SWASH: this is a new commissioned build using an original Noise Swash PCB from 2010 by @4ms_company /Commonsound. This pedal is hard to classify and is every bit as hectic as it looks.
Some sounds that came out of this box (with and without guitar signal): light drive, fuzz, torn speaker velcro fuzz, octave up clang, octave down ghost sounds, phaser vibe sounds, delay-like glitches, hi and low pitched pulses, droning synth noise, harsh wailing noise, rhythmic stutters, oscillating noise, tune-able feedback, etc. There are just so many parameters to control over every aspect of the pedal, I feel I wasn’t able to scratch the surface. I don’t understand how it’s possible to obtain this range of noises from the relatively simple parts (4 basic OP amps, 1 transistor) in the circuit so we’ll say that there’s some magic in there somewhere.
The PCB is visually quite unique - it super large to allow all 12 pots and 4 switches to mount across the dimensions of the enclosure size. It was refreshing to see a layout that’s not heavily condensed and too design conscious, just functional.
The enclosure stamping process was really stressful as there are so many labels. I was having nightmares about getting to the 17th label and cooking it, but fierce concentration and sweat paid off.
Big thanks to the client for trusting me with the task of bringing the original PCB to life and into a usable form, and letting me build it within my own ‘aesthetic’ sensibilities (also thanks to @foundsound_ for being the delivery conduit for the PCB between the USA & Melbourne)!
#diypedals #diy #guitareffects #pedals #pedalboard #stompboxes #custompedals #customfx #guitarpedals #guitareffects #telesis #hello #thankyou #melbourne #btdr #belton #superhitech #distortion #fuzz #gear #noiseswash #vimex #aluminum #reverb #4ms #commonsound #noise #knobs #harsh #harshnoise
DIRECT: this is a trapezoidal triple DI! Made to be simple, small, high quality.
This was built to suit the needs of a client who runs a very loud, interesting and slightly complicated live rig. Rather than running three off the shelf DIs, it made a lot of sense to condense everything into a small, neat enclosure. Jensen JT-DB-Es were used for their optimal shielding properties and immaculate reputation, and quite neat mounting system. Great care was taken to keep the grounding schemes separate, in order to prevent loops or unwanted connections. Only ground lifts were required (no pad, thru or other controls), and these can be toggled for each channel.
Other things worth noting: I was fixated on the mounting hardware, I ended up choosing some nice stainless hex bolts for the transformers, and continued the hex theme to the countersunk XLR mounting bolts. The trapezoidal enclosure has a very retro-futuristic aesthetic, and thanks to the difference width of XLR and 1/4 inch connectors, I was really happy to use one for a functional purpose rather than Jetson-core fun and games (nothing wrong with that though!).
Such a fun project, I can’t wait to see it all in action! No LEDs, no footswitch, no external power, no MERCY!!!
CHASM: this is the first big custom build I've done in a while! It is a classic green ringer inspired octave up feeding into a Chasm reverb circuit. Three foot-switches select between octave on/off, reverb on/off and reverb oscillation.
The octave component is quite simple and built on vero, no major tweaks, just making sure the output volume would be a little louder than unity, and a lot of part value matching (very crucial for a decent octave effect). The Chasm reverb PCB is from 2014, bought directly from Deadastronaut in the UK at that time. Robert from Deadastronaut has some very well renowned and loved circuit designs; I think that this is by far the best BTDR2 based reverb I've ever heard.
I left the enclosure a little distressed, and kept a cool little blemish which I stamped the logos over the top of. I moved the oscillation control to a foot-switch instead of the usual toggle near the knobs, and added an LED to indicate when the OSC is engaged. This is important as the effect is not true bypass, allowing for tails when the pedal is turned off. This means that the oscillations can be heard when the pedal is not engaged too :O
The vibrato quality of the BTDR pops out a lot at higher settings, and the blend is very powerful at cleaning up the 'dank'. The oscillation can be dialed in with the damp and decay knobs very gently to allow for a subtle washy drone in the background. The octave produces really strange, ring mod-like textures when playing chords or complex runs, and a classic octave up fuzz-ish sound when hitting power chords or single notes. There's a lot of interplay within all of this which sounds greater than the sum of its parts! I’ve included a very basic demo so there is some actual reference of the sound.
#diypedals #diy #guitareffects #pedals #pedalboard #stompboxes #custompedals #customfx #guitarpedals #guitareffects #telesis #hello #thankyou #melbourne #superhitech #distortion #fuzz #gear #reverb #btdr #beltonbrick #greenringer #aluminum #alpha #echo
Hello, please excuse this… In addition to audio electronics I am deeply passionate about bicycles. This has led me down an unexpected rabbit-hole, to the point where I’m currently compelled to reproduce an amazing shirt made by the independent Canadian MTB company SYNCROS in the 90s.
I found a small jpeg of the original design and proceeded to enhance, optimise and rebuild this into a proper sized, print ready file.
So now I am doing a small run of these, for basically the cost price of the shirt, plus a small amount for my time. If you’re an MTB fan, a shirt collector, or just want this NICE shirt to look COOL, please consider ordering this! I will close the portal on Sunday, and printing will begin immediately after. All details in the store.
