Topics

Well, Mojotone was very excited to send out an email for the latest pedal in the Lerxst line, the ATWAS. It is a faithful replica of the original Morley Power Wah, just in a much more pedalboard friendly size. BUT...there is a very important thing missing:  the awesome sub-miniature pilot light jewel that all those old Morley pedals had. Those lamp jewels have proven to be the most impossible guitar pedal part to source in history. Tons of manufactures would be using them today, no doubt, but they are non-existent. Who made them back then? Where did they come from? How has nobody ever found a single NOS one in a little bag somewhere? The only way to get one is to cannibalize it off an old Morley pedal, but many of those are far too valuable to do that.
It doesn't look right without it.

[two MN3004's]

There are so many versions of the MXR M117, it's not surprising there is one version that has pretty much flown under the radar for the last couple decades. Yes, there are people who know the version I'm talking about, but for the most part, it's still kind of a sleeper. Clear back in 1996, MXR made it's first reissue of the M117. There doesn't seem to be much information about that first reissue on the Internet. It appears they may have only been made for about 2 years. The majority of online demos for the M117 are of the originals or the "newer" reissues. A gut shot is nearly impossible to find of the 1996 version.
The '96 version was US-made and used good-ol through-hole components and a very interesting choice for the BBD:  not one, but two MN3004's! In the world of flangers, that makes it much more rare than the SAD1024-based M117's. I don't think there is another flanger in existence that uses two MN3004's. This version also has two independent clock circuits as well, so it's easily the most complex version of the M117 MXR has ever made. A schematic would be awesome to check out, but is impossible to find.

So how do you spot one of these "post-vintage, yet vintage" versions? The easiest way is if there is a picture of the bottom plate. MXR didn't provide any battery power option in '96, so no battery doors.
If there isn't a picture of the bottom though, you can spot them by the paint. The first reissues were always a matte rough-finish gray color with no metal flake. So if it has metal flake charcoal paint, it's not the one.
The other odd identifying mark is the LED. On the '96 versions, the LED is one of the strangest colors of red I've ever seen for an LED. It's like watermelon Kool-Aid red when it's off. You can easily see the color difference when compared with the 2004-present versions.
So here are the pics:


The insides of these rarely see the light of day...

Dual MN3004's are under them pots...


Why did I bother posting any of this? I've still seen this rare version listed as "2004-present", and it generally get's lumped in with the newer ones that just aren't quite the same. So keep an eye out! You can still pick these up for pretty cheap considering how nice they are and how rare the BBDs are. You will never regret getting a hold of one of these early reissues. Highly recommended.
Happy hunting!

I've had a couple Madbean boards sitting around for a while, and I've finally had some time to complete them.
First off is a 2022 Collosalus. All I can say is, this was a collosal pain to get dialed in, because of my own choice to go way off the marked trail. I decided to try to follow the original pedal as closely as possible, so I got an old schematic and made the appropriate additions/subtractions. I had some old 1458's and 4558's to spare, so it seemed like a good idea. I also used different transistors just to make it hard on myself. In the end, I had a pedal that "worked", but didn't sound anything like I wanted. Ultimately, I had to make tons of mods to the bias control and the clock circuit. I found that Q5 & Q3 are very critical to the overall sound, and should be closely matched to get it to sound right. I also found a very interesting quirk to the biasing of the MN3007. There seems to be two settings of "correct" operation with the MN3007 in this circuit, and they're basically 90 degrees apart from each other on the bias control. I used the bias circuit on the Wizard schematic from 2009 you can find for the MXR117. At one bias setting, the pedal is very mid-80's rubber band metallic sounding, just like all those flangers people hate. But 90 degrees from that bias setting, suddenly it becomes a liquidy Andy Summers chorus machine, which is very good!
One thing I've noticed is that the Manual control really should be a logarithmic pot. The majority of the control is bunched up in the first 1/4 turn of the pot, and then you get about nothing from noon on. This also happens on my original Ross flanger (which is just an MXR117 with 4558's), so it's a common issue with this circuit.


The next one is the covid-era Rabbit Hole 2020.
My first intention was to build and ELK Sustainer with this, since I was always curious as to how that compared with a regular Big Muff.
I didn't like it. The tone control is just too weird. So I decided to try putting the tone control back to the normal cap value. That was a little better, but it still didn't sound great. So I decided to try swapping out the transistors. I had some random transistors that were in a CD case of all places, and it turns out, they just happened to be old BC239's that had the same markings as ones from mid 70's Rams Head big muffs. I adjusted one resistor in the the tone stack and one capacitor in the clipping stage to match the '75 Rams Head muff and BOOM! A killer-sounding Big Muff was born. This thing rips. Run some mild overdrive into the front end, and it sounds epic. I housed all of it in an old enclosure I had used for a DOD 250 clone, and I used random knobs and slapped a Thomas organ logo on it. All the wear and tear on the enclosure is from real use, so it isn't a relic job. It's now one of my favorite dirt pedals I've ever made. Funny how that happens.

