Strymon Lex Rotary V2

There is something uniquely powerful about the sound of a vintage rotary speaker system. The organic chorusing as the treble horn and bass rotor start speeding up. The grit of the internal tube-driven amplifier, creating additional harmonics that spin around the room. Plug into Lex, close your eyes, and be transported by this classic sound, recreated with astonishing realism and depth for your pedalboard.

Complete Rotary Speaker System.

Lex provides you with a complete, accurately reproduced rotary speaker system: the low-frequency bass rotor, the rotating treble horn, the tube-driven amplifier, finely tuned microphone placement, and all the complex sonic interactions between these elements. Powerful, intuitive controls mean you can quickly dial in just the customized sound you desire.

Classic Sound, New Features.

Our second generation Lex gives you the same rich rotary sounds of our original and adds significant new features, incorporating technological advancements, hardware improvements and design enhancements to give you additional flexibility, power, and ease of use on stage and in the studio.

• ●  User Interface - A more powerful and intuitive user interface gives you instant control over mic position and distance, dry level, acceleration speed, volume boost/cut, and easy customization of rotor speed. Everything you need for the full rotary speaker experience is at your fingertips.

• ●  MIDI - Full MIDI implementation means you can control just about every switch, knob, and setting remotely by sending MIDI commands from your controller or DAW via Lex’s EXP/MIDI jack or USB-C connection. Rotor speed can be synchronized via MIDI Clock Sync, and the sync setting can be saved for each preset. 300 MIDI preset locations are available for loading and saving your favorite settings.

• ●  Hardware Improvements - A premium analog JFET input circuit ensures superb responsiveness to your playing, and you can select mono or stereo input with the flick of a rear panel switch. All this, plus a new ARM DSP chip provides more processing power for every sonic nuance, with less energy consumption on your pedalboard.

Sound Design

Tone Controls

Our goal with Lex was to create the most realistic sounding, flexible rotating speaker effect ever fit within a pedal. As part of that, Lex features a full suite of practical controls to help you shape your rotary tone to your heart’s content.

A major part of that is Lex’s dedicated Horn Level control, which adjusts the output level of the high frequency rotating horn. Turn it up for added output that will help your rotating effect cut through the mix, or dial things back to mellow out Lex’s higher frequencies.

For this new generation of Lex, we’ve added a Dry mix control, which allows you to add more dry mix to your signal for a cleaner, clearer tone — or go full wet, and truly immerse your signal in rotating speaker goodness.

For added flexibility, we’ve also included a Volume knob for control over Lex’s significant +/-6dB boost/cut — perfect for dialing in the best level for a live or studio mix.

Mic Controls

The smallest changes in how a rotary speaker is mic’d can have drastic changes on its tone. Lex’s offers you all of the flexibility of different mic setups without ever needing to worry about setting one up.

Want a more pronounced rotary effect? Bring Lex’s stereo mic setup closer for more prominent modulation, or back things up a bit for a further mic setup that brings more ambiance and space to your sound.

A dedicated mic position switch also lets you choose between miking the partially covered front of the rotary speaker for a more diffused tone — or mic the open rear of the cabinet for a cleaner, more direct tone.

Speed
Our new generation Lex makes it easier than ever to dial in the speed you need.

Seamlessly shift between a slow or fast rotating speed with the dedicated Slow/Fast switch. Want to bring things to a full stop? Press and hold the Slow/Fast switch to gradually brake the rotary system — and let go to ramp back up to your chosen speed.

Lex’s dedicated Ramp switch lets you choose how fast things slow down and speed back up when changing speeds or when braking the rotary system.

Dialing in your individual slow/fast speeds is simple: press the Slow/Fast footswitch to select your desired setting. From there, adjust the Speed knob to the desired speed for this mode. Press the footswitch again to go back to the other mode and set the Speed knob for that mode. Now Lex will smoothly transition between these two speeds when you alternate Slow/Fast modes.

Rotary Brake
Press and hold the Slow/Fast switch to put the brakes on.

The Lex rotary will wind down and stop. When at rest, the horn and drum “brake angle” is optimally positioned for consistent results.

Release the Slow/Fast switch and the rotary system will begin to spin again.

Preamp Drive

At the heart of Lex’s rotary speaker is a tube preamp, ready to be pushed to add some grit to your tone.

Lex’s Preamp Drive knob lets you control the drive of the rotary cabinet’s tube preamp and phase inverter stages. Set it to lower settings for a sparkly clean tone, or push things up a little bit to add some tasteful texture to your rotary tone.

Secondary Functions

In order to keep Lex’s user interface as simple as possible while giving you as many powerful features as we can, we’ve included some unique Live Edit secondary functions for added tonal flexibility for just about any possible setup.

