Show Your Pedal Builds

HomespunEffects said:
I’m still trying to figure out how to do the gold plating. Any tips are appreciated.
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I know how to remove gold plating but have no Idea how to put it on. :grin

I bought a strat years ago and didn't like the gold hardware so removed it with a metal polish called brasso. The parts ending up looking great. The layer under the gold was quite a warm silver colour. I couldn't believe how easy it was to get the gold off tbh.
 
Complete: Aion FX Procyon, based on a BJFe Honey Bee. I have no experience with the real pedal, so I can't comment on any comparisons to the source material. I've only really played with it enough to confirm everything it working but here are my initial thoughts:
  • This is a nice, low-gain overdrive. Similar to the KoT, I like the all-at-1 o' clock setting as a starting point.
  • Works best as a standalone overdrive into a clean or clean-ish amp. I didn't like it as a boost into a high-gain amp.
  • Might play better with single-coils for some applications because it does maintain a good bit of low end, even with the Low switch set for the most aggressive low-cut.
  • I didn't hear a massive difference between the two Mode settings, but I may have to use more extreme Nature settings to really hear the difference, according to the project documentation.

On the project, this was my first PCB kit build. I've done vero builds, and I've done full kits (such as I've posted on TGF), but I've never sourced just the PCB and gone from there. This comes with its own challenges - namely you're operating in a defined physical space and therefore there's a lot more pressure on getting the closure drilled correctly. Preparing the enclosure was, by far, my least favorite part of this project. However, in exchange for having to get the enclosure drilled correctly, internal wiring is much easier compared to a vero build - my vero builds always looked like a rat's nest. This was much easier to finish and looks much nicer too.

I definitely phoned-in the labeling part of the project, but I think it's charming like this. I also really hate this color scheme - I don't know what I was thinking. I don't know why I did yellow-on-white. Yellow-on-black would have been better, I think.

I have the Hadron (Lovepedal Eternity) and Viridian (Mad Prof Little Green Wonder) PCBs done. The Viridian enclosure is drilled, but I forgot to order one of the dual-gang parts, so I'm waiting on that one. I'll drill the enclosure and finish the Hadron up tomorrow maybe.

Next boards on the bench are the Tesseract (TC Integrated Pre) and Blaze (AmpTweaker Tight Drive).

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IMG_3562.jpeg
 
eggpl@nt said:
Complete: Aion FX Procyon, based on a BJFe Honey Bee. I have no experience with the real pedal, so I can't comment on any comparisons to the source material. I've only really played with it enough to confirm everything it working but here are my initial thoughts:
  • This is a nice, low-gain overdrive. Similar to the KoT, I like the all-at-1 o' clock setting as a starting point.
  • Works best as a standalone overdrive into a clean or clean-ish amp. I didn't like it as a boost into a high-gain amp.
  • Might play better with single-coils for some applications because it does maintain a good bit of low end, even with the Low switch set for the most aggressive low-cut.
  • I didn't hear a massive difference between the two Mode settings, but I may have to use more extreme Nature settings to really hear the difference, according to the project documentation.

On the project, this was my first PCB kit build. I've done vero builds, and I've done full kits (such as I've posted on TGF), but I've never sourced just the PCB and gone from there. This comes with its own challenges - namely you're operating in a defined physical space and therefore there's a lot more pressure on getting the closure drilled correctly. Preparing the enclosure was, by far, my least favorite part of this project. However, in exchange for having to get the enclosure drilled correctly, internal wiring is much easier compared to a vero build - my vero builds always looked like a rat's nest. This was much easier to finish and looks much nicer too.

I definitely phoned-in the labeling part of the project, but I think it's charming like this. I also really hate this color scheme - I don't know what I was thinking. I don't know why I did yellow-on-white. Yellow-on-black would have been better, I think.

I have the Hadron (Lovepedal Eternity) and Viridian (Mad Prof Little Green Wonder) PCBs done. The Viridian enclosure is drilled, but I forgot to order one of the dual-gang parts, so I'm waiting on that one. I'll drill the enclosure and finish the Hadron up tomorrow maybe.

Next boards on the bench are the Tesseract (TC Integrated Pre) and Blaze (AmpTweaker Tight Drive).

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View attachment 35064
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I like the honey bee and the MP sweet honey into fender amps but neither has worked for me into a Marshall style amp.

Nice build. I do love Aions pcbs and build docs.
 