Is it just me, or are the number of views on even new posts skyrocketing into the thousands wayyy too quickly?
Nice that the AI bots are out there looking to steal information!

As far as I can tell, the Gaspedals Dumbbell was the very first boutique pedal that attempted to capture the sound of the Dumble Overdrive Special amp. This was years before that became a thing. And was years before the "transparent overdrive" craze became a thing. I've always wanted one of these original versions with a single volume knob, and finally I have a clone (originals are about impossible to find, and they'll set you back some $600-$700 if you do find one).
So how do they sound? Incredible. I don't usually give any pedals the "always on" treatment, but this thing really does work great in that context. It's touch dynamic to your playing in standard mode. Sometimes you don't realize it's even on, until you turn it off. It really does just make everything sound better. In the boost mode, it's a full-on overdriven tube amp in all of the good ways. It doesn't sound like a distortion pedal on top of an amp. It sounds like an amp.
I'm so glad I finally took the time to build one, though it is a pain since there are no pcbs and only one schematic available for the single knob version. I had to build it on stripboard.
It was worth the effort!

Here is my build of the latest Misfit pcb. I jumped at the chance to get the board with a verified CA3260 for the great price Mr. Bean offered. This is an outstanding overdrive/distortion pedal, and yet another great pcb/project to try. I can see why it gets so much love from studios and session players. It just does exactly what you want a dirt pedal to do, without getting in the way of your playing. The 3-band EQ is one of the best I've used on a dirt pedal. The midrange control is especially effective. It can take the pedal from chicken-pickin' clarity, to full-on scooped heavy tones that are borderline metal (I would say, no, this pedal does not do metal).
For the design aesthetic, I'm not really sure what I was going for, other than trying to get inspiration from the original pedal. I guess I wanted that mid-80's "this is a guitar pedal that came with your NES" feel?
It doesn't look like any other pedal I have, that's for sure.

After watching a recent Rick Beato video on AI, I decided to test out Suno's V4 AI system. We musicians are in trouble, because this sounds straight up sick:
https://suno.com/song/08e584da-4c7d-4da3-af31-caf56d3ad829?sh=6LbxuoHh8OlPGVGV

Recently Reverb.com had some special edition cast iron Plumes and Blumes Earthquaker pedals that supposedly went on sale on their site. The things sold out so incredibly fast that there wasn't even time to look at the official listing! No doubt there will be second-hand ones that will pop up soon on Reverb for 3X the price as soon as people start getting them in the mail. I wasn't interested in buying one, but it is ridiculous how frantic "collectors" go after these things just to try to make a quick profit off something that really is no different than the original sound-wise. Do they just sit at their computers all day hitting the refresh button with 300 custom searches lined up? So the reason to own one has nothing to do with playing guitar. It's just the old ticket-scalping routine.

I've recently had a USPS priority package disappear into the ether. The more I look into what might of happened, the more it seems the entire USPS network is self-destructing. TubeDepot.com has a warning not to use USPS if you want to receive your items in a timely manner. I've found recent news articles from all over the country of people complaining about lost packages, late deliveries, and no cooperation with tracking information. In fact the TubeDepot article implies their tracking is not working at all anymore. I tried to log in to USPS.com and it said my "account is disabled". I tried to create a new account and it said it's "unable to process the request". The city of Boston has even tried to subpoena USPS to testify in court over why there are so many problems...and they just blew them off!
How can this even be real? I thought USPS was part of the Executive branch of the US federal government. This is more like the behaviour of a drug cartel!

[$5 billion a day.]

Major U.S. ports on the East Coast and Gulf are very likely to strike on Oct 1st. Here will be the result:

"The ports that could close in a strike handle more than 68% of all containerized exports in the U.S. and roughly 56% of containerized imports, according to industry data. So even a short strike would cause significant disruptions in regional trade flows. One analysis estimated that could cost the U.S. economy as much $5 billion a day."

Who will pick up the $5 billion a day tab? YOU WILL
This will make COVID look like a cakewalk. At least during COVID essential products still moved around on a limited basis. This strike will bring everything to a complete halt. Zero. Nothing. It won't be, "oh, we've run out of some things." It's going to be, "we have nothing."

We all know the classic pickup types/configurations that are tried and true recipes for great tone. But I'm more interested in what pickup configurations you've found that work great, even though they're a bit out in left field. I've recently come across this one for my Strat:
- Dimarzio Air Norton S wired with parallel coils in the bridge.
- Fender "player" series Telecaster neck pickup in the neck with the cover removed.
The real surprise was how great the player-series Telecaster neck pickup sounds with the cover off. It's thick and punchy (around 9K on a meter). Wiring the Air Norton S in parallel coil mode gives it a more Strat-like single coil sound, and the two together just sound fantastic. Full-range with punchy bass and brilliant Strat jangle on the top end. I'm definitely gonna stick with this combo for a while.

