hello. First post here, so I apologise for sounding a bit grumpy. Basically, I bought my second Octatrack and love it to bits. It’s come a long way since its first release and I’m enjoying almost everything about it.
EXCEPT
Those blasted encoders. They are dreadful and marr what should be a damn near perfect sampler. I’m really concerned about them. So, I was wondering if it would be possible to replace them with high quality third party replacement? I’m sure many people would be willing to pay a wee bit extra to make sure this Incredible machine survives for many years.
I had a Dave smith prophet 8 which suffered major encoder failure, so I know these issues are a nightmare. Also, when I look at how good the encoders are on the OP1, it makes me think it would be great if the Octarack was the same.
Can anyone help? Can I buy better quality encoders and fit them to the Octatrack?
Is this possible?
I’ve seen 3rd party caps on the encoder shafts and will likely replace mine soon, as they have taken on a weird color after four years of use.
But if you want to replace the shafts/encoders themselves, it gets tricky, warranty-wise.
Do you care about the warranty?
Hmmm. Yes, I do. Elektron are very generous with the warranty. Maybe I just need to stop worrying and get tweaking! I would just love some super high quality encoders on the Octatrack. I am keen.on all the Elektron boxes, but just worry about the knobs. I hope my worries are misplaced!
My lower right encoder is playing up. I think its because its the zoom encoder when sample editing which I use alot.
I saw a utoob clip this guy pulled the Octa apart and showed how the pots can come apart. I might have a look as I have no warranty.
Anyone tried this or have any ideas ?
…i thought only the first generation of octatracks were lacking a lot when it comes to the push encoders…
moszly because of the simple fact, they have no counter screws that fixes them also with the surface…
now i know they still built them in all machines with no such thing…
still the push encoders are ONLY fixed directly to the motherboard…
hmmmmm…that’s quite a point to poke on…this is hi and top end boutique gear we’re talking here…
but push encoders are in general something to come weak easily…
so some counter screws could do a lot here…
but if you,re aware of that fragile fact, handle them that ways…
what fucks them up the most is sideway pushing…
so if you get some accurate motion settled…always coming straight down to push and turn not with fingers twiddles but more out of arm and shoulder…
no sideway pressure and the sockets will be fine with many push and turns to come…
but i also sow some viking kind of guy vid who gave a shit for the warranty and did some xtra solderingtreatment to the sockets…
if you just wann change the knobs…take some not that long as the originals…so you get less sideway pressure anyway…
outer: 12mm (but you can put bigger ones on there)
inner: 4mm
here is a pic with chromacaps. (courtesy of dirty sandwich/jayphonic)
these particular ones are wider than 12mm at the base and seem to give a bit more sideways stability. i can confirm they do give better grip for fast tweaking.
Thanks for the tips! Great advice. Loving the Octatrack, so it’s good to know that the encoders can be replaced. Would be great if some enterprising soul (or Elektron) offered an upgrade service too. Hint hint! Thanks everybody. There’s a great community here.
FWIW, you can use the OT every day for four years and the encoders seem fine. I don’t go easy on tweaking and have high expectations for accuracy and repeatability.
… just about to order for my MM (maybe also MD)