Finished pedals, pics, clips !! !! !!

[syzygy]

Well, it's time for me to give back to the community.  I have finally finished my first stompbox project.. Instead of doing one I did four boxes, started in April of this year.  Thanks to the wonderfully generous people on this site, GEOFEX, tonepad, generalguitargadgets, and runoffgroove for inspiration, instruction, and guidance!  One tip I can offer that I don't think is mentioned on this site mounting their PCBs is to buy 3M interlocking plastic fasteners from Home Depot or similar store.. they are yellow and have adhesive backs and work on similar principle as velcro.  You can see one of the fasteners in the corner of the Insanity guts picture.  To remove the board, you just pull it and it snaps out, and snaps back in easily.  I originally planned to use screws but they didn't fit due to my poor planning.     So I used the fasteners, on all the boards and they work great!  Tell me what you think!

Insanity Box - sound clip
This is Aron's Insanity Box, which I have modified by replacing three trimmers with the orange pots, and I also installed a switch for germanium/silicon diode selection, and another switch for opamp selection.  The sound clip was made chip set to TL071, and diode set to a germanium.  With these settings it gets a great growl crunch.  The RC4558P sounds tighter.. this project has surpassed my expectations, and I have finally found some sounds that I have been searching for for years.  With my mods the original PCB wouldn't fit in the box, so I grabbed the free EagleCAD software and designed my own circuit layout that you see here in the guts.



fOXX Tone Machine - sound clip
This is the stock circuit, except I had to use a small 100k audio volume pot  and a 100k audio tone pot instead of 50k linear ones because they fit better in the box.  I don't think it made any difference in the sound.



BSIABII
What can I say that hasn't been said about this one yet?  It's a great sounding distortion.



Shaka Express
This pedal has a different distortion character than I'm used to hearing out of pedals.. you might call it darker? warmer? tubier?  It's all subjective anyway.

[Hal]

what is that finish...?

[MartyB]

Gorgeous boxes and a sweet soundclip!  What paint and labelling did you use?

Nice work syzygy

[syzygy]

what is that finish...?

The finish was laborious!  hah.. I started by sanding the box, then used Duplicolor Adhesion Promotor.. then a few coats of Duplicolor Metalcast, two coats of DupliColor Truck Van and SUV clear top coat, the labels, and about three more coats of top coat.  here I wasn't sure what to do, so I let it sit for 4 weeks untouched.. The surface still was a bit tacky, and sortof grabbed on to the washers when I tightened the pots down slightly, so I decided to attempt something more drastic that I was afraid might screw it up the paint and labelling..     I sanded it down a bit with 2000grit, baked it in the oven at 150-200 degrees for several hours.  left them alone for a day or so, and did this again, and the finish looked ok then.  I think my mistake was adding too much top coat, which made it tacky and took a much longer time to cure (according to what I've read on this site).  But after sanding some of this down, and smoothed out the sanding marks in the outer coat by baking the surface, it was definitely "drier".  Sanding the surface added scratch marks that mostly came out when baking and polishing, but it's not a complete mirror finish when you look real close.  Then I added some guitar polish and rubbed it in.  I was a little concerned about the pot washers embedding in the surface, but after a day of being screwed in tightly and loosening them, most washers didn't stick, but some stuck a little.  So that was good enough for me.

[syzygy]

Gorgeous boxes and a sweet soundclip!  What paint and labelling did you use?

Nice work syzygy

Thanks!     I used Duplicolor metalcast paint, and the labelling was white waterslide decals.  I used an exacto blade to cut them out before wetting and placing them.  You can still see the edges of the labels a little bit when you have a box in your hand.  Actaully I'm not sure that using the clearcoat that I did was a good idea on these labels becasue after putting the clearcoat on, the labels etched and cracked just a little bit.. i don't know if you can even see this in the pics, but it's not a big deal to me.  They look fine at a distance.

[Connoisseur of Distortion]

your boxes are absolutely gorgeous. i love the finish!

[zeta55]

Beutiful boxes, the depht end the colours are amazing. I wich I could get that finish on my boxes.