I have 4 pedals in the build process. I missed some components when I ordered the parts. Interesting that I actually missed at least one component for each pedal. I ordered the parts I needed but haven't made it back to the pedals to work on them. It has been long enough now that I am going to have to go through the schematic and really look the boards over to see what is missing. I will then be at the part that for whatever reason was making me nervous and that is drilling all of the enclosures. I have a template for each one but am still nervous I will get some of the holes off by a bit. I don't have a drill press so hand drilling is going to be fun. Pilot holes are going to be important.
 
JasonE said:
I have a template for each one but am still nervous I will get some of the holes off by a bit. I don't have a drill press so hand drilling is going to be fun. Pilot holes are going to be important.
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Drill your holes 1mm oversized. It will give you a bit of wiggle room and will be covered by your washers so no one will know. That's saved me a load of times.

If you build more than a couple of pedals a year a cheap pillar drill is definitely worth it. Also get a stepped drill bit, it saves a lot of time without having to muck about changing lots of drill bits. I just drill 3mm pilot holes then switch to the stepped bit to widen them all out to the right size.
 
SillyOctpuss said:
Drill your holes 1mm oversized. It will give you a bit of wiggle room and will be covered by your washers so no one will know. That's saved me a load of times.

If you build more than a couple of pedals a year a cheap pillar drill is definitely worth it. Also get a stepped drill bit, it saves a lot of time without having to muck about changing lots of drill bits. I just drill 3mm pilot holes then switch to the stepped bit to widen them all out to the right size.
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I thought about buying one of those cheaper devices you can mount your regular drill into that makes it into a small drill press. I would probably be better off just buying a cheap drill press. They are not that expensive. I do have some stepped drill bits already. I have no idea what I may want to do for finishes on the enclosures. My plan is to get them all done and make sure it all works then I can pull the boards and jacks out of the enclosures and finish them in some way.

I decided to start building pedals to feed my overdrive addiction. This way I can get to try overdrive pedals at a much cheaper price and it also feeds the hobby of getting to build and modify circuits. I like the idea of one hobby feeding another.
 
eggpl@nt said:
TC Integrated Pre, Amptweaker Tight Drive, and Lovepedal Eternity all ready to be enclosed. I just need to mentally prepare for all that marking and drilling...
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I wasn't sure if all the out-of-box prewiring would make final assembly more or less difficult, but this really went off without a hitch. The Blaze (Amptweaker Tight Drive) is complete.

I'm a sucker for boosts that allow you to tune the low end - see also, Friedman Buxom Boost, Airis PikaDrive, Way Huge Green Rhino, etc. I was super excited to complete this pedal, and it's an incredible boost - it's not honky, it has a good amount of output, tone control has a good sweep, and the tight control is a thing of beauty. Even at its max setting, the tight control lets just enough low-end through so as to not make the overall tone sound weak or anemic. I even like this as an overdrive into a clean amp. However, in these applications, the tone control can get a little gnarly near the last third of the sweep - almost like a bright, screeching fuzz.

Astute viewers of the gut shot will notice several socketed parts near the Aion logo, on the righthand side of the board. The socketed resistor and capacitor above the logo control the total output of the pedal. I opted for a higher-gain configuration than the stock pedal. And the socketed capacitor below the logo (unpopulated) completes a low-pass filter (high cut) at the output. I've omitted this component, but I suppose it may help to tame the aforementioned gnarly brightness when used as an overdrive. However, since I will probably only ever use this as a boost, I probably won't populate that cap. The tone control didn't sound nearly as abrasive driving an already-driven amp.

I probably should capture these pedals with NAM or the QC to share them...

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PLX said:
[IMGs]
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Nice. My first soldering station was from CircuitSpecialists and must have been a clone of that Hakko unit. I didn't realize that CS station was a clone until this very moment.

How did you do that graphic on the pedal? As charming as my label-maker graphics may be (to me, at least) that's the next frontier for me - learning how to make the outside look nice.
 
eggpl@nt said:
Nice. My first soldering station was from CircuitSpecialists and must have been a clone of that Hakko unit. I didn't realize that CS station was a clone until this very moment.

How did you do that graphic on the pedal? As charming as my label-maker graphics may be (to me, at least) that's the next frontier for me - learning how to make the outside look nice.
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That one.. I used photo-quality glossy, printer paper - glued it to the painted enclosure - then over-sprayed with clear coat.

