Vintage Synth Explorer Forums

Hi all

I'm looking to buy my first analogue synth since owning a Moog Prodigy back in the 80s/90s and currently in negotiations re the above, i have had the following mail from the seller:

*It looks as if the touch sensitivity could do with retuning, and possibly updating. This is a common problem with these instruments, I spoke to my tech (who I can put you in touch with to do the work if need be, and he said it's not a big job). It's possible that simply adjusting the setting internally will rectify the problem, at the moment I'm getting it working on about half of the keys. *

Does anyone know about this type of fault on the ARP soloist range Touch Sensitivity function, is this a simple repair, or symptomatic of something either difficult or costly to repair or worse, something going badly wrong with this synth?

He's asking fairly top wack for this synth - £375/$750, and thats without being prepared to undertake the above repair

Hope you can all help a novice

Cheers Neil

we have an original arp soloist whose aftertouch isnt working. the reason seems to be that theres a special conductive foam inside thats deteriorated over the years (which is something ive been told usually happens to them). i dont think this is a simple fix, unless the tech has that special foam or a suitable replacement. its likely not just a simple tweak. ask the seller more about this. if hes got the foam required, we would be interested in acquiring some
thanks
mini

Thanks Mini

I have been lead to believe that the conductive foam issue was isolated to the original Soloist and that the Pro Soloist/Pro DGX were based on a different design - Can anyone confirm this?

Cheers Neil

actually i think youre right as the other solo arp synths weve had havent had any problem. sorry if my info was incorrect!
mini

No problem Mini.

My source is from an article in last months UK "Performing Musician" which ran a quite informative feature on the ARP Soloist series. I quote:

"..Phillip Dodd's claim(ed) that the foam in the Soloist's pressure sensitivity mechanism dries out and stops working"

"...the Pro Soloist was actually one of the most innovative synthasizers of all time. Years before microprocessors became commonplace, the pro-Soloist's keyboard scanning system was digital. When you pressed a key, an array of primitive logic chips provided a quantisised output that was converted to an analogue CV using a digital-to-analogue converter. This meant that the pitch was digitally controlled, as the Pro-Soloist's tuning was far more stable than on any other synthesizer of the time".

This infers to me that the Pro Soloist Touch Sensitivity is electronic rather than "mechanical" as in it's predecessor, and when i hear words from the seller that the tuning needs adjusting, alarm bells rang.

I am not an electronic engineer, and there may be far more (or less) to this than i am assuming.

This is a moot point, as the item has now been sold on ebay - someone may have taken on a world of hurt, i'm glad it's not me!!

Neil

always expect the worst on ebay....