How To Fix P&G Faders on a Mackie Control
Fader #2 Failed Calibration
I had big plans for this weekend… I was going to run some cables and hook up some more of my gear in my new home studio. I got the cables run, but then I noticed a major problem with my Mackie Control. Three of the faders were messed up. I’m not quite sure how to explain it, but if you’ve come across this article from a search engine, you probably already know. I’ll try: Basically, when you run the fader upwards from -Infinity to +6 it get’s all funky feeling around Unity (0.0dB).
Last year I called Mackie to get a replacement fader for one that had the same issue. They happily shipped one out… at a price-tag of $100… and explained how easy it was to replace- just open the unit, unplug the old fader, plug in the new one, and you’re good to go.
Only this time I had 3 funky faders (one truly funky, and 2 slightly funky)… and I wasn’t about to shell out that kind of dough without at least trying to fix them on my own. As I was finishing up I realized that I should probably document and share this with everyone, since I’ve been bailed out MANY times by some random blogger announcing a quick fix to one of life’s problems. Here is a detailed step-by-step to get you back up and running if you’ve got the same problem.
First, I need to mention that there are 2 distinct different problems that you could be seeing.
- The fader motor is no longer functioning (completely dead fader syndrome).
- The fader motor is functioning, but the fader doesn’t move freely along the path from top to bottom.
I will address both issues, but keep in mind that #2 is much easier to fix then #1.
You will need:
- A Phillip’s screwdriver (or screw-gun, if you’re careful)
- Needle-nose pliers (bent worked well for me)
- A Flat-Head screwdriver
- Hex key that fits the hex head screws above and below the fader
- A smaller jeweler-size flat-head screwdriver (just for prying, other tools will work)
- Some good music
- Some time (1-2 hours if you go slow).
My choice of music was Ryan Adams… I suggest something similar.
So, here we go. You’ll need a place to hold a bunch of screws.
- UNPLUG THE UNIT. Don’t blame me if you skip this step and electrocute yourself.
- Take off the fader cap for whatever channel you need to fix. No need to take off the others.
- Take out all the screws that are holding the top of the unit in place. These are the phillip’s head screws.
- The ribbon cable for the jog/shuttle control will be attached to the top part that we’re removing, so be very careful not to damage that cable as you open the unit. Pull the top back away from the jog/shuttle control and when it’s clear lift it up to open the unit. (At this point, discharge any static electricity by touching the inside base of the unit. )
- Find your broken fader by counting (duh). It’s attached by some snap connectors. You can remove either end, just be careful not to pull the wires out. Grab it by the plastic only! Use the pliers if you have to. If you rip your wires out don’t blame me, you were warned.
- If your motor works skip this step. If your motor was not working at all before (completely dead fader syndrome), try re-attaching the cable and checking the connections. (I’m not instructing you to carefully plug in the unit and test it at this time, but that is something to think about). If you still don’t have any motor function in that fader, switch the fader end of the cable with one of the faders that is working during the fader calibration at startup. See if it will work from another channel. If it starts working, put it back together and go make some music, if not, read on.
- Using the hex key, remove the screws that are holding the fader in place. It should fall into the unit, that’s okay.
- You should now be holding the fader in your hand. Set the rest of the unit aside. You’ll notice that the fader has a hard plastic base, housed in a metal casing.
- Pry the little tabs up that are holding the metal casing in place with the jeweler’s screwdriver. Two of the tabs are right next to the solder points for the fader motor, DO NOT MESS UP THESE SOLDER POINTS! If your motor wasn’t working (dead fader syndrome) then check these solder points. There’s a black & red that attach up to the perf-board above the motor. Re-solder carefully if necessary. If you don’t know exactly what your doing, Google soldering and re-evaluate (maybe consider calling Mackie). It is VERY easy to fry the perf-board so don’t try it if you don’t know how.
- When all of the tabs are bent away, the fader should slide out of it’s metal housing. Be very careful, as the metal housing is there to protect some VERY fragile parts inside.