I know nobody manufactures them, but with 3D printing so prevalent, I'm sure somebody could make them.
Transparent resin printing
The most practical use for these would be to add LED lighting to vintage pedals without having to drill or modify in any way. The washers could either be for a 1/4" jack or the stomp switch. With how ridiculously bright LEDs are these days, I'm sure the light would bleed out just fine.

Scratchy pot? The solution:
https://caig.com/product/deoxit-fader-f100l-l2c/
Deoxit fader lube is amazing. Works perfectly. Put it right on the carbon track. I resurrected and old wah potentiometer with it and now it functions better than it ever has. Not even the slightest hint of a scratch. Where has this stuff been all this time???

Yay. Exactly what we needed in an already oppressively-crowded pedal market:
https://reverb.com/news/just-in-jhs-relaunches-ross-with-new-effects?utm_source=braze&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Midweek_Content_V2_20230816_(US)&utm_term=Variant_2&utm_content=general-version_feature-2_effects-and-pedals

I was surprised to stumble on this since there seems to be little to no hype around it at all.
https://sunnamps.com/
I wonder what this is going to mean for the band, and the Earthquaker life pedals, which have been plastering Sunn's registered trademark on their stuff? I wouldn't want to take on Fender's legal team...

The title says it all. This is the circuit that is built into the Kustom 150 tuck and roll heads from the early 70's. It's just a fantastic tremolo! Swampy, greasy, but can also be dialed in with the intensity control to be subtle and musical. And you can blend in Vibrato as well, which makes it really unique. Yes, it is exactly that "Born on a Bayou" sound. It would be awesome if somebody reverse-engineered this into a modern stompbox:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1uZWRTByEbNL4LQCZ0LYVIo_NmSh7So8M/preview?pli=1&rm=demo

It's no secret that overdrives rule the guitar pedal scene. The most valuable guitar pedal is an overdrive. The most copied and popular circuit is an overdrive. The most talked about and debated tone-shaping devices...overdrives. With that much hype and scrutiny surrounding overdrives, it amazes me that some big brand offerings pretty much fly under the radar. Enter the Boss OD-2. This particular one is a MIJ model from 1986. It does not suffer from any kind of unity gain problems that I've heard some people complain about with some of these. And the fact this is a MIJ "black label" model in this kind of condition, I can't believe you can still get these in the sub $100 range.
Other than modding the ACA power supply to work off 9V, I haven't done anything else to the pedal, and this thing is spot on for what you would want from an overdrive. The mode 1 setting can go from mild to fairly crunchy. It sounds just like my OD-1 modded SD-1. The mode 2 "turbo" mode can get into straight up stack distortion. And that one trim pot works very much like a variac for the turbo mode. Starving the gain stages to get more distortion at lower volumes...I wonder who started that idea? All this in a pedal that uses no op amps. It's actually a pretty unique circuit design that was partly used in the highly-regarded Blues Driver. To put a caveat on all this, the later Taiwan version and the OD-2r version are not the same as the original MIJ OD-2. So if you can get your hands on the MIJ version, do it. You won't regret it.

I guess they're no longer the iconic British company:
https://www.guitarworld.com/news/marshall-amps-sold-to-swedish-speaker-company 
Maybe they'll come out with a JCM model that has a built-in Boss HM-2?
The Marshall Amplifikurgen. (You have to assemble it yourself)

I recently picked up an original Maxon PT-999, from back when it still mentioned Greco on the label. This is a slightly modified version of the Phase 90, and I have to say that so far it's the best 4-stage phaser I've ever owned. This thing stacks great in front of an overdrive and gives it that classic 70's "chew" that has been on countless recordings. It's a very musical phaser as well that doesn't overpower the mix or add a ton of it's own tone (and no volume drop). It just enhances whatever you've got going on with swirly goodness. I've never tried an original script logo Phase 90, but from what I've read online, this Maxon version is better. I'm impressed with the condition it's in too, considering it's 47 years old. If you like phasers and don't own one of these, it's highly recommended.

Did I miss something? All of the sudden, "8" size reverb tanks with the "A" low-impedance input have sold out worldwide. People seem to have gone nuts trying to gobble them up. Does that particular tank somehow create free beer when you plug them in or something? Just today I watched them sell out on Ebay in the 20 seconds or so that I found one listing for a few. I couldn't click buy it now fast enough, apparently. Other sites all say, "out of stock" or "that page doesn't exist". There aren't any on Reverb.
They're just all of the sudden gone and if one does show up, people frantically buy them before you can even look at the listing.
It's weird.