Crybaby mods. What a difference!

[Paul Marossy]

From what I hear I think I want a Maestro Boomerang...

It's still one of my most favorites, and I have tried or built most of the inductor based wah ciruits that exist. 

[anti-idiot]

This is kinda off-topic, but I think you'll enjoy it:

http://www.youtube.com/user/crybabydoc

The story of the wah-wah pedal.

[Paul Marossy]

This is kinda off-topic, but I think you'll enjoy it:

http://www.youtube.com/user/crybabydoc

The story of the wah-wah pedal.

Nice video. The only thing I didn't like is that they basically attribute all the character of the old wah pedals to the inductor. They seem to be oblivious to the variability of all the rest of the parts, too. Anyway, they probably did that on purpose so they can maintain the marketing hype about inductors and keep the average joe consumer guitar player in fallacy land.  

[Gus]

Paul

Have you looked at this idea I have not had time to build it yet. It sims nice.
R11 and R12 are a 100k lin pot

Bootstrapped EF input and EF sweep cap driver stage.  EF after the gain transistor to drive lower "harder" value loads allowing tapering resistors.  Tune the same way as other whas to taste.

[ghostsauce]

I had such great results with the mods I mentioned at the beginning of this thread, that I decided yesterday to convert it to true bypass and remove the buffer. Not because I have ever noticed any tone-sucking issues, or because I have a stigma about buffered pedals, but I guess because I was bored. So anyways, I do all of that and plug it back in... TERRIBLE sound. It was completely un-usable.. I'm going to assume it was so bad because of the other mods I made.. like I had a very deep and thick wah sound before removing the buffer, but once it was gone it was too deep and too thick and the sweep was way way off & everything.

I can imagine that performing only the true bypass/buffer removal mod is enough to completely change the voice of the wah.. But anyways, I had to put the buffer back together by trial and error and install the old switch. It sounds amazing again, but man what a headache. I'd like to know if anyone has had great tone results after performing only the tb mod.

[Paul Marossy]

Paul

Have you looked at this idea I have not had time to build it yet. It sims nice.
R11 and R12 are a 100k lin pot

Bootstrapped EF input and EF sweep cap driver stage.  EF after the gain transistor to drive lower "harder" value loads allowing tapering resistors.  Tune the same way as other whas to taste.

Uh.... no. Did we talk about this before?

[ghostsauce]

Hmm, it still doesn't sound quite right to me. Does anyone have a schematic with the input buffer that has the resistors numbered?  Need to double check that I did it right but I am coming up blank searching here and the web for it.

[Joe Hart]

There should be plenty of gut shots online, so you could just match the resistors that way without needing a schematic (or even knowing the values -- just match the color bands).
-Joe Hart

[zombiwoof]

I think the problem is that the buffer changes the sound of the wah, if you wanted to true bypass and remove the buffer you should have done it before modding.  After removing the buffer and adding TB, you are going to have to re-visit your mods and adjust the values for the sound of the pedal without the buffer.  People have reported that the Dunlop buffer makes the pedal brighter, so I'm not surprised that after removing it the sound has dulled.

When I decided to mod my Vox V847 (the older Dunlop-made version, not the newer Chinese one), I wanted to make it sound like the vintage Clyde McCoy wah I had when I was a kid.  I used the info at Fuzz Central to do my mods.  After analyzing how the modern Vox wah differed from the vintage circuit, I saw that it basically came down to the higher-gain transistors that Dunlop uses (MPSA18), and a couple of different values of resistors that they changed to accommodate those higher-gain transistors.  I put in some BC109B's in the 350-400 hfe range, changed the couple of resistors to the vintage values, and just those changes made the wah sound a lot more vintage.  I haven't even changed the inductor yet, but I plan to put a Whipple or Area 51 inductor in at some point.  I also TB'd it.  Of course, mine didn't come with the input buffer circuit.  I was also planning on putting in an output buffer to make it work better in front of my Fuzz Face, but I recently made a discovery, I found that if I insert a certain compressor pedal in between the wah and the FF, the wah works with the fuzz and also the FF works by itself even with the comp on.  So far, I've found this to be the case with both my BBE Bench Press (Ross comp clone) and my BBE Main Squeeze (Orange Squeezer clone).  My guess is that those two comps have the right output impedance to work with the Fuzz Face.  I haven't tried it with any of my other comps yet, but since I was planning on using a comp set to slight compression early in my chain anyway as a buffer (always on), it seems that I don't have to put the output buffer in my wah after all.

Anyway, good luck with your wah, hope you get it to your liking.

Al

[BoxOfSnoo]

Hmm, it still doesn't sound quite right to me. Does anyone have a schematic with the input buffer that has the resistors numbered?  Need to double check that I did it right but I am coming up blank searching here and the web for it.

I could take a pic of my 535Q if you think it's similar enough.

Maybe you let some mojo out when you desoldered things?

[ghostsauce]

Sure BoS, if you don't mind! Yeah, definitely leaked out some of the mojo. I have a sad.

[BoxOfSnoo]

Sure BoS, if you don't mind! Yeah, definitely leaked out some of the mojo. I have a sad.

OOh, I just opened mine, and it's all SMT.  It probably won't help you then, right?

[ghostsauce]

lol, nope. Thanks anyways though