Tools, Tones and Toys for Guitarists
“The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he, who in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother’s keeper and the finder of lost … Read more
Fred Briggs – Super OCD Schematic The Fulltone OCD has been an overdrive favourite for many years now. It’s got a really nice tone when your amp is set right (I prefer it with Marshalls I must say). Well, I’ve always thought about modifiying the basic circuit (which itself is based around the old Voodoo … Read more
The B K Butler Tube Driver has been used by several of Rock Guitar’s greats – David Gilmour and Eric Johnson to name just two. There are many schematics out there as well as a wealth of PCB projects. I’ve looked to compile the best and most reliable for this post. If you’re wondering how … Read more
The Wampler Pinnacle Distortion. This one has been requested – here’s the details. Firstly a description from the Wampler Website: “Zeke Clark, Edward Van Halen’s longtime renowned guitar tech played through a pinnacle and this is what he had to say:“I’ve played tons of pedals that promised that “Brown Sound”… this pedal NAILS it better … Read more
Here’s the schematic: And here’s the last in my series of Fender / Vox / Marshall themed boosters/overdrives – The “E11even” (Spinal Tap reference intentional). It’s designed for those classic Marshall overdrive tones, plexi / jtm45 sort of stuff. It’s based around the old mosfet booster design I love with a few tweaks. The bias … Read more
Here’s the Face MKI schematic: I really like this one, it’s a booster/overdrive with a nice Fendery feel and voice to it. As you can see there are some values which you can alter on the schematic that allow you to tailor the tone to your exact needs. Firstly the supply voltage – the lower the voltage … Read more
Ok, so I’ve got a few projects in the pipeline. First up is a continuation of my work with boosters – I’ve already published the “’64 Vintage” (a Vox voiced boost/overdrive), I’ve got the “E11even” (A Marshall voiced booster/overdrive) and the “‘Face” (A Fender voiced booster/Overdrive) to release soon. I really like these three designs … Read more
Ala Freakish Blues the people behind “Toxic Pedals” have gone and done the “buy cheap JOYO clones, repainted/rebrand them and then sell them on as your own.” trick. It turns out the Toxic Pedals “Muddy Drive” is the Joyo “Ultimate Drive” (Which is itself a clone of the Fulltone OCD/Voodoo Labs Overdrive) which has been … Read more
People like the Klon, they like anything to do with the Klon. People have been building up the Buffer section of the Klon and selling them as a standalone unit. Well, there’s the schematic of the buffer section and here’s a vero layout from Mcaviel: Now many people ask me why use a buffer? What … Read more
Pete Cornish doesn’t like true bypass: http://petecornish.co.uk/case_against_true_bypass.html So inside all of his pedals he includes a buffer to aid the switching process and act as a line driver for the remainder of the pedal chain. He sells these individually as the LD-1 (and LD-3 with the mute switch and tuner output). Here’s a description from the … Read more