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Post by niklas1073 on May 7, 2023 14:38:23 GMT -6
Today I ran to this issue for the first time. I had never used my BAE1073 pre’s for kick before. But decided to add an at4047 with -10dB pad engaged to my kick. The only pre I had free was the BAE. Noticed that with the gain at lowest i would have ended up turning attenuator way down to get by.
Anyone have any suggestions on some in line PAD attenuator that could be worth looking into to be able to run the BAE on kick and toms. The at4047 works well with other pre’s with pads but i’m kind of running out on drum pre’s here at the moment 😄
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ericn
Temp
Balance Engineer
Posts: 16,107 
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Post by ericn on May 7, 2023 14:46:09 GMT -6
Shure has a nice variable in-line pad that has worked well over the years.
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Post by niklas1073 on May 7, 2023 15:06:34 GMT -6
The shure a15as? Yeah I was looking into that and the at8202. Great to hear that you have been pleased with the shure. Will try to find a dealer close by who stocks them. Thanx 👍
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Post by jmoose on May 7, 2023 15:26:24 GMT -6
The shure's are good and so are the AT8202... I have a couple of each. Get whichever you find a better deal on.
Though, I have to ask... BAE 1073 (or any good neve klone) should just eat up drums with headroom to spare. Even with a condenser outside the kick.
What are you plugging the output of the 1073 into?
Some months ago a friend called with the same problem... no headroom with his BAE on drums. Turns out he was plugging the XLR outs of the BAE into the XLR ins of his Apollo... essentially running through two mic preamps in series. Mucho gain. Too much! Which is why he couldn't turn the gains up past 1 or 2.
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Post by EmRR on May 7, 2023 17:05:32 GMT -6
Yep any Neve thing should have none of the overload problems of something like an API or Quad 8. Everyone should own a half dozen inline pads. Really doesn’t matter what. It’s 3 resistors of more or less the same values to create the same voltage divider loss. The Shure might be convenient, but switching from lowest to highest will change mic response more than going with -20 and setting gain from there.
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Post by phdamage on May 7, 2023 21:54:07 GMT -6
I have a bunch I had made by Naiant. Some 12 dB, some 24dB and I think a stray 18dB. Used to use them for almost any mics hitting my Syteks but have different pre options these days and almost all of them have pads.
I do still need them for my Lawson 47FET when it goes on kick out and my Blue Mouse on bass cab. Have used them on various tube mics before but now I just run them to compressors to basically use as a fader and maybe a tiny bit of gain if I even need any.
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Post by niklas1073 on May 8, 2023 1:18:41 GMT -6
The shure's are good and so are the AT8202... I have a couple of each. Get whichever you find a better deal on. Though, I have to ask... BAE 1073 (or any good neve klone) should just eat up drums with headroom to spare. Even with a condenser outside the kick. What are you plugging the output of the 1073 into? Some months ago a friend called with the same problem... no headroom with his BAE on drums. Turns out he was plugging the XLR outs of the BAE into the XLR ins of his Apollo... essentially running through two mic preamps in series. Mucho gain. Too much! Which is why he couldn't turn the gains up past 1 or 2. The problem is that even on lowest gain in bae and with mic on -10dB pad I will clip in pro tools. The bae goes thru an 1176 or La2a into the ua4-710 line in where I convert the signal. So sure I could push the brakes in the compressor, but I rather take it down in an earlier stage which gives me more play room sound wise. I mainly use the bae’s on vocals and guitars. Which is odd since I run really high volume guitars with the same setup, but the kick somehow just didn’t work. I have a 14” tom on my other bae1073, that kind of works but need to keep gain on lowest there too and a little brake on on output. So both would benefit from a pad for sure. |
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Post by nick8801 on May 8, 2023 15:35:06 GMT -6
Doesn’t the BAE have an output gain?
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Post by EmRR on May 8, 2023 18:09:05 GMT -6
Remove the comp from the picture and report back. We need to know there's no gain there.
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Post by jmoose on May 8, 2023 20:44:51 GMT -6
Yes patch around the compression ... double triple check everything & report back? What your experiencing seems odd to me, even a floor tom is clipping??
I've done countless sessions with a 414 or M147 outside kick into some kinda 10xx Neve...
Basic setup = Mic about a foot to 18" off head... output gain / fader nearly wide open... pre / click gain at minimum
That should have a fair amount of headroom. Now turn up input gain one click at a time until unity / clipping converter. Fine tune output then add EQ & compressor?