Cab Filter

Want to run Lex directly into an audio interface, mixer, or full range speakers instead of a guitar amp? Lex’s Cab Filter Live Edit setting lets you do just that by tailoring the speaker cab filter response for use specifically with those types of systems, giving you a fuller tone when not using a guitar amp.

Bi-Amp Mode

Need to split things up? Bi-Amp Mode splits the output of Lex’s woofer and horn signal by sending only the horn signal to the left output and the woofer signal to the right output. This handy Live Edit setting works great if you want to apply specific effects to just the lower frequencies of Lex, or individually track or mix Lex’s two distinct speakers.

Features

MIDI

Our new generation of Lex features full MIDI implementation, allowing you to control just about every switch, knob, and setting remotely by sending MIDI commands from your controller or DAW via Lex’s EXP/MIDI jack or USB-C connection. Rotary speed can be synchronized via MIDI Clock Sync, and the sync setting can be saved for each preset. 300 MIDI preset locations are available for loading and saving your favorite settings.

Remotely bypass or engage the pedal, sync rotary speed changes along with your tracks, automate knob adjustments, recall unique presets for each song on your setlist — the possibilities with MIDI are limitless.

True & Buffered Bypass

Lex lets you choose electromechanical relay switched true bypass for a 100% untouched, unprocessed signal when the pedal is bypassed (this is the default setting), or you can opt for our premium quality buffered bypass that conditions your signal to preserve its integrity by preventing the high end roll-off that can happen due to longer cable runs.

JFET Input

Uncompromised dynamics and feel. Exceptional touch sensitivity and responsiveness. Lex feels just as good as it sounds, thanks to a high impedance ultra-low noise discrete Class A JFET preamp input.

Stereo In & Out

No need to make compromises when it comes to signal routing or pedal placement — Lex features full stereo in/out capabilities.

A single TRS input jack allows Lex to keep its compact form factor while giving you the option to use a stereo input signal. A dedicated rear panel Input switch allows you to easily set Lex for operation with a stereo (TRS) or mono (standard TS) input source. Low impedance dual TS output jacks let you use Lex as a stereo effect.

Line/Instrument Level

Pedals aren’t just for guitarists. Lex’s adjustable input signal level makes it a versatile tool for endless applications from the studio to the stage.

By setting Lex to line level input mode, you get 10dB of added headroom, allowing you to use Lex with bass guitars with active pickups, synthesizers, keyboards, effects loops, and more.

Powerful New ARM Processor

Significant developments in mobile phones and computers have led to an evolution in technology that now allows our pedals to perform more simultaneous processes with less power draw than ever before. That means more processing power for every sonic nuance with less power consumption on your pedal board.

Controls & Routing

MIC

Changes the position of the microphones relative to the cabinet.

front: picks up the sound from the partially covered front of the cabinet.

rear: picks up the sound from the open back of the cabinet.

SPEED

Controls the rotor speed for the SLOW and FAST modes.

HORN LEVEL

Controls the output level of the high frequency rotating horn.

MIC DISTANCE

Varies the distance of the stereo mics from the horn rotor and the single mic on the woofer rotor. Turn left for a more pronounced effect. Turn right for more ambience.

SLOW/FAST

Toggles the rotor speed between SLOW and FAST. A flashing red LED indicates the rate. HOLD for brake.

ON

Engages the effect. A red LED indicates the effect is engaged.

RAMP

Controls how quickly the rotors transition when switching between speeds via the SLOW/FAST switch. The rotors accelerate independently, with the low-frequency rotor accelerating more slowly, just like an actual rotating speaker system.

VOLUME

Controls the +/-6dB boost or cut when the pedal is engaged (12 o’clock is unity gain).

PREAMP DRIVE

Controls the drive of the rotary cabinet’s tube preamp and phase inverter stages. Turn up for a more overdriven cab sound.

DRY

Adds your dry input signal to the effect signal. Dry is off at the minimum setting and blended 50/50 with the effect signal at maximum.

AUDIO INPUT SELECTOR

mono: Use with a mono input signal. Output is stereo.

stereo: Use with a stereo input signal. Output is stereo.

IN

High impedance, ultra low-noise, discrete Class A JFET preamp input. TRS adapter cable required for stereo input signal.

OUTPUTS

Low impedance stereo audio signal outputs. Use OUT L for mono output.

EXP / MIDI

Multifunction communication jack for external control of Lex’s features and functions. Use a standard TRS expression pedal for continuous control over the knobs of the pedal (default setting). See complete User Manual for details about configuring for MIDI communication or accessories such as Strymon Conduit, MultiSwitch Plus, and MiniSwitch.

USB-C

Computer connection for controlling via MIDI and firmware updates.

9VDC

Use the included power supply or an adapter with the following rating: 9VDC, center negative, 300mA minimum.