DIY Guitar Pedals

[deuce42]

The good news is: your Fat Pants probably works once you dig it out of the reject pile! Just need to plug your guitar in the *other* jack.

LOL! You can't make this up, it's really that bad out there.

Musicians have their version of this. Simple google query example: "[any song name] tab". It's a face palm city.

What is it with guitar players?

thanks Nash - I've reversed the i and o's and presto!  I might call it "fat fool" instead. I concur with guitar players per capita being amongst the worst musicians. I put it down to two things:

1) Its an instrument that requires little ability to play decently, although I put a caveat to say that it's also an instrument that requires an enormous amount of talent and skill to play very well however.  By this I mean that the barriers to entry are very low for a guitar in proportion to a lot of other instruments. And at the risk of being even more obnoxious, it might even be argued that being tone deaf and limited in ability will probably get someone most of the way to being a guitar player - but to actually play an axe better than the average guitar schmuck suddenly does require talent, ability and diligence. Given that most contemporary songs comprise only a few chords, the majority of entry level guitar players are the ones "transcribing" this stuff. Perhaps I'm not enunciating my point clearly but I think you get my drift.....

2) In contemporary music, its the instrument more than any other that has iconically been seen as a fashion accessory. So amongst the crop of brilliant and inspiring guitar players the world has seen, there is also an entire universe of charlatan wannabe posers whose real interest in having one around their neck is to act as a stage prop or external piece of clothing, etc etc.  In many respects, Fender and Gibson is akin to Levi's.....

Food for thought anyway even if my anecdotes are a bit exaggerated

 

[CJ]

yes, there are perhaps 100 million guitar players on the planet today.

reminds me of ZZ Top in Mexico>

 

[kato]

thanks Nash - I've reversed the i and o's and presto!  I might call it "fat fool" instead.

King dick!  Glad I could help.
I called mine the "monoplex" because I don't understand the sisterhood of the traveling fat pants. Actually, I just don't like the word "fat."  Or "loaf."  Or "beverage." Ick.

 

[dandeurloo]

So how does it sound?  Is it worth the trouble?

 

[deuce42]

I'm going to say it is a good one and worth making. The whole echoplex front end has been utilised by many a great player before (Page, Van Halen, etc) and I liked the idea of making a pedal that uses the preamp part of it's circuit. After looking at the schematic of the real echoplex, the schematic of the Xotic EP booster which is the most common commercial pedal on the market that replicates the echoplex's front end, and this madbean circuit, I can confirm that all three schems are slightly different.

The short answer is that I really like this sound. It's a pedal that's great with strats and tele's. Gives them a thicker sound which can make them sound a bit like humbuckers when needed.


Whilst we are still debating which pedals are good ones to build, I think the DOD250 grey version is a great one if you play a strat into a marshall.  There's just something very warm and natural sounding about this overdrive when boosting a older vintage marshall into liquid lead playing. Its a great one for lead guitar players when pulling solos. I find it a lot more natural that a tubescreamer and its a classic for old school 80's metal. That being said, as a basic overdrive pedal I think it is pretty crap!  I think most people would agree. And the MXR Classic Overdrive is almost entirely the same circuit too other than a couple of resistor values. General Guitar Gadgets sell a pcb (which works!!) of it.

Nash, the monoplex is a great name. Your case design makes me think Led Zep.

CJ, I'm keen to read that ZZ top expose. I'm sure it would be really interesting.


Now to relieve my guilt for hijacking this thread and to steer it back to Dan's original premise of seeking recommendations for pedal builds, here is my list of hits:

1) Jack Orman's Mosfet Boost - nothing but clean boost - no grit or drive, honestly just gives clean increase in headroom (well within reason, not perfectly). Very few commercial boosts can even do this. Almost all other's start overdriving or distorting, whether by virtue of their own circuit or because they force the front end of a tube amp into overdrive. 

2) Madbean Trembulator - really pristine sounding tremolo - surprisingly sounds like a pro studio effect coming out of your guitar amp.

3) Madbean Fat Pants - only sounds good if you reverse the input and output we've established. Using it's specified input and output provides a very different effect entitled "no signal".  Whilst this effect is not commonly employed by guitar players it could be artistically interesting. Perhaps even improve the tone of some guitar players who devote generous time to transcribing songs on the net. On a serious note,  it can kind of gibson your fender when needed or just thicken your sound a bit. Particularly nice with old school fender amps - think super reverb or twin reverb being turned into a tweed sound.

4) DOD250 Grey Version - turns a Marshall into Yngwie Malmsteen lead tone - requires discretion and to be tastefully used given its possibly cringeworthy history of musical genre and its most famous user. The most natural sounding extension of a marshall lead sound I've heard though. Just sounds like more gain from the Marshall.  Think "11" from the marshall rather than sounding like you've added a pedal to the tone.  Using it as an overdrive pedal itself however sounds like bees in a tin can.

 

[kato]

the Clyde wah was great sounding but i did not like the mechanics of the pedal,

the fulltone 70's fuzz was alright, but the Fulldrive 2 was less radical so i used that more,

i liked the old tonebender that plugged into the guitar jack, good for the Doors stuff,

CJ you'd dig it the most. If the last time you did a stompbox was from some ASCII art on rec.music.makers.guitar, the road-tested classics are all verified so tourists like us can build without getting immersed in the stompbox scene. White rabbit-era stuff like the foxx tone machine, and Tonebender have been double-blind reverse verified: http://fuzzcentral.ssguitar.com/vox.php  No paying holy grail prices for butt-simple circuits - especially nice for guys who've already got a good stash of vintage parts, like i know you do.

