Return of the Queen - A Special Saurus Regina!

Back in July I completed my first clone of the Lizard Queen pedal - it's really a decent old school fuzz pedal, and I've built a few here and there. I'd ordered some more enclosures and unfortunately one of them was misprinted at the factory. This is a fairly rare event, and Tayda always makes things right, but I wondered if it might be possible to use this particular enclosure for something fun - so enter a special version of the Saurus Regina pedal!

A New Violet Ram's Head 2 Big Mutt

So since it's been several months since I built a Big Muff clone (granted, the combo pedal I just finished includes a Big Muff, but it is more than just a Muff clone), I figured it was time to go ahead and test out some alternate configurations of the Loud Cancer board - and try out some different potentiometer orientations as well. One of my favorite variants of the BMP is the Violet Ram's Head 2, so I decided to give it a whirl!

Cloning the Lizard Queen!

About a year ago, Josh Scott from JHS pedals released a really fun video where they did a bit of live action role playing and developed a new effects pedal from the ground up they called the Lizard Queen. Nothing unusual there, but the catch was they wanted to replicate the process used by Electro Harmonix in the 1970's and create something that was simultaneously new and vintage. The result was a brand new fuzz pedal with very old DNA that could be built using available components. Speculation abounded as to whether or not the pedal would ever actually be released, but earlier this year, JHS released both small and large form factor versions of the pedal. Amazingly enough, the large form factor pedal was shown in full detail (front and back) so not only the components but the electrical traces were visible. Therefore this is likely one of the most quickly and extensively cloned pedals out there, but I figured there had to be room for a dinosaur version too!

One of Steggo's First Layouts - the Kosmoceratops Envelope Filter!

For the first couple of years building pedals, I was content to mostly just buy professionally produced circuit boards, populate them, and enjoy the awesome tone. However, as time has gone by, I wanted to start learning how to take that next step from schematic to layout. I'd gotten good at reading a schematic and could breadboard, but most of the available programs for actually turning the schematic into a set of Gerber files for a manufactured PCB (Eagle, Kicad, etc.) weren't not intuitive, expensive, or both! A few weeks ago a came across a video by the Tone Geek on how to lay out your own PCB using EasyEDA, so I figured I'd give it a try. Let's just say it's sent me down an amazing rabbit hole and opened up a lot of new possibilities because I'd finally found a layout program that was intuitive and cheap (read free). 

A Custom Triangle Big Mutt Phi!

The Triangle version of the Big Muff Pi is one of the more popular versions of the venerable circuit. I've built one in the past using a Tayda board, and it came out really pretty well. A friend was in the market for a Big Muff clone, and so I brought in pretty much my complete stable of variants to my favorite local guitar store (Five Star Guitars) so he could try them all on relevant amplifiers. In the end, he decided he wanted a triangle variant. He also wanted something in a form factor slightly larger than my standard 125B Big Mutt Phi build, so I decided to just go back to the Tayda board and come up with a suitably cool 1590BB2 enclosure for it!

A New Electric Mistress Clone - With a Dinosaur Theme!

The Electro-Harmonix Electric Mistress is one of the foundation modulation effects pedals released in the 1970's. It has been used by many guitar luminaries over the years, and is a really amazing flanger / chorus pedal. I'd previously built the PCB Guitar Mania version of the board - though it appears that this was a copy of the Madbean Current Lover board as it had many of the same quirks. Madbean has recently released a 2023 revision of the board that adds a volume knob, support for multiple BBD chips, and multi-voltage support (up to 18V). While my previous build was a great pedal, I really wanted to do a fun dinosaur version to add to my Steggo line-up. I'd also gotten requests for an Electric Mistress clone from some friends, and I really wanted to go with a better base PCB than on my original build, so I grabbed a few of the new Madbean boards and got to work!

Finally a True "Steggo" BMP Clone!

Any long time readers of this blog will know that I really like the Electro-Harmonix Big Muff Pi in all of its forms. It is one of the main pedals of choice for some of my favorite guitarists, including David Gilmour, and is a key ingredient in their overall sound. I've built several BMP clones over the years, but all of them have had enclosures that mirrored the original in one way or another. Recently I've tried to do a "make over" of any of my "Steggo" pedals with a focus primarily on creating fun dinosaur names for them, and I've finally come up with a dinosaur themed BMP clone!

The Oddball Muff - The Op Amp Version...

