[sdiy] Socket schematic symbol question

[Tom Wiltshire]

Ben,

On 28 Oct 2010, at 16:55, Ben Lincoln wrote:
> 
> Alternately, are one or both how (some?) guitar pedal manufacturers wire up the input jack so that the pedal is powered off when nothing is connected? I would think those would use mono connectors, but maybe some manufacturers use stereo jacks for some reason?

That's often done using a normal stereo jack with no 'break' or 'make' connections at all. Instead when a normal mono jack is inserted into a stereo socket, the ground and the ring are connected together by the jack. When there's no jack, the circuit has no ground connection and is switched off.

I was impressed with the elegant minimalism of this when I first saw it - now over 20 years ago, and I bet it'd been done for 20 then too!

T.