Most times I'll add click gain to unity & then start chasing tone... keep going add hair & harmonics. The fatness. Saturate that input transformer!! Not uncommon to have click gained up high & output turned down especially for rock & roots music.
Eh..?
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Post by niklas1073 on May 10, 2023 5:42:18 GMT -6
There is no added gain in the signal chain. My 26" kick just is pretty loud. The rack tom (14") I can work with it if input gain all the way down and then back off a little on the output. On the tom I have an ATM230.
Today I got my hands on two attenuators. PROCO MAX20. Now I can lift up the pre's to -35dB on both kick and snare (Kick AT4047 with -10dB engaged).
I will take back the attenuators though, because when I was swapping them around on same source, I noticed the other one was cutting off some high ends quite noticably. Will try to find the shure or AT somewhere.
All and all I would say the BAE1073 puts out quite a lot of gain. If not attenuating I will en up with maximum -30dB input gain on vocals. That gives me around -15- -10dB in pro tools.
I have two separate mono units from different batches and they behave identically. So I don't think there's anytjing going on there.
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Post by EmRR on May 10, 2023 6:11:36 GMT -6
Ok, you’re telling us you’re certain where unity gain is on those comps.
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Post by niklas1073 on May 10, 2023 6:52:57 GMT -6
Ok, you’re telling us you’re certain where unity gain is on those comps. If i remember correctly they are true bypassed. But what i will do next time around I’ll pop them out (one of them i can easily unplug and bypass). When I earlier this year was troubleshooting other things I plugged them in and out on multiple occasions trying to eliminate issues and did not hear any difference with them out or in (in bypass mode). So I am pretty confident they don’t interfere. Also i will get a new set of attenuators tomorrow and see if they work more consistent. |
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Post by niklas1073 on May 11, 2023 7:04:13 GMT -6
Ok, a small update. I pulled back the mic from ca 10cm to 20cm from the kick. I have it angled downwards towards centre, didn't somehow realize it was that close. Anyway. now the readings with AND without compressor plugged in gives -10dB in daw with the BAE input gain at lowest setting and output all open. So I guess the situation is not as catastrophic as I thought to begin with. But I will anyway use attenuator as that gives a little room to play with the pre's input gain.
The comps seem to be true bypass in the way that plugged in bypass mode or unplugged does not make any difference.
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Post by Darren Boling on May 11, 2023 9:55:12 GMT -6
Seems like everyone else already helped you get sorted but wanted to chime in that I never had problems with my BAE's overloading on kick, or even with using the InnerTube 87 mod as a room mic (which was a HOT output!). Assuming it's the BAE in your profile pic you could also flip it to line and/or utilize the output attn.
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Post by copperx on May 11, 2023 11:35:57 GMT -6
Seems like everyone else already helped you get sorted but wanted to chime in that I never had problems with my BAE's overloading on kick, or even with using the InnerTube 87 mod as a room mic (which was a HOT output!). Assuming it's the BAE in your profile pic you could also flip it to line and/or utilize the output attn. True, isn't the line in basically a ~ 40 dB pad? I would like to know what the outcome of this was, because I haven't had problems of this kind with Neve clones. |
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Post by niklas1073 on May 11, 2023 12:56:58 GMT -6
Seems like everyone else already helped you get sorted but wanted to chime in that I never had problems with my BAE's overloading on kick, or even with using the InnerTube 87 mod as a room mic (which was a HOT output!). Assuming it's the BAE in your profile pic you could also flip it to line and/or utilize the output attn. True, isn't the line in basically a ~ 40 dB pad? I would like to know what the outcome of this was, because I haven't had problems of this kind with Neve clones. As I earlier posted, the outcome was pretty much that at4047 (-10dB pad engaged)@20cm in front of my 26” no hole kick into bae1073 on lowest input gain, without attenuation on output, gives -10dB on input on my daw. adding an -20dB in line attenuator on top of that allows me to turn the bae 3 clicks up, and I end up in -15dB on daw. First I think I mixed something up and and created a post in my despair. This happens in the tumble of recording sessions 😜. when I redid it all I realized it wasn’t really all that catastrophic. When I track with the bae i usually use it on vocals and guitars. I try to keep the output dimed and not attenuate if possible. That way I end up in the -30- -35dB on inputgain and have a fairly clean signal with nice touch in the peaks. This I would believe is all normal behavior, especially as my both 1073’s work identically. But the mention about using the line in was a good idea I could try. And it never sounded as the bae would run out of headroom sound wise, just that it felt more came out of it into the daw than I first suspected. |
