MSA Legend- Potential weakness

[Haddock]

Hi all
I was happily playing away last night giving it laldy on Satie’s Gynmopedie no.1 when a sickening snap occurred down below and my B pedal went all floppy. I had snapped the stud that attaches the pedal rod to the pedal and fortunately I have spare pedals so it was an easy fix. If this happened on a gig though, I would think most folks would be unlikely to have a spare so you’d be screwed. Closer investigation revealed that the hole for the stud is heavily countersunk to the extent that the hex part of the stud barely has any metal at all to mate with. It’s been flexing slightly and over time has snapped. I’m going to shave a couple of mm off each pedal to remove most of the countersink and I think it’s unlikely to happen again but it might be worth having a look at your own if you have one of these guitars. Pic attached.
Cheers
Calum

[Haddock]

Here’s a modified one. It needs a very small bit of countersink left to accommodate the slight raise where the stud thread ends but you can see there is loads more metal to meet the hex bit now. Worth doing I think.
Cheers

[Malcolm]

Calum, of all the people I know who have Legend/ Millennium/Studio Pro,( all use same pedals)
I have not heard of any, up until now, who have had a pedal connector snap, they are normally pretty hard wearing, have never had to replace one on any steel I have ever had, in fact my two spare ones have lived in my case for thirty years.Let Kyle at MSA know, I am sure he would be interested just in case this was going to be a problem.

[Haddock]

Hi Malcolm
Yes I reckon this could well be a very rare occurrence. Perhaps a 1 in 10000 fault? But you can see that the hex has been digging in to the pedal and started to move. This is an older legend and I’m the third owner so its been wiggling for a while and might have lasted many more years. Still, I’m happier now that Ive tweaked the rest and I know which type I would want as a clutch pedal on my space shuttle!
Cheers
Calum

[Steve Conway]

Exactly the same thing happened to me on a gig when I had an MAS Classic! Sickening!

[Conor Smith]

I have an older MSA universal and this happened to me on soundcheck for a gig just recently, B pedal too.

[Malcolm]

This problem does happen mostly on older guitars be it MSA, Shobud, Emmons etc, more so on side mounted ones , and as these guitars are significantly older have therefore lots more use on them, also one of main reasons is rough use of pedals. The older MSA you Guys refer to bear little resemblance to the modern MSA ( same name different company),the materials and build quality and design are in different leagues.For those of you who don’t know MSA is owned by Micro Space Industries, who mainly supply top of range components to Aircraft Manufacturers, NASA, US Government, as well as top end medical supplies such as joints valves etc. Until I visited the factory I had little idea of how much work goes into them, as is probably the same for many of the present day manufacturers, both materials and design have come on greatly.
These connectors have been around from the Year dot, before I Ever had a steel I remember seeing them used on the accelerator linkage on Jaguar cars and on most marine engines ( where I picked up my spares )
I’ve got to admit the thought of one shearing off at a gig gives me nightmares especially if it shears off flush with nothing to grip to get it out. Remember guys it helps not to mash the pedals, treat them gently and hopefully you will not experience the problem.