Kemper into Line 6 Helix FX Loop Questions?

  • Happy Holidays all!


    New Kemper owner here. My plan is to be able to use the Kemper as an amp plugged into one of the FX Loops of the Helix, which I'll use mainly as my pedalboard, but also as a MIDI controller for the Kemper (mainly just to switch between amps when in Performance mode, at least at first). This is how I have things connected:


    - Guitar => Helix Guitar Input.
    - Helix FX Loop Send => Kemper Alternative Input.
    - Helix FX Loop Return => Kemper Left Main Out.
    - Helix XLR Left => Xitone wedge XLR input.
    - Helix MIDI out => Kemper MIDI input.


    So far, everything seems to be working fine except when I enable the Wah pedal n the Helix. Then the audio drops significantly, and it seems to only have the effected sound drowning the main amp tone. Not sure what's going on, but hopefully I'm explaining it correctly. If I disengage the Wah, the amp tone from the Kemper cones back up to normal level. Anyone knows what may be happening here?


    Also, what would be the best way to level match both devices so that they are sending and receiving signal at "unity gain" (for lack of a better term). Those are the only two questions I have for now. Thanks!

  • I suggest looking at the routing in the Helix. Perhaps you are turning the wah on, and turning the FX loop off?


    I wouldn't get any sound if that was the case. Bypassing the Loop in the Helix effectively cuts off the sound from the Kemper, so that's not it.

  • Jose, no offense but seems like an expensive foot controller if that is what you are using it for?


    None taken. I'm not just using the Helix as a foot controller, I'm also using the effects and routing capabilities within it. Actually, with this setup I could even use both the Kemper and the Helix's amps simultaneously! If anything, this gives me a VERY powerful setup. The possibilities are almost endless :-).

  • Is there a level control on the Wah in the Helix? You have checked the input and output level of the loop you have the Kemper in I assume. Only other thing I wondered is. is the loop in parallel or series with the Wah ie a straight through path with the wah to the output and the loop in a parallel path that might not have the levels set accordingly to the two paths? Sorry I don't have a Helix so just trying to help out with a few guesses
    as I was thinking of using this setup as well but haven't ordered a Helix yet


    Dan

  • Is there a level control on the Wah in the Helix? You have checked the input and output level of the loop you have the Kemper in I assume. Only other thing I wondered is. is the loop in parallel or series with the Wah ie a straight through path with the…


    Hi Dan,


    Yes, there is a level control in the Wah block (the Helix has a level control in each and every block actually), but I don't think that's the problem since the other effects (i.e. Delay & Reverb) are also very low in volume when the Wah is engaged. Unfortunately, I won't be able to mess around with it until later today, but I remember keeping the FX Loop levels at default in the Helix.


    The loop is in series with the Wah, yes. In that preset I have a Wah, Overdrive, FX Loop and a Volume block in series and then a Delay and Reverb block in parallel after the Volume block. The signal chain merges back to series with a Gain block (which I'm using as a boost) before the Output. That's the entire signal chain.

  • BTW, if I eventually decide to connect the Kemper into the Helix via S/PDIF, can the Kemper be the slave? Fortunately, the Helix can be switched to use pretty much any sample rate I want, with 24 bit resolution. But I think it needs to be the Master (though I could be wrong about that).

  • Scratch that last question. I just found out that the FX Loop in the Helix doesn't include the S/PDIF I/O. I guess I'm stuck with analog connections until Line 6 adds this feature in a future firmware (hopefully). In any case, it's not a big deal at all since I probably wouldn't even tell the difference anyway. Just wanted to keep things as clean as possible :-).


    In any case, further experimentation revealed that the problem I was originally having wasn't caused by the Wah block but rather by the Volume block. I had both the Wah and the Volume blocks set to engage/disengage via the toe switch. Pressing on the toe switch of the onboard expression pedal enabled the Wah while the Volume pedal disengages, and pressing it again does the opposite. So when the Volume block was disengaged, the tone dropped and sounded washy (all effects and no dry tone). Manually engaging the Volume block, while the Wah was still functioning, restored the tone to its original gain. In order to mitigate this, I changed the switch that engages the Volume block from the toe switch to a footswitch, and now engaging the Wah works as expected (and the Volume disengages automatically when the Wah is ON). So that problem is solved!


    Interestingly though, when I tried to reproduce the problem starting from scratch with an empty preset, the FX Loop wasn't working at all. All I could hear was the dry, unaffected DI sound from the guitar when setting the Mix parameter of the FX Loop down to 0%. I need to spend more time with this but, since I had solved the Wah/Volume problem, I decided to move onto MIDI programming instead.


    OK, so with the Helix I have up to 10 programmable footswitches available to me. I started by setting up a custom Performance on preset 1 in the Kemper with an AC30 clean amp in slot 1 and an ENGL Fireball amp in slot 2. Then in the Helix, I proceeded to program a couple of footswitches that engage these two Performance slots. Everything is working fine, except when I switch presets in the Helix. At that point, the Kemper switches Performances and jumps to number 54. Thankfully, the Helix also has instant MIDI messages that I can program in order to tell the connected MIDI device what preset (in this case, which Performance) to jump to when I press the preset button in the Helix. However, according to the Kemper's "MIDI Parameter Documentation" pdf, I also need to tell the Kemper which slot to load before in actually loads the Performance.


    This is not a big problem but, when you want to stay in stomp box mode in the Helix, it requires two stomp presses on different footswitches rather than just one. The workaround I have found is to switch the Helix to 8 stomps mode (instead of 10), which turns two of the footswitches into Bank Up/Down switches. This way I CAN just press once on a preset that takes me to the correct performance in the Kemper at the cost of 2 footswitches. Again, not a big deal but it would be nice to figure out a way to keep the Helix in 10 stomps mode and also switch preset/performances on both devices with a single press of a switch. Any ideas? BTW, the Helix can send up to 6 instant MIDI commands with the press of a switch. I tried sending the Performance AND Slot commands simultaneously, but that seems to be confusing the Kemper. Am I missing anything?