I took a photo of one of Chris Merren's Shaffer-Vega wireless units and applied a graphics filter to make that visual effect.
 
PLX said:
That one.. I used photo-quality glossy, printer paper - glued it to the painted enclosure - then over-sprayed with clear coat.

I took a photo of one of Chris Merren's Shaffer-Vega wireless units and applied a graphics filter to make that visual effect.
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You can get self adhesive glossy photopaper. It Would save you having to apply any extra glue.
 
Cinder is done. My good run was bound to end eventually - I don't know that I'm too fond of this one. That's on me, because I should have maybe considered a different fuzz build, but I wanted to complete the Aion Amptweaker trifecta with the Tight Drive, Metal, and Fuzz.

In building a fuzz, I wanted something big, spitty, and saturated. If the Tight Fuzz is capable of those tones, I haven't found them yet. It can get spitty, but it doesn't really saturate very much. It's also possible my expectations are just out of line. I have no experience with fuzzes (this is my first fuzz pedal ever), so maybe I'm not using it right or maybe those fuzz tones I hear in my head are in fact something else or fuzz + something else.

For clarity - I was using the Cinder into a clean Bandmaster model on the Axe Fx. I should also try this into a distorted amp, and it's probably worth trying to stack this with other drive/distortion pedals as well. It's not love at first sight, but I'm willing to work through our issues.

Part of my problem, I think, is the range of fuzzed-out tones is small on this pedal. It really only gets fuzzy when the Fuzz knob is around 2 o'clock. When I first activated the pedal with everything at noon, I thought it was busted because the tone I was getting hardly sounded different than my base clean tone. That could make the Tight Fuzz an interesting boost pedal. I'll have to give that a whirl.

The build itself was challenging and fun. Similar to the Gladiator kit I built, there are a lot of knobs and switches to line up, but the enclosure is much smaller this time. I 3D printed a jig to help get all the holes drilled precisely, and it worked marvelously. The final assembly process went super smoothly.

Even if this isn' the fuzz I wanted, per se, it's still a cool pedal. The switches give it a lot of tonal options, and it'll take some time to really explore this pedal. I'll keep it in rotation and try it in a few different scenarios. If you fuzz connoisseurs and aficionados have any wisdom to bestow upon me, I'm all ears.

Pink knobs are an homage to my favorite pair of pink fuzzy handcuffs, obviously.

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IMG_3593.jpeg
 
eggpl@nt said:
Cinder is done. My good run was bound to end eventually - I don't know that I'm too fond of this one. That's on me, because I should have maybe considered a different fuzz build, but I wanted to complete the Aion Amptweaker trifecta with the Tight Drive, Metal, and Fuzz.

In building a fuzz, I wanted something big, spitty, and saturated. If the Tight Fuzz is capable of those tones, I haven't found them yet. It can get spitty, but it doesn't really saturate very much. It's also possible my expectations are just out of line. I have no experience with fuzzes (this is my first fuzz pedal ever), so maybe I'm not using it right or maybe those fuzz tones I hear in my head are in fact something else or fuzz + something else.

For clarity - I was using the Cinder into a clean Bandmaster model on the Axe Fx. I should also try this into a distorted amp, and it's probably worth trying to stack this with other drive/distortion pedals as well. It's not love at first sight, but I'm willing to work through our issues.

Part of my problem, I think, is the range of fuzzed-out tones is small on this pedal. It really only gets fuzzy when the Fuzz knob is around 2 o'clock. When I first activated the pedal with everything at noon, I thought it was busted because the tone I was getting hardly sounded different than my base clean tone. That could make the Tight Fuzz an interesting boost pedal. I'll have to give that a whirl.

The build itself was challenging and fun. Similar to the Gladiator kit I built, there are a lot of knobs and switches to line up, but the enclosure is much smaller this time. I 3D printed a jig to help get all the holes drilled precisely, and it worked marvelously. The final assembly process went super smoothly.

Even if this isn' the fuzz I wanted, per se, it's still a cool pedal. The switches give it a lot of tonal options, and it'll take some time to really explore this pedal. I'll keep it in rotation and try it in a few different scenarios. If you fuzz connoisseurs and aficionados have any wisdom to bestow upon me, I'm all ears.

Pink knobs are an homage to my favorite pair of pink fuzzy handcuffs, obviously.

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View attachment 35495
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I didn't know amp tweaker had made a fuzz pedal. I was just reading the build doc from aion, seems the fuzz pot controls the