Peavey Backstage Chorus 208 foot switch help

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dadroadie
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Peavey Backstage Chorus 208 foot switch help

Post by dadroadie » Mon May 29, 2023 7:09 am

Hi to all,
I'm hoping that someone in this great forum might be able to help me with making up a footswitch for my Peavey Backstage Chorus 208.
This amp uses a 7 pin DIN connector (which I have already obtained) and normally used a 3 button footswitch to control the channel select,chorus,and reverb.
I never got the foot switch with the amp and the cost to get one of the 3 button replacement units is out of my price range at the moment.
I do have a Peavey 2 button foot switch from a old amp. What I would like to do is install the 7 pin DIN connector to the 2 button switch to be able to control the channel select and the chorus. I use the reverb all the time so I don't need that to be controlled by a switch.
This leads me to my question.
I understand how to wire the DIN for the channel select and chorus but I'm not sure about about the jumper between pins 3 and 4
According to the foot switch chart that I found in the information section of the forum (see attached under Backstage Chorus 208) it should be wired as shown in the drawing.

Our late friend to this forum Enzo had replied to the Peaveys wiring of the foot switch in another forum as follows
Quoting Enzo:
What I see is the FS wiring needs to be as follows.
Pin 4 is your ground or common
Pin 3 needs to be wired to pin 4 - just a plain piece of wire.
Pin 1 is your channel switch, ground to activate.
Pin 6 is your reverb, ground to activate.
Pin 7 is your chorus, ground to activate.

I have attached a schematic of the amp (see attached).
If you look at the second page at the breakaway #1 section you will see the foot switch wiring.

My question if I'm only wiring the foot switch for channel select and chorus do I still need to jumper pin 3 to 4?
Or should it be wired as follows
Pin 1 channel select ( ground to activate)
Pin 2 no connection
Pin 3 no connection
Pin 4 ground wire
Pin 5 no connection
Pin 6 no connection
Pin 7 Chorus select ( ground to activate)

I know this is a long post but it is my understanding if I wire this incorrectly I can blow up the amp!
Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Best regards dadroadie
Attachments
Wiring Guide '95 (1).pdf
(196.4 KiB) Downloaded 287 times
Peavey-Backstage-Chorus-208-Schematic.pdf
(1.03 MiB) Downloaded 294 times

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dak
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Re: Peavey Backstage Chorus 208 foot switch help

Post by dak » Mon May 29, 2023 7:30 am

You've seen viewtopic.php?f=19&t=2464#p20317?

Anyway, it appears like you found the wiring guide. The foot switches just short signals to ground it would appear. It will be possible to create something that doesn't work, but I think it would be rather tricky to create something by accident that would be able to break the amp.

dadroadie
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Re: Peavey Backstage Chorus 208 foot switch help

Post by dadroadie » Mon May 29, 2023 8:44 am

Thanks for the reply.
If you look on the schematic on page 1 of the schematic it mentions that if the wrong or incorrectly wired foot switch is used a certain resistor will burn out and certain sections of the amp will not function.
That's where I pulled the damage amp part of my post.
Just want to do it right the first time.
If I can answer any other questions please let me know.
Regards
dad roadie

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dak
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Re: Peavey Backstage Chorus 208 foot switch help

Post by dak » Mon May 29, 2023 9:23 am

R123 looks like it won't stand for getting shorted to ground indeed (15V at 22R will burn off something like 10W). Didn't see that one from a glance over the various footswitch models.

So, uh, just get it right first time. If you have a loupe or good eyes: the pin numbers are usually embossed in small digits near their respective pins. Of course you can measure the result out before plugging it in first.

All the best

dadroadie
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Joined: Mon Jul 23, 2018 1:37 pm

Re: Peavey Backstage Chorus 208 foot switch help

Post by dadroadie » Mon May 29, 2023 10:39 am

Thanks again for looking at the schematic to make sure I'm not reading it incorrectly.
What I'm trying to figure out in a nutshell is do I need to run the jumper wire from pin 3 to pin 4 if I'm not wiring in a reverb switch?
If I wire the DIN connector so that pin 1 controls the channel select , pin 7 controls the chorus ( off and on ), and pin 4 being the ground for both of the above do I still need the jumper to pin 3 which looks like it's just the ground for the reverb (which I'm not wiring in).
My concern is that looking at the schematic it looks like pin 3 also goes up through a couple of transistors.
Not sure if they just control the relay to turn the reverb on and off or also effect the channel select and chorus .
Again thanks for the help.
Right now I have pins 1,4, and 7 wired.
I'll wait to hear a the thoughts on pin 3 before I button it up and try it out.
Regards dadroadie

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dak
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Re: Peavey Backstage Chorus 208 foot switch help

Post by dak » Mon May 29, 2023 1:07 pm

Like Enzo said, it appears like 3 needs to be wired to 4. That will switch off Q2 and make your channel select switch on the foot switch make a difference.

dadroadie
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Re: Peavey Backstage Chorus 208 foot switch help

Post by dadroadie » Mon May 29, 2023 2:09 pm

Thanks dak,
I really appreciate you taking the time to help me with this!
Best regards
dadroadie

Herb B
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Re: Peavey Backstage Chorus 208 foot switch help

Post by Herb B » Thu Oct 05, 2023 1:27 pm

I was wondering if someone could help me with a couple 208-foot switch questions.
1) has anyone repurposed a Stereo Chorus 212(seem to be a good selection to buy used) and just removed the lead crunch out of the wiring to the 7 pin DIM because the rest of it seems to line up to same schematics as the 208-foot switch.
Then the 212's bypass clean button should just function as the 208's Efx/Select switch?
Any help with this idea would be greatly appreciated or just even telling me if I am out to lunch with this idea...
Cheers,
Herb

dadroadie
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Re: Peavey Backstage Chorus 208 foot switch help

Post by dadroadie » Sun Oct 08, 2023 5:51 pm

Hi Herb,
I don't have access to the footswitch you are speaking of but a while ago Enzo was kind enough to supply the following information to me about making a footswitch for my backstage chorus 208 amp.
Make sure that the 7 pin DIN connector look the same!
If you follow the pin out below you should be fine.
It worked well for me
Just remember that this pin out shown below is the solder side pin out.
Check and double check to be sure before you try it with the amp!
Pin 1 channel select. ( to one side of the channel select foot switch/ other side of this foot switch to ground)
Pin 2 no connection
Pin 3 jumper a wire to Pin 4. ( this goes to the ground side of the 3 foot switches)
Pin 5 no connection
Pin 6 reverb (to one side of the reverb foot switch/ other side of this foot switch to ground)
Pin 7 chorus (to one side of the chorus foot switch/ other side of this foot switch to ground)
If you have any questions send me a pm and I'll try to answer to the best I can.
Hope this helps!
Dadroadie

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