Another Big Muff Pi variant! I know those of you who read this blog semi-regularly are shocked... shocked! That being said, this one is actually a bit different. In 1977, Electroharmonix engineer Howard Davis was tasked with redesigning the normal BMP circuit to use op-amps rather than transistors for the gain stages. While some purists do not consider the op-amp version to be a "real" Big Muff, it's simply called the version four on Kit Rae's page. One of the best known users of this particular variant is Billy Corgan who used the V4 on the 1991 Smashing Pumpkins album Siamese Dream among others. For this build I'm using the AionFX Corvus board in the base build configuration for the project incorporating the tone bypass toggle and the variable gain-stage modification developed by Analogguru. Original versions of the pedal can cost upwards of $500, but new versions can be had for about $100 - so it's a decent DIY opportunity, but nothing compared to more boutique offerings.

Old School CMOS Overdrive - Cloning the Original EHX Hot Tubes

The 1970s was a time of rapid change and development in the electronics industry. Transistors became increasingly common, and the technology to fabricate them saw revolutionary jumps in density and fabrication. Complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor (CMOS) technologies became increasingly common, and were first applied to guitar fuzz effect pedals to emulate a "tube sound" in 1977. In 1978, Electro-harmonix released their own CMOS-based overdrive pedal, the Hot Tubes. It was only produced in its original form from 1978 to 1981 when EHX ran into financial issues. The pedal was eventually re-released as a "nano" series pedal in 2013 and in a dual pedal with the Crayon as the "Hot Wax" later. These are still in production and only run about $80, so while you can save a couple of bucks building your own, it's not one I'm going to produce in any volume!

Old School Big Muff Pi - Or Hold My Beer, I'm Gonna Try Something

I know, I know, yes - it's another Big Muff Pi clone. I like them, a lot. There will be more in the future. For this one, however, I decided to do something a little different. I'm still using the AionFX Halo board for this build - largely because I wanted a rock solid PCB for this experiment. If it ended up not working, I wanted it to be because of an issue with components rather than an issue with the board itself. The difference comes in my component choice. If you look at a lot of the early BMPs (like the one in the photo below), you'll see a lot of carbon resistors and ceramic capacitors. My first BMP build used older Allen-Bradley resistors, but all modern film capacitors. Later, I built a Ram's Head variant on a home-etched PCB - again with old school resistors but the capacitors were Panasonic film capacitors (not new by any stretch of the imagination, but not ceramic either). So this time around, I decided I'd try and go with ceramic capacitors across the board to see how the sound changed.

Early V1 BMP - Photo from Kitrae's page

Even More Pi? A Violet Ram's Head 2 Build!

So, for those few of you who actually follow the blog, have you gotten the idea that I love the Big Muff Pi circuit, yet? If you're a fan as well, I definitely recommend Kit Rae's page covering all of the different variants of this iconic effects pedal. It has been an absolutely indispensable reference as I've tried to go through and build many of the different versions of this stomp box! As I mentioned in my announcement a few days ago, I'll likely have a few pedals for sale in the not so distant future, and the initial ones are likely to be BMP clones - so continue to watch this space.

That being said, this particular pedal was all for me! For this build I've gone back to AionFX's Halo board. It is a great board, and there is a spreadsheet that lets you build literally any version of the pedal you'd like - it even cross references the component codes on the board to the component codes on the circuit diagrams on the Kit Rae page. I'd already built a couple of versions of the '73 Gilmour Ram's Head (one of my two original Halo builds and the home etched PCB), a Russian Civil War / Red Army variant (also on a Halo board), and a Triangle (on a Tayda board). I'd heard great things about the Violet Ram's Head versions, especially the 2nd version, so I decided to go that route for this build. 

PCB Mania No Noise Gate - Dang Useful Utility Pedal!!!

Readers of this blog should be well aware at this point that I'm a fan of high gain distortion and fuzz pedals. I'm also a fan of vintage transistors actually used in those high gain pedals. While you can get some absolutely amazing tones using high-gain distortion effects, you can also get a lot of tones you don't actually want. The most common is a hiss (high or low pitched) or a hum, though there are other unwanted noises that can detract from your sound. Given the prevalence of the issue, it should be unsurprising that there is a solution out there - Noise Gates. Many companies have produced a variety of pedals that essentially act as a high-pass filter - louder tones, i.e. what you actually want to hear, sail through while the softer hiss tones are filtered out. In this entry, I build PCB Mania's No Noise Gate - which is based on the Electroharmonix Noise Gate. The current EHX Silencer pedal is a bit more capable as it includes an effects loop rather than simply acting as a filter.

