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Bigfoot FX – MagnaVibe

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[Note – this is the newer Bigfoot Magnavibe, without the tremolo switch – Note]

Now here’s an interesting one inspired by the great old Magnatone amps. I really like the sound of this thing from Bearfoot FX, here’s their description (taken from the Bigfoot FX website):

“The Magnavibe was inspired by the early 1960’s vibrato guitar effect (not the typical tremolo which is just pulse modulation). The Magnatone amp was known for having that amazing wobbly sound. Setting out to put that type of sound in a box and use it with any amp took much experimenting. The results are excellent. This is not a plain one dimensional vibrato such as a chorus pedal with the dry mix removed. Delay chips weren’t even used back then. Nor is it just another uni-vibe clone, but a unique sound with that classic unique tone. Adding spring reverb or delay after the vibrato sounds especially good.”

And a really nice soundclip of it in action (A cool cover of Etta James!): http://www.nicolacosta.com/at_last.mp3
Well KindaFuzzy over at the Freestompboxes forum bought one and took it apart and here’s the results:
[Images pinched from KO Amps great Flickr album: http://www.flickr.com/photos/35422385@N07/]
Here’s a schematic:
Nocentelli drew up a vero layout too:
As you can see by viewing the schematic it’s pretty simple and it’s *very* similar to Tim Escobedo’s “Wobbletron” circuit as can be seen here (Basically the only real change is the use of a LED/LDR to modulate the vibrato instead of the JFET):
Anyhow, nevermind about that – it sounds nice, build one now 🙂
Here’s the freestompboxes.org topic discussing it’s de-gooping!: http://freestompboxes.org/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=12539
[NOTE] If you want to build a slightly more complex version (But one that can achieve many more tones!) check out MadBeanPedals “QuadraVibe” project here – it’s pretty cool : http://www.madbeanpedals.com/projects/index.html [NOTE]

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