[radio]

syzygy:

Besides the state of the art finishes and the useful soundclips another feature arouse my curiosity on your "Insanity Box":

How does the OpAmp switch from "Tl071 to Rc4558" work?

A never seen before feature!

Greetings JMErnzer

[syzygy]

syzygy:

Besides the state of the art finishes and the useful soundclips another feature arouse my curiosity on your "Insanity Box":

How does the OpAmp switch from "Tl071 to Rc4558" work?

A never seen before feature!

Greetings JMErnzer, thanks for the kind words! And everyone, thank you for your appreciation!  The switch is a 4PDT toggle switch that I have hooked up to 4 legs of each OpAmp.. In+, In-, Out, and Power.  The ground to each chip stays connected at all times.  Each time you switch, it routes the three signals from the circuit board and power to the alternate chip.  There's a noise when you throw the switch, but it's not very loud.  You can see the 4PDT in the picture with all those wires attached to it, and you can see the two chips mounted on the circuit board on the bottom left.

[jimbob]

Very Nice work! I love those finishes.. Very inspiring!

[markr04]

I'm impressed! Your finishes prove that technique alone is worth more than expensive finishing materials. Many will be inspired by your work.

[radio]

I did not expect a 4PDT would do the job, but I imagine in a Dist+ clone

the difference between lm741 and opa134 would be quiet noticable!

Thanks for the quick reply!

Greetings JMErnzer

[Herr Masel]

Damn, so many wires! Your boxes look really nice, I prefer a more DIY/idiosyncratic look myself, but I can't deny the beauty of those! But who am I to speak, I have my finger up my arse as far as enclosures go, I need to step on it.

[tiges_ tendres]

very inspiring! the fox tone machine sounds like every stooges song I ever heard!  I'ts going on my to do list.  it sounds a lot like the deluxe bazz fuzz but with better note decay.

[ezanker]

Excellent work!  The pedals look incredible.

Were the sound samples recorded direct to sound card or miced?
Erik

[syzygy]

Were the sound samples recorded direct to sound card or miced?

I miced them with an SM57.. but didn't pay too much attention to mic technique, I basically stuck a mic close to the speaker and hit record.  They sound better in person.

[MartyMart]

WOW  !!
That's some beautiful work, both inside and out, I'm impressed  !!   
I've had some trouble trying to get "pro" finishes, "boxing up" is as important as
the circuit !

Marty.

[vanhansen]

Absolutely fantastic.  I love the paintjobs.  They made my wife go "Oooooo"....LOL. 

[syzygy]

I did not expect a 4PDT would do the job, but I imagine in a Dist+ clone
the difference between lm741 and opa134 would be quiet noticable!

JMErnzer-

I didn't know the switch would work either, until I tried it.  It worked logically on paper, but that's no guarantee.  And about opamp sounds, I tried several different chips in different circuits I started out with (Chaos was one of them), and noticed differences in most of them.  Sometimes the differences were more subtle, sometimes less subtle.  But it definitely depends which guitar/pickup/speakers/amp you're using too..  For instance, the TL071 in the Insanity Box sounds better on one pickup/phase settings on one guitar, whereas the RC4558P sounds better with different settings on a different guitar.

Regards,
syzygy

[syzygy]

WOW  !!
That's some beautiful work, both inside and out, I'm impressed  !!   
I've had some trouble trying to get "pro" finishes, "boxing up" is as important as
the circuit !

Marty,

Aww shucks.. that means a lot, really.  You guys have been my mentors as I quietly read post after post on this site.    One thing I'm not sure about is how well the box will hold up to chipping.. I've heard that us DIY'ers can come to expect it.  But even a brand new Boss pedal I bought and modified got chipped recently, and that was a professional finish.  I guess anything meant to be stomped on is destined for battlescars.

vanhansen,

ROF your post made me grin, heheh.  some DIY'ers wives probably hate stompboxes because how much time they require to finish.. You think that's why there is the schematic site called home-wrecker.com?   

syzygy