Effect Pedal building

[davent]

Thanks guys! (I suppose i could trace a subconscious influence way back to the Brain Salad Surgery cover.)

Primarily aluminum tape and India Ink.

[IMG:800:600]http://i216.photobucket.com/albums/cc30 ... a1a118.jpg[/img]

Cut out a rectangle of tape, roll the embossing wheel around the perimeter of the aluminm rectangle to give it 'rivets' and stick it on the enclosure. Cover the enclosure with 'panels' add more texture to some of the panels with punches, nail and hammer, impress with screw/bolt threads, files and rasps anything that will press in and leave a dent. Paint with India Ink, let dry a minute or two wipe it off, repeat if necessary. Clearcoat with acrylic medium to protect the ink, splatter, drip, stamp with paint and ink then wipe off before they dry completely. Apply dry transfers, stencils, sand and any other abuse you can think of, acetone will strip it back down to the clean tape, isopropyl alcohol is far, far less aggressive. Lacquer when damage is complete.
dave

[ampgeek]

NICE!
That is way cool.
Well done,
Dave O.

[sepulchre]

That's nigh unto Steam Punk! Outstanding work!

[Reeltarded]

Thanks guys! (I suppose i could trace a subconscious influence way back to the Brain Salad Surgery cover.)

Primarily aluminum tape

Dood, brilliant, and consider at least partially STOLEN at this point because I am absolutely doing my amp in polished aluminum now!

[Tillydog]

Primarily aluminum tape and India Ink.

Way cool! Thanks for sharing.

I might just steal this idea....

[dorrisant]

Thanks for the info Dave...

Please post more pics of your stuff. It is definitely inspiring!

Tony

[vibratoking]

That finish treatment is awesome? Thanks for explaining. Does that finish stand up to any abuse or do you handle with kid gloves?

[davent]

Thanks again! No special treatment. The ink onto bare aluminum will rub off but that's what you want anyways. As it developed i coat with an acrylic medium, GAC200 to protect the under colours and allow abuse of the new colours without affecting whats gone on before. The final coat was a waterbased lacquer, Target 7000 and that seems to be holding up well. That said it's only a couple weeks old so too early to tell how well it will wear... could use some patina and wear & tear here and there, missed a few spots.

Keep it away from a long acetone bath and it should be OK.
dave

[davent]

Nothing new to show just yet but this was done at the end of last year, simple true-bypass box. Made it to use with a single, stereo-cable FX loop i put in a few other pedals but can still be used conventionally, volume control and feedback control (with on/off) in the loop as well. This one comes in handy as a breakout box when breadboarding circuits.

[IMG:800:600]http://i216.photobucket.com/albums/cc30 ... G_4947.jpg[/img]

[IMG:800:600]http://i216.photobucket.com/albums/cc30 ... G_4954.jpg[/img]

[IMG:637:461]http://i216.photobucket.com/albums/cc30 ... Crop-1.jpg[/img]

[IMG:400:300]http://i216.photobucket.com/albums/cc30 ... /50-13.jpg[/img][IMG:400:300]http://i216.photobucket.com/albums/cc30 ... /50-12.jpg[/img]

[IMG:800:600]http://i216.photobucket.com/albums/cc30 ... G_4925.jpg[/img]

[IMG:400:300]http://i216.photobucket.com/albums/cc30 ... /50-11.jpg[/img][IMG:400:300]http://i216.photobucket.com/albums/cc30 ... /50-14.jpg[/img]

Reminder for a couple great pedal building forums, i'm sure they showed up in earlier posts.

http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/
http://www.madbeanpedals.com/forum/

Take care

[M Fowler]

I like the pedal Dave with the rat and all

[ampgeek]

Really getting the itch to package up all of my effects ala' Pete Cornish.
Thought that I would tackle the footswitch cover first and share it with others that might be interested.

I came up with the attached. Should be fairly straight forward for one with a lathe and some skills. I have a retired friend with just those...and..he loves to do unique projects!

Got some excellent guidance from the good folks over at the PCB.com forum. Lots of really nice project boards at reasonable prices to boot. I have built 5 or 6 of there offerings over the last year or so and the all have worked great.

http://www.guitarpcb.com/apps/webstore/

Cheers,
Dave O.

[BTF]

Somehow, I found and read some articles on the Echoplex Ep-3 and it's "magical" preamp (a fairly simple, single JFET amplifier). Since the original JFET TIS58 is discontinued, I built two using a J201 and MPF102. I was surprised at how good this little circuit actually sounds! The J201 was a bit too gainy, but the MPF102 sounds very good. All it required was a minor bit of tweaking on the drain resistor. My overdrive pedals actually seem to sound better pushing it before my tube preamps.

Just wondering, have any of you tried this circuit?

[dorrisant]

BTF... haven't tried it but want to. Care to post it?

Tony

[BTF]

Be glad to, dorrisant! After all, it's Mike Battle's original circuit, not mine. Give me a bit to draw it up and scan it. Keep watch.

Bill.

[dorrisant]

Will do!