Thank you for humouring me! More pedals soon… 💟
Here we got one I forgot to post about! Rehouse of a classic Madean Moodring from eons ago for friend and colleague. I really like this reverb circuit, it has both the Belton brick and PT2339 for a lovely combination of pre-delay with the spaced out modulation. I moved the trim pot gain to a main pot on the enclosure, similar with the ‘kill’ - moved from toggle to serious foot switch. This kill feature is really nice, actually, removing the dry circuit instantly allows for some serious wet. If you see any of these moodrings pop up, would suggest you jump on it! Very powerful with drippy and trippy beautiful edge…
A pedal so nice we made it twice. Just finished up this Rat pedal x 2 for the legend Justin at Herad. A *much* longer term project than initially thought, this box contains two Rats made to a very certain specification, based on a special original Rat owned by Justin. This enclosure was also made by him!
Much painstaking work went into de-soldering and testing most of the original components to ascertain if any anomalies were present (there weren’t really any that jumped out), recording all values before re-soldering, before moving onto populating the two aftermarket PCBs. These PCBs have some additional switching for the Ruetz mod and extra clipping options which is nice, and they’re designed to be drop in replacements in a standard Rat box.
I took a lot of care to measure everything going into this and can say that I’ve gotten it as close as humanly possible within my humble means…
Would I try to do something like this again? Maybe not… but the end result is extremely GRATIFYING. Side by side, the ones in the box sound identical - I hope that they can hold up to the original 🙇♀️
fragility in conformity (2023)
balancing thin slabs supported by thick coils, a process of forming a shape from moulds and the ongoing repair and the tension of trying to fit something in
Reduction fired stoneware, construction site clay, found materials- shino, leftover fabric chord,
custom hand cut brass plate and G4 halogen globe, electrical wiring by @super.hi_tech
seeing so many inspiring lights for MDW I wanted to share my first attempt at lighting with the much needed help of Darcy. We have been playing with some prototypes so watch this space
A note on found materials:
window glass from construction site in Ovens St,
test glazes and broken pot from SoCa
material and firing development done @soca_brunswick
One run of Notches now competed - let’s go on a walk down memory lane and appreciate this marble off-cut while we’re at it. For those with a keen eye, the middle Notch is my older style sanded enclosure from an earlier batch, while the other four are a newer, brushed style I’ve been experimenting with. They all sound real good!
Thanks to everyone who ordered one, there is still one left for anyone who would like to scoop some mids and/or boost treble/signal 📈✅💯
Today I populated and soldered the boards for the Notch run. I filmed some tiny time lapses of the process - my phone decided how long they went for and I was ok with that. This five took 1 hour and 50 minutes in total. Is that slow, is that fast? Who knows? Who cares??
KNOTCHE: hello! Quick one today to show how Notch could be useful for you! Or not! This is one is my personal prototype build, excuse the scrappy exterior!
Filmed these quick and raw on the phone mic, please forgive me… played the out of tune JM through these pedals into a tiny Champ amp. We have:
1. Big Muff > Notch. Showing how even at the must muffled of all Muff settings we can recover some note separation and clarity! A miracle!
2. Notch > SL Drive. Showing how pushing the boosted & scooped signal into the responsive op amp drive can make it sound even more responsive and dynamic. Getting a little too crispy at the end maybe but this thing has some range.
3. Rat > Notch. Showing how we could use the Notch as a lead-y, solo boost type thing to cut through the mix for certain parts of a song, typical kind of boost implementation and useful.
That’s about it! I’ve opened up some build slots for this, head to superhitech.org if you’re keen to obtain one. I don’t claim to have made any changes or spins on this circuit, it’s a verbatim clone and faithful as heck. Thanks to John of EAE for tracing the schematic so I was able to make one to hear for myself 🎸🎸🎸
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CASSETTETAR: Helllo, it’s been a minute! Today I’m sharing this beautiful object at the perfect intersection of instrument and toy - Casio EG-5 casette/amp/guitar. The client needed a separate guitar signal for practical performance purposes, being that the exisiting bridge pickup is fully integrated into the cassette and amplifier circuitry. Rather than install a bypass switch and hack into the electronics, we opted to install a new pickup in the empty neck area with a little volume pot and a separate output jack.
Due to the hefty internal cast aluminium spine, routing a normal pickup cavity wasn’t an option, so surface mount it was! The winner was a CB Gitty cigar box guitar pickup - the thing sounds really nice and it’s maybe 4mm tall, quite unbelievable. Also, really not much in it, very thin wooden sides with a thin bent aluminium sheet as a cover. I stole some braided shield from some coax cable I had lying around and for noise reduction on the pickup cables. The pot and jack could only fit in one location each, as you can see there was a huge amount of PCB packed inside. Battery terminals were corroded beyond belief, quick brush and re-terminate at the board and we’re good to go. Now one is able to use the separate circuit to play as a regular, passive guitar, or can run both outputs as a stereo setup, ie. signal A neck circuit, signal B original bridge circuit and/or tape output with all the controls still intact! It feels and sounds a lot nicer to play than you’d think…
Hallo! A nice short and sharp one for today...
What I would probably call a modern classic, the Mr Black Supermoon, came to me with some bypass issues... sometimes no signal, sometimes the normal amount. Not ideal when you want to play a concert on stage!
The culprit was a worn out foot switch, not a huge deal. The very neat PCB dated from 2013 had everything mounted to the board, again like an MXR kind of pedal, which made it slightly painful to remove (9 lugs to get fully desoldered). A gentle, dentist like extraction was required - with a little patience everything came out cleanly. In went the new Alpha 3DPT and we were on our way!
I hadn’t played one of these for a long time, forgot how kooky and far out they get. Also forgot that this is a Spin FV-1 based circuit; nice to see an earlier implementation of this part (2013 was 10 years ago 😬) and to see it sound so good, still!
Tiny FYI: I’m still doing some boring things in the background that are keeping me busy, but you’ll see what it’s all about soon enough! Bye 👋