    Sorry for the long post. Just thought it would be more useful to include all the info.


    Thanks!

  • UPDATE:


    Today has been a very productive day, as you guys have witnessed :-). I apologize for posting so much, but I want to make sure that I document everything for anyone who may stumble upon this thread.


    Remember the problem I originally thought was being caused by the Wah pedal, and later discovered to be the Volume pedal? Well, it was neither! The source of that issue came about me incorrectly using a STEREO FX Loop instead of a MONO FX Loop. Each path in the Helix is a stereo path, so I was only hearing half the signal when using a stereo FX Loop (which explains the volume drop). It was a huge DUH moment, lol. But now that's behind me :-).


    In regards to switching Kemper performances with my Helix patches, I discovered that pressing twice is just the way it worked with the HD500. I'm assuming there's just no way around that, unless someone knows a way. From what I've been reading, most people were using sequential patch switching with the HD500, where patches 1A-1D would change Presets #1-4 in Browser mode on the Kemper until reaching patch 16D on the HD500, which would go up to a Preset #64 on the Kemper. However, I'm finding that it is more effective to simply assign the same 4 (or 5 in the Helix) footswitches to always switch Performance SLOTS 1-5 on the Kemper. That way I simply bank up a preset (readies up a Performance), and then press one of the assigned footswitches to load the corresponding slot (which completely loads the Performance in the Kemper). I find this much simpler to program and its always consistent. Plus, this saves me from programming 64 presets and being limited to that number in the HD500 (which is a lot, but still). Perhaps there was a limitation in the HD500 that I don't know about, and that's why people did it that way? I have no clue.


    Also, I was able to program the expression pedal so that simply moving it would enable the Wah in the Kemper, and then automatically disengage whenever I stopped moving the pedal. This is such a useful feature!! No wonder people have asked for it to be implemented in the Helix. BTW, I'm loving the Kemper's Wahs, especially the one called "WWAH Ibz Wh Ten". It's so dirty sounding, but in a good way. Reminds me of the U2 "Mysterious Ways" Wah tone. Very cool! I also went ahead and programmed the Tap Tempo to follow the Helix, but I'm not sure that's working exactly on both units. I'm assuming I have to set a timing master in order for them to sync perfectly, but I don't know how to do that. Any help there would be appreciated.


    Lastly, have I mentioned how awesome the Kemper sounds. I haven't even delved into Comercial profiles, or even the free Rig Xchange profiles. The factory profiles sound great once you enable Pure Cabinet. This is the closet device to the real thing. I could probably make the Helix sound close, but there's that extra mojo that the Kemper has that I just can't get out of the Helix. Perhaps someone who is a bad ass at programming modeling devices can get there, but I sure can't. Plus I just like the fact that the Kemper just sounds good, given a good profile, and it's VERY easy to tweak to taste. However, nothing beats the Helix's UI. It's just the sexiest UI out there, without a doubt.


    Anyway, that's it for now. Hope you guys had a Merry Christmas. I sure did!


    EDIT: For clarification.

  • .. This is how I have things connected:
    - Guitar => Helix Guitar Input.
    - Helix FX Loop Send => Kemper Alternative Input.
    - Helix FX Loop Return => Kemper Left Main Out.

    ..
    How do you set the levels? Helix FX Loop Send to instrument level and Return to line level?
    It's bad that you can not set the levels of the send and return independently.
    I have it connected like this, but this uses almost all Helix FX Loops:
    - Guitar => Helix Guitar Input.
    - Helix FX Loop Send 1 (instrument) => Kemper Front Input.
    - Kemper Left Main Out => Helix FX Loop Return 3 (Line)
    - Kemper Right Main Out => Helix FX Loop Return 4 (Line)


  • Use separate Send/Return blocks instead of the FX Loop block if you need individual level controls. Personally, I didn't adjust anything. All levels were left at their default positions. Also, even the way you have it set up, you still have half of the Helix's FX Loops available.


    Currently, I'm experimenting with using the S/PDIF connectors instead, for the FX Loop. It works very well, but there are a couple of limitations due to the way you'd have to go about it. But the good news is that you're bypassing extra AD/DA conversions. You should vote these IdeaScale up if you're interested in this way of connecting the Kemper to the Helix:


    http://line6.ideascale.com/a/d…X-Loop-Block/820223-23508


    http://line6.ideascale.com/a/d…utput-Option/820221-23508


    Take care!

  • Quote

    Use separate Send/Return blocks instead of the FX Loop block if you need individual level controls.


    You can not set send 1 to "instrument" and return 1 to "line", can you?


    Yes, an FX Loop with S/PDIF would be fine for inserting the kemper. It avoids the A/D conversion, and there is no noise.
    But the you have no S/PDIF left as an output! We need a second S/PDIF output... ;)

  • You can not set send 1 to "instrument" and return 1 to "line", can you?


    I don't think so, no.


    Quote

    Yes, an FX Loop with S/PDIF would be fine for inserting the kemper. It avoids the A/D conversion, and there is no noise.
    But the you have no S/PDIF left as an output! We need a second S/PDIF output... ;)


    What for?

  • I connect the S/PDIF output of the Helix with the S/PDIF input of my fireface 800. Again a noiseless connection, and no unneccessary D/A conversion.


    I guess I'm not following why you're doing that. I thought we were speaking of connecting the Kemper to the Helix via S/PDIF for live applications. What does the Fireface 800 have to do with it?