A Long and Winding (Development) Road - The Dimetrodon Distortion is Finally Done!

When I started building guitar pedals a few years ago I had a couple of initial goals in mind. First, I wanted better (and affordable) access to guitar pedals that were expensive, esoteric, out of production, or often a combination of all three. Second, I'd always had an interest in electronics (I work as a materials chemist in the semiconductor industry, and my uncle was always good with electronics), so building my own pedals seemed like a great vector to develop my skills in an area that I'd long neglected. As with most people new to the hobby, I started with professionally produced PCBs which were clones of the pedals I wanted build. However the further I delved into the hobby, the more I wanted to start making something different or unique - which gave rise to the idea of creating my own distortion pedal using a classic pedal as a base. 

A little over a year ago I posted an article with my hand-etched prototypes of the Dimetrodon Distortion pedal. It basically took the MXR Distortion+ and added a Big Muff tone stack and a gain recovery stage. It was okay, but after I'd built it and tested it, there were problems. It tended to pop a fair amount because of where the volume and gain recovery were located in the circuit. I tried solving this with pull-down resistors, buffers, you name it, but it just didn't quite fix the issue. So I decided to take a step back and see if I could re-engineer the pedal a bit better, and now a year later - it's finally done!

Dimetrodon Distortion prototype enclosure

Another New Design - The Falcarius Overdrive - Modified TSV808 With 3-Band EQ

As I mentioned yesterday in my entry on the Kosmoceratops, I've moved from simply populating boards laid out by 3rd parties (either professionally or by request) to boards I've laid out myself. One of my all-time favorite pedals it the TSV808 (the Secret Spinosaurus in its dino version), so when I found that "Chuck Bones" of Celestial Engineering had worked with others on a modified version of that circuit with a 3-band equalizer, I knew I had to try laying one out myself.

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). 

Don't Fear the (Hoof) Reaper - A Double Fuzz With Octave

There are many combination pedals on the market today. Sometimes these combine two different types of pedals, other times they pair very similar pedals. I've done several of these in the past including a clone of the Cheese Source (a distortion + fuzz clone), a clone of the ThorpyFX Heavy Water (essentially a clean boost + dirty boost), and even a build inspired by the venerable Mu-Tron Bi-Phase (two of the same six-stage phaser in one box, with some extras). A few years ago, Earthquaker Devices decided to mate wto of their fuzz pedals - the Hoof and the Reaper together in one pedal, an sneakily added an additional octave up circuit (later released as the Tentacle) to the mix. The pedal was available in both the normal "Hoof Reaper" version, and with a "Cloven Hoof" variation - the "Cloven Hoof Reaper." PedalPCB has a board available for this project, the War Scythe, so I decided to take the plunge... well, twice!

Supersized Kloned Centrosaurus!

By this point I've built a lot of Klon clones using multiple different boards - AionFX, PedalPCB, Ceriatone, South Obolon FX, Tone Geek, and Puzzle Sounds are the ones I can remember off of the top of my head. I've used several combinations of diodes and a variety of part load outs depending on what I was trying to do with the pedal. I had a friend approach me and commission a large form factor Klon clone, so I decided to go back to the Tone Geek BFK board, and work out from there. 

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!

Return of the MX-RAWR! Distortion+ with Options!

A few weeks ago I posted a custom MXR Distortion+ build I worked up for a friend using the tried and true AionFX Aphelion board. Well, the response I got to the design was frankly overwhelming and unprecedented. So I've decided to make up a few more for the shop. If they sell, I'll make more. They're not terribly hard, but I really want to keep using good vintage diodes where possible. So that may limit the pedal's lifespan, but maybe not. We'll see.