More Pi - Two New (for Me) Takes on the Classic Effect

The Electro-Harmonix Big Muff Pi remains one of the most popular and ubiquitous pedals out there. In a previous blog entry, I'd built up two of the Aion FX Halo boards in different configurations. I had a lot of fun with the project, but given there are over 20 variations on the BMP circuit I figured there was room to add a few more flavors to the stable. While I was at it, I decided to look at other board sources as well (though there will likely be more Halo variants coming out in the future!). One of the boards I built up was a Tayda Big Muff DIY board. It's relatively inexpensive and tiny, but the instructions do come with component lists for seven different variations of the board. The second build was a bit (read a lot) more ambitious. A friend and fellow pedal-builder from Kansas City sent me a bare bones board he'd etched for the Ram's Head Big Muff based on the pattern from the Effects Layout blog. I've done some of my own photoetching for hobbies - I first learned from the gurus at the Ohio State University Chemistry department's electronic shop - but I've never etched my own PCB. Therefore, this was the first time I'd attempt to use a truly "old school" board. That being said, now I've now found a completely new rabbit hole to go down - so look for some "home brew" stuff in future blog entries!

Updated Pi - Repainting a Friend's Pedal!

Back in September I posted a couple of versions of the Big Muff Pi I'd build using Aion FX's Halo board. One was done in silver with a Pink Floyd inspired font and recreated the circuit of the '73 Gilmour Ram's Head version of the pedal. The other one was done in Russian 4BO green and recreated the Red Army / Civil War circuit. A friend asked me to make up a second Russian style enclosure, so I did and sent it to him. Unfortunately there appears to have been an issue with my primer, as the paint started to flake on arrival which sort of ruined the effect. So he sent it back to me for a redo, and as long as we were doing it again, he wanted a bit of a variation on the theme...

Updating the Electric Mistress - No Send / Receive Loop Mod

Last week I posted an entry detailing my EHX Electric Mistress build based on the PCB Guitar Mania Electric Lover PCB. Overall I was pretty happy with the build, but I had noticed something a little unusual when I began the calibration process. In my first entry I mentioned having to crank the bias trimmer quite a bit to get a good tone (or any tone at all for that matter). On the PCB Guitar Mania Facebook group, another user posted that he was having a similar issue with his build, although his was apparently bad enough to where he couldn't get a reasonable calibration. Fortunately the long-time board users had a fix for him, and since I'd had a similar issue in my base-build, I decided to take a deep breath, pull the PCB out of the enclosure and try the fix on mine as well. 

The Electro-Harmonix Electric Mistress Flanger / Chorus

I'll be completely honest, I'm not a great guitar player at this point. I'm somewhere in the "intermediate" range, but I'm having a huge amount of fun learning not only guitar technique but chasing great sounds. One of the songs I've always loved is Rush's "Natural Science," and the flange effects at the beginning of it really do a lot to set the tone and mood of the piece. While no one seems to have a definitive answer (apart from Alex Lifeson, who apparently hasn't discussed / disclosed what hardware was used), the consensus is that he used an EHX Electric Mistress on the album Permanent Waves - especially on "The Spirit of Radio" (another song I need to learn...). As I'm on a massive pedal-building kick, and given one of my other guitar heroes David Gilmour also used one, I decided to build my own EHX Electric Mistress using PCB Guitar Mania's Electric Lover Flanger PCB. 

Pi All Around - Two Unique Versions of an Ubiquitous Pedal!

The Big Muff Pi, originally designed by Mike Matthews and released by his company Electro-Harmonix in 1969, is one of the most ubiquitous pedals ever produced. Combining elements of both distortion and fuzz with variable sustain, the Big Muff has been produced in a dizzying array of varieties over the years. Many of the variants were a result of EHX simply changing the value of the components willy-nilly during the production run. When Electro-Harmonix went out of business in 1982, clones and copies exploded on the scene, and Mike Matthews would re-open shop in the USSR under the Sovtek brand name and begin re-issuing his designs in the early 1990s. Matthews would bring production back to the US in 2000, and numerous new editions of the pedal have been released since then. If you're interested in the history of this great pedal, there are several great references, but one of the best is Kit Rae's page. 

Aion FX offers the Halo, which is their trace of the Big Muff. The only change is a mid-range switch that provides three mid-tone options: stock, flat, and boosted. Otherwise the circuit is a completely faithful tracing of the original. A spreadsheet of 18 different versions is included so you can target any variant with your build - or play around and develop your own recipe. At this point I've built two versions which are included in this entry, a Ram's Head '73 Gilmour and a Civil War / Red Army version. Depending on what transistors I'm able to find, I may go back and build other variants as well, as these are a lot of fun!