Revisiting an Old BMP Variant - With a New Board!

A little over a year ago I finished up a build of a really high gain and doomy Big Muff variant, Frantone's The Sweet. I had used a hand etched board from Effects Layouts and it came out pretty good overall. It sounded pretty much like all of the demos I found online. I'd tried to etch a couple more boards, but ran into some issues with my resist. Fast forward a few months and I'm learning to lay out my own boards. I figured something like this would be good practice as it is a bit more detailed than most of the early ones I'd been working on. So I got cracking and came up with my own PCB - no etching required!

Upping the Amp-erage - Building the Mojotone 5F2-A Tweed Amp Kit

I've been building pedals for several years now, but like any gateway dru... errr... hobby, I soon discovered that there were people who built their own amplifiers as well. Much like with guitar pedals, being able to build your own amp opens up options that may not normally be available because the amplifiers are rare, expensive, or likely both. Even if it is a more common amp style, building one yourself can often be cheaper. It also allows customization and choice of components to create a unique sound. I'd started my first amp project about 1.5 years ago, but sort of got bogged down and intimidated by the scope. I decided it would be advisable to maybe try a slightly more entry-level build to understand the ups and downs of the process a bit better. Mojotone offers a variety of kits with good documentation, wiring diagrams, and schematics. They aren't incredibly cheap, but all of their designs are well-proven. Their easiest kit is the 5F1 Tweed based on the 1950's vintage 5 Watt amplifier. This was a little more basic than I wanted to go as it only has a volume with no tone knob, so I went with the 5F2-A Tweed Princeton, which was first introduced in 1957 (and should pair up really well with my '57 American Vintage 2 Stratocaster). 

A David Gilmour Inspired Strat - Redux

A little over two years ago I put together a parts-caster using the EMG DG20 pickup set. This set of pickups was used by David Gilmour starting in around 1985 at the Live Aid concert. He'd continue to use the active pickups through about 2005 when he would return to the Black Strat and it's traditional single coils. When I first got the EMG DG20 together, it sounded good - by itself. Unfortunately most of the Gilmour sounds and pedals I'm trying to emulate are from the earlier albums, and the active pickups didn't stack well with my amplifiers and effects pedals. So given I have many guitars and this one wasn't being played - I had two options. I could try and sell it (the market for parts-casters as a unit is not good), or I could pull out the active pickups and re-wire it with single coils. After some unsuccessful attempts at the former, I settled on the latter, and I'm very happy I did!

Updating a Most Tranquil Steggo Pedal!

One of my favorite enclosures and pedals was the Steggo take on the Zendrive (which has since been re-introduced by Warm Audio as the Warmdrive). I'd initially used the AionFX board for my builds, but my friend at South Obolon FX released a version of this board and was kind enough to make me a Steggo version. I'd built one up a few months ago, but I've finally gotten a few more done for the shop!