When I did my first build of a Tayda Big Muff Pi board back in January, I mentioned that the board included a set of instructions to allow you to build a total of seven (of the myriad) variations of this venerable circuit. I built my first one up as a Triangle, and it quickly became one of my favorite BMP pedals (okay, to be honest, there's none I don't like, but a few rise to the top). After finishing up that one, I'd devised a "cunning plan" to create not only a few more fun BMP pedals for my use, but a few to sell to "support the habit" as it were. Since I'm fairly good at Soviet green paint jobs (as you can see in my first Civil War / Red Army build as well as the enclosure I painted for a friend), I figured it would be fun to try and build a Sovtek BMP clone with as close to the original components as possible.
There were a couple of problems with my idea at the time, however, and unfortunately the list of issues has continued to grow by leaps and bounds. First, the Red Army build on the AionFX board is honestly my least favorite BMP pedal. It feels fairly weak compared to the Ram's Head and Triangle variants, and even lacks the genuine quirkiness of the V1 Perf Board version. I wondered if part of the issue could be because the resistors and capacitors were chosen to pair better with the forward voltage of the ex-Soviet diodes used in the originals. So I set out to start collecting the correct components (as much as possible). I've picked up several ex-Soviet resistors, but they're much too large for the Tayda board (I've got some ideas on how to utilize them on future projects), so I stuck with modern metal film resistors. Finding ex-Soviet capacitors was an exercise in futility, so I stuck with domestic replacements there as well. I was, however, able to find KD521A diodes and KT3102 transistors, along with some vintage Russian LEDs from a source on ebay (more on that later). I had to double check the polarity on the diodes as well as ensure I had the transistor orientation correct, but once I got the pedal together, it sounded spectacular! It doesn't have quite the punch of the earlier Ram's Head versions, but it has plenty of bite when needed and really made this version jump up several spots on my top BMP variant list.
Of course, by the time I got all of the parts in, especially the new LEDs (which were shipped on February 10), Russia had decided it would be a good idea to invade Ukraine. As such I could not in good conscience build and market a pedal with "Russian" anywhere in the name or theme. That being said, my primary source for all of the parts I'd used for this build was Ukrainian - so instead of a Red Army / Civil War BMP, this is now a Ukrainian Army BMP. The case (above) is hand painted in an appropriate Russian Ukrainian Green using actual Electro-Harmonix knobs. The decals are all hand printed using a font I found that included the Ukrainian Trident as well. I used blacked out LED bezels and even a black dress nut to sort of keep the "green and black" theme running through the whole enclosure top.
On the inside you can see that the circuit board takes up very little of the actual enclosure space itself. All of the electrical connections to the DC jack and 1/4" input/output jacks are covered by heat shrink wrap to keep them properly insulated. The 3PDT stop switch daughter board is courtesy of Frog Pedals (they're amazing guys - check them out!). I chose the Frog Pedals board because they're set up for a bipolar red/green LED. Of course, you can't actually get a vintage Soviet bipolar LED, but you can get separate red and green LEDs.
I wired up the daughter board with two wires going into the hole for the common anode. I then had a separate wire for the red and green cathodes. When the pedal is in bypass mode, the red LED (above) is on. When you activate the pedal, the red LED turns off and the green LED (below) turns on. These LEDs are far more muted in their brightness level than most modern clear or even diffused LEDs, so I dropped the resistance on the current limiting resistor on the daughter board just a bit.
Needless to say, I'm extremely happy how this project turned out. The pedal sounds great, and I think it looks great as well. I'm still eventually planning on selling a couple of these, and to that end I've got a second enclosure ready to go. I have about three Tadya PCBs, but as these enclosures originally came from Smallbear (which is currently on hiatus) I'd have to find an alternate enclosure for pedals three and four. I know I have plenty of diodes, but I need to inventory my KT3102 transistor stock. Unfortunately my Ukrainian source of parts, who has been so good and so amazing, is shut down at this point because of unbridled imperialistic Russian aggression. I really hope he is okay as I'd love to be able to continue to support him, his business, and his country soon!!! What I'll likely end up doing is if any of these actually sell, I'll donate a portion of the proceeds (likely anything above cost) to Ukrainian relief efforts. I haven't figured out exactly the right way to make that work, so I'm going to be talking to a few other small business friends for advice.
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