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Post by jmoose on May 12, 2023 16:27:01 GMT -6
True, isn't the line in basically a ~ 40 dB pad? I would like to know what the outcome of this was, because I haven't had problems of this kind with Neve clones. No... line in could (should?) be a different circuit & gain amp. Does anyone have a block diagram for this particular BAE to verify? With most real Neve junk, esp something like a "real" 1073 (with EQ module console style etc) line in typically bypasses the input transformer. Keeping output fader / attenuator dimed? Maybe not always the best practice but kinda depends on what & how you want to drive things... Typically (again referencing actual console modules) nominal / unity gain is going to be about 2 o'clock on the dial. And maybe more importantly there's another line amp on that fader which could have up to about 10dB of additional gain. And that's a whole different part of the circuit... getting gain out of the back end output amps & transformer. And so its a different sound. And with console modules that have the EQ built in? It lives in between the input stage and that output stage. Kinda like an old Marshall amp you can gain stage things to get different tones outta the box... Keeping the output fader wide open & setting click gain low is typically going to be the "cleanest" most neutral sound. But we can chase tone, harmonics & compression and crank the snot out of the input gain and turn output down. With things like drums & bass, especially kick drums I'll push the input gains harder. That's where all the low end "bloom" is... transformer saturation & compression. Sounds like rock & roll! |
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Post by craigmorris74 on May 12, 2023 18:36:08 GMT -6
Actually, on older Neve consoles, there are two input transformers, one for mic, one for line.
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Post by niklas1073 on May 13, 2023 15:00:04 GMT -6
True, isn't the line in basically a ~ 40 dB pad? I would like to know what the outcome of this was, because I haven't had problems of this kind with Neve clones. No... line in could (should?) be a different circuit & gain amp. Does anyone have a block diagram for this particular BAE to verify? With most real Neve junk, esp something like a "real" 1073 (with EQ module console style etc) line in typically bypasses the input transformer. Keeping output fader / attenuator dimed? Maybe not always the best practice but kinda depends on what & how you want to drive things... Typically (again referencing actual console modules) nominal / unity gain is going to be about 2 o'clock on the dial. And maybe more importantly there's another line amp on that fader which could have up to about 10dB of additional gain. And that's a whole different part of the circuit... getting gain out of the back end output amps & transformer. And so its a different sound. And with console modules that have the EQ built in? It lives in between the input stage and that output stage. Kinda like an old Marshall amp you can gain stage things to get different tones outta the box... Keeping the output fader wide open & setting click gain low is typically going to be the "cleanest" most neutral sound. But we can chase tone, harmonics & compression and crank the snot out of the input gain and turn output down. With things like drums & bass, especially kick drums I'll push the input gains harder. That's where all the low end "bloom" is... transformer saturation & compression. Sounds like rock & roll! I’m under the impression the BAE has the unity output at “dimed”. Its just an attenuator. Not as ams or others that have the + and - concept. You can turn it down some, to lets say 12oclock, for the sound but not much more, then the saturation isn't pleasant anymore. I feel the actual gain reduction is not too much on that anyway. I rather keep it up, bring it down a notch if needed if Im within a few dB’s from good gain staging. I now use an external pad for more attenuation and crank the input on the pre some more. what I usually do is trying to keep pretty solid track on my gain structure from a to z. Not using my comps etc as attenuators or boosters, but rather keep the same gain structure through out and dial in the sounds on the units. I know there’s a dozen of ways to go around it, this just suites me as it eliminates over or under feeding units along the way and I can easily keep track of my chain and know exactly what each unit is feeding to the next and how the receiver behaves accordingly. That’s why I first got a little confused with the bae as i hadn’t used it on kick before. The other thing was my mic placement, something really out of the ordinary. I often leave a small angle to it, a habit from using ribbons on the kick, and I guess I had more angle to it than normally. It gave a overdriven, flabby sound and I thought the mic was distorting, had to pull it back quite a bit. Now I put it straight against the kick front and I could leave it a few inches from it and worked great with no issues. Was tracking drums today again with this setup and it was flawless. Turned on the la2a clone after the bae and blending the at4047 with akg d12vr, and it was sweet. Had just replace the remo P3 batter head with a P4 and it has this amazing round bottom end thru the akg and the 47 nicely puts thru the tone and sustain of the solid front high tuned 26”. Oh happy days 😜 |
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