The "Weener Wah" I mentioned is the Clyde McCoy verbatim. (Well, mostly - adds an output buffer.)



Back on the subject of Face Palm City:
I still see a shocking # of layouts with the word "unverified" at the top. And I always think, 'why would you publish a project without testing it first?'  Why waste everybody's time? Just total dumbfukkery.  (A solid 10% of projects at tagboard effects are unverified.)

Even though I pointed out 2 Madbean errors in this thread, his layouts are otherwise solid. He could've e-mailed deuce42 and everybody who purchased a revision 2 board to let them know about the error    But I chalk it up to a hasty revision, and still highly recommend his projects.

 

[kato]

So how does it sound?  Is it worth the trouble?

I'd say don't bother with a "highly recommended effect" unless you've heard a demo and thought "Holy crap, I must build one." That's what happened with me and the FatPants. I'm not normally a booster kind of guy.  But I heard a (low-quality) demo and absolutely had to build one. I could hear its potential through the guy's crappy playing and bad sound quality.   I love it, even though it doesn't do that much.

Before YouTube, when sound samples were scarce, I'd try things based on popularity - often to find out they weren't my bag - like the Rangemaster. People are nuts for that thing. But for me it boosted a spectrum I'd later have to EQ out.

In general I think stompboxes are more "worth the trouble" to audition because the admission price is so low. Usually a few bucks to try it out on the bench. Then I only commit to the cost of enclosure / jacks / stomp-switch if I really like it. Otherwise, the board ends up in the cigar box labeled 'meh.'

Stomp DIY seems doubly worthwhile in this age of overhyped 'boutique' stuff. I'd hate to be that guy who got hyped into buying a $400 holy grailmobile only to discover it's a tube screamer with one component change. 

 

[kato]

Sorry I'm hijacking the fcuk out of this thread. i'll give it a rest and let more people speak up.

Just want to show you the 'stuck wah' progress inspired by this thread.
I went nuts and mashed the Weener Wah down to a small PCB to fit in a regular stompbox enclosure. I'll let you know if it sounds appreciably better than the Karate Chop.

 

[qmp audio]

A friend of mine has been hand making guitar pedals as of recently.  Some really good sounding stuff:
http://daredevilpedals.com/

 

[CJ]

here is the box i really liked, plugs into the guitar,

has the tropical fish caps like Fuller uses,

here is the link>

http://www.thegearpage.net/board/showthread.php?t=1091591

Kato, is that the automatic wah from Andertons old circuit?

has anybody done a vacuum tube overdrive box?

you could use a 5636 or similar mini tube,

wow, never seen a Ducati capacitor, my brother had the motorcycle which was pretty good until a tree branch got stuck in the front wheel, 

here is the schemo,

http://analogguru.an.ohost.de/193/schematics/Vox_V8162_DistortionBooster.gif

wow, listening to GLT radio out of Chi Town, Danny Joe White's  Poke Salad Annie was ripped from Slim Harpo's Scratch My Back,

 

[Kingston]

This is what I've been knitting lately.

 

[letterbeacon]

They look great!

 

[dandeurloo]

They look great.  Hopefully they sound as good as they look! 

How did you do the artwork on those? 

 

[Kingston]

How did you do the artwork on those?

transparent white or black stickers with a bunch of vectors, like stolen logos off the interweb. I didn't actually mean to do any stomps but I was making stickers for a much bigger front panel and the sticker size was A4. There was lots of empty space left and I thought I'd fill them with something.

The electromechanical infrastructure around the very cheap and simple stomp box PCB is quite expensive. I won't do any more of these when there are companies like http://www.modtone-effects.com/. Kind of pointless.

 

[CJ]

anybody done the Small Stone phase shifter?

 

[usekgb]

anybody done the Small Stone phase shifter?

I have an original, so haven't bothered.  I've always liked the MXR's more anyway.

 

[dandeurloo]

I just finished this.

http://tonefiend.com/guitar/build-the-worlds-wickedest-overdrive-for-under-30/#comment-59086

I tried 3 different ac128's before one worked and the forth one I tried sounded a lot better.  I also tried a few other pnp transistors but the ac128 sounds the most fun!

I bought a T Rex phaser pedal for 49 bucks a few weeks back.  That should cover my phaser needs the few times I ever record one.

More to come.

 

[CJ]

very good write up!  you should become a teacher.

where did you get the Ge transistors?

i know, "i could tell ya, but i would have to kill ya," 

try some tropical fish caps for C1 and C2 and see what you think,

 

[dandeurloo]

CJ, I wish I could take credit for that but that's not my write up  It's what inspired me to build the pedal.  I wish it was me!  That would mean I was Joe Gore.  He's a fantastic player. 

 

[Gus]

I just finished this.

http://tonefiend.com/guitar/build-the-worlds-wickedest-overdrive-for-under-30/#comment-59086

I tried 3 different ac128's before one worked and the forth one I tried sounded a lot better.  I also tried a few other pnp transistors but the ac128 sounds the most fun!

I bought a T Rex phaser pedal for 49 bucks a few weeks back.  That should cover my phaser needs the few times I ever record one.

More to come.

Have you looked at http://www.geofex.com/ for the Austin Treble Blaster?
Have you read the treble boost threads at Diystompboxes? http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php
There were threads about the rangemaster at ampage.

Si Treble Boost sims
http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=93926.0
http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=93052.0