Sunday, January 3, 2021

REVIEW MOSKY LOOP BOX EFFECT SWITCHING PEDAL

 by Mark King


The Mosky Mini Loop Box is another one of those fun discoveries I found on Amazon. This is an incredibly useful pedal that lets you make a single pedal or a whole chain of pedals into a single switchable effect.

First lets clarify what this pedal is and is not. It is not a "looper" of the variety that allows you to compose music and play along with yourself. This loop box has no memory.

The Mosky loopbox is a true bypass footswitch in a box. It provides you with an external loop that can be switched in or out of your guitar signal path.

DC POWER INLET

This is a compact pedal that has an external 9-volt DC power inlet which is wired according to the negative-inner/positive-outer standard (same as Roland and Boss). The pedal still switches without DC  power. The power inlet drives the LED indicators. You'll find the pedal input jack on the right and the output on the left. 

Now for the loop, there is a Send on the upper right which feeds your signal out to an external device input. There is a Return jack on the upper left which returns the signal from the external device. The Send and Return comprise the external loop connections. 

Two bright blue LED's indicate the status of the loop. The left light means the loop is out of the signal path, the right light means the loop is in your signal path. The true bypass footswitch makes the external loop active or not. When bypassed the Loop Box passes signal unaffected. 

Tom Scholz used a pedal with this kind of function on the first Boston tour, his was labled "Kitchen Sink". I always assumed he had a big loop of various effects which were switched in and out with a single button press.

I'm currently evaluating a string of seven reverb pedals, I have the complete string of all the reverbs daisy-chained together and they are switched on with a loop box. I don't run all the reverbs at once but the loop box allows me to remove the whole string with a single button press. 

I have a Boss graphic EQ with a dead footswitch, it is stuck in the ON position. I put that graphic EQ into the loop of a loop box so I can switch the EQ in and out. 

I have a 5150 overdrive pedal that I like to use with a graphic EQ. A single loop box pedal lets me switch the combination of the distortion and EQ with a single button press.


The loop box is a compact cast aluminum enclosure. Overall the construction seems to be quality and heavy duty. The price of this pedal varies depending on who you purchase it from. I bought three of them for under $25 each when I first found them. Today the best price I could find was $27.98 each. Look around and buy it from the lowest price supplier.

There are several brands that offer similar external effect loop switching functions but this is the simplist, lowest priced and most compact model I've seen. I've had three of these for over a year and have used them regularly to achieve fun switching options. I've had zero problems with any of these. 

EPILOGUE

These pedals are truly cheap and very useful. There is little to complain about at the under $28 purchase price. Even at twice the price the build quality is well worth the price. 

I purchased and actually use the pedals reviewed here. There are no affiliate marketing links or advertising. You can purchase the pedal wherever you want and can get the best deal. 

Thanks for reading.

Good music to you!


BTW This review is copyright 2021 Mark King. It's not ok to quote or copy without written permission.