your quick response.
I resoldered the cable to swap the tip and ring on one end and attempted to use the expression pedal again. The inverted cable was definitely one issue I was having, my Moog EP3 now works perfectly.

However the bloomery is still not functioning properly. I have been in contact with tapestry and have tried a few of their recommendations in regards to the dipswitches on the unit to no avail. I believe the bloomery itself my be faulty but I before I request a return could you please have a look at the short video below of my issue and let me know what you think?

https://photos.app.goo.gl/67oCqeDmV0jDNVmm1

In the video the bloomery is set to expression with the newly inverted TRS to TRS cable.

Thank you so much for your time.
 
I know this is an old thread, but did this get resolved? I'm looking at getting a Bloomery to use as my expression pedal with the PBC but I can't find anything online to confirm that it will work well. Ideally it would work with a standard (non-reversed) TRS cable, but this issue implies that it may not work even with a reversed polarity TRS cable.
 
Hey Josh, unfortunately I never got it working, as I was never able to identify exactly what the issue was it was impossible to resolve. I had both an active and passive Bloomery at the time and they both behaved in the same way so it would be safe to say they are incompatible.

I ended up exchanging it for a Mission Engineering SP1-RJM which is designed specifically to work with RJM products and is essentially guaranteed to work.
I would more highly recommend it over the Bloomery for the toe switch, I've found it incredibly useful. For example you can use it to change presets, parameters, songs, expression functions, etc at the top of the sweep. A good example would be to use the expression as a volume swell, at the top of the sweep you can use the toe switch to engage another preset, rather than having to then reach over to your Mastermind.
 
Thanks aaronf. That’s a bummer... I had ordered the ME SP1-RJM, but am trying to cancel my order as I realize I will be among those who are not satisfied with the sweep. I’ve been using an EB volume pedal forever. I then found the Bloomberg which seemed to address that issue but now I was wondering if the small size is going to bother me... maybe I just need to go with EB again.

Anyway, thanks for responding!
 
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