- The main culprit is dirt and crud in the fader (which you can clean out now), or a bent or mangled grounding cable (the brown ribbon cable you see in the pictures attached to the fader). This is the cable that allows for touch sensitivity. When you touch the fader, you’re grounding the circuit via this cable. For some reason they have a habit of getting bent, kinked, and generally messed up inside that metal housing.
- Gently straighten any kinks or bends out of this cable with whatever method you choose. Personally, I just used my fingers to bend it into a nice gentle arc. Replace the metal housing and check your work. If you think you’ve got it, bend the tabs back into place. (Again, being very careful around those motor solder points).
- Reverse the other steps to re-assemble everything, and you’re good to go.
- Make some music!
Hi,
Thanks for this guide!! I have just bought a second hand MCU + extender which worked fine for a couple of weeks but now 2 faders started to have this syndrome. Following your guide showed some funky grounding cables.
Herwig
Thanks for the tutorial on how to fix a funky fader in a mackie control. I just recently bought one, Mackie Control and if the fader goes out I know what to do now.
Music Marketing Packages
Hi
I have followed the repair guide you posted. Thanks for that. Just one more question. I have a broken fader which basically the string that holds the fader position has come of the motor. Is there a way to wound it back on? I there a default position the fader has to be before wounding the string?
Your help is much appreciated.
Kind Regards
Raffi
Nice guide with some good pictures, explanations and info. Here are a few things to consider about this article. The touch sensitive faders sense capacitance for their touch sensitive feature, NOT resistance (grabbing a ground rod will NOT make a poorly touch sensitive unit work any better; apply some cheap hand lotion instead; dry hands such as I have mandate the use of lotion periodically for reliable functioning)… As is lamented, a bad connection or ruined ribbon cable will cause their touch sensitive feature to fail.
I have worked a lot with Mackie, their main service center for the U.S. market as well as Penny+Giles engineering teams in a (futile I’d guess…) attempt to redesign these faders to be more rugged, last longer and make them cheaper to produce; don’ think they were interested… LOL Anyway, I’d like to mention a very important omission in your article/write-up above with regard to these units.
Mackie “forced” P+G to make cheap units for them – unlike ANY of P+G’s normal offerings. The NUMBER ONE failure mode for these cheapened up P+G faders is one that I cannot understate. The shaft for which the fader slides back and forth on is of inadequate strength for the application. This shaft is hollow and EASILY BENT. This is the A #1 issue we see with binding faders and/or faders that do not pass calibration.
What CANNOT BE UNDERSTATED IS THE FOLLOWING:
ALWAYS be certain the faders are returned to their default, “all-the-way-down” zero volume position when not in operation! NEVER, EVER set anything, even a small manual, or book on top of the control surface; this is enough to bend the faders’ shafts if they are not all on their stops. Likewise, same goes for leaning your arm on the control surface – bend city…
When transporting one of these units, EVEN in their OEM packaging, be 100% certain the faders are in the down/off position, and then as an added precaution use light tape to carefully and LIGHTLY secure across all of the faders so they cannot move off the bottom stops and escape from the foam that “should” capture them on their bottom stops. The original packaging, while they figured out that if they put foam over the faders’ sweep area and they moved, it ruined the units during shipping; thus the OEM packaging has nothing between the cardboard box and the fader’s surface/sweep area. Be certain when transporting them in the OEM box, NEVER, EVER, EVER put any force, or place any items in the center of the box where, if the fader(s) have moved, the force might be applied to the fader(s) and in turn their shafts that could lead to bending them, for the end result is a ruined, binding fader. The tubular shafts are not easily straightened and the only practical substitution I could ever think of would be to turn a replacement on a lathe – something that negates the cost of simply buying a new “cheap” P+G fader as a replacement that while their construction may certainly be cheap, their replacement cost has become tremendous!
Also of note is lubrication – DON’T DO IT! They should need none and the fader mechanism that slides on the vulnerable shaft has small O-rings at the end of its throw to “cushion” the fader as it is forced either direction to its stops. Lubrication can swell and ruin these O-rings and even if the chosen lubricant does not damage the O-rings themselves, the end result will be that: 1) The lubricant will simply attract dust dirt and crud and cause the fader to bind and fail calibration or use. Or 2) Said lubricant will cause the O-rings to “follow” the fader movement on the shaft, off of the stops, making for an inconsistent feel and movement of the fader near either end of its travel. You can feel and see this behavior in the units when the drag of the fader increases near the stops at either end of its travel as it runs into the O-ring and then must “push” it on the shaft back to its proper end of throw “stop” position. So clean the shafts and fader slide bushing and leave them 100% clean, dry and free of ANY oil, including the oil on your fingers for the best, most trouble-free operation and longevity.
Good luck. I have a few NOS P+G faders here for these units and a few parts for them and the MCU’s/XT’s, so let me know if I can be of any assistance. I would assume the faders and most of the parts for the original gray MCU’s and XT’s are now, or soon will be obsolete.
PUPCo Studios & Research Group,
I followed the guide with one fader that would stick and found that the black plastic sitting connector that holds the knob (connect the two stringed rods) is broken. I have an original Emagic Logic Control and was wondering (since you said you have a few P+G faders) if you are willing to sell a unit so I can replace it. If you can’t, I guess I can contact Mackie and see if they have any of the parts. Not sure if the newer Mackie Universal controls contain the same parts.
Thank you!
Todd
This was a helpful and inspiring tutorial for me as I’ve had 4 faders go bad on me on my Extender and one on my main MCU unit. I wanted to add a couple of things I found out while doing this that may help you and others:
1. The size of hex key needed is 1/16″
2. When disassembling the unit, there is no need to remove the four screws that are below the faders (near the jog wheel). Instead, take out the screws from the bottom of the unit (8), this allows the jog wheel assembly to be lifted out of the base (and not risk damaging the jog wheel’s ribbon).
3. With regards to checking for a blown motor (your step #6), an easier way to test the motor on one of these faders is by simply checking for resistance (ohms) using a multimeter. Take the leads and check both connectors on the motor; if you don’t get a reading this means the motor is not working.
I noticed that the faders that are on my main unit were made in the UK by Penny & Giles. The four that went bad on the Extender were Chinese-made faders (the stickers on them even say “Peny” and not “Penny”). I called Mackie when I got mine to see if they could send UK-made faders and they said they were no longer being manufactured, so the contract went to a Chinese firm to make these (Penny & Giles UK must have realized these weren’t up-to-par with their quality, I guess).
Anyway, I decided after that to look into refurbishing my own faders and have successfully refurbished one that I pulled from my main unit using a product called “DeoxIT Fader Grease” that is meant for plastic potentiometers. It worked great on a fader that was sticking.
Amazing… this actually worked for me!!! I didn’t see any kinks or dirt, but I wiped it down and worked the moving parts, not expecting much…
Iput it back together, and VOILA!!!! Amazed…. Thanks!
These things are no longer available, so a fix is the only route…. or buying 1 for parts.
I remember this post somewhere else on the internet the first time I replaced a fader and tried to find my comments of what screws to actually unscrew. It looks like it was removed from the web as far as I can tell.
Anyway in step three remove all of the flat screws around the sids and the 3 on the bottom as well as the 4 protruding but indented screws into the plastic base on the bottom. That way you don’t have to worry about holding the unit to the very short ribbon cable and then you can just lean the unit against a wall or something with out it braking like it did to me the first time I did it the wrong way.
Video
http://www.flickr.com/photos/69888245@N08/6347973972/
Picture with bottom off
http://www.flickr.com/photos/69888245@N08/6347229051/
Picture of the bottom
http://www.flickr.com/photos/69888245@N08/6347977488/in/photostream/
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Does anyone know how to fix the pan controls? I have only one channel (chan 1) that doesn’t work. I had just bought on ebay and may or may not get my money back from it but it might be an easy fix.
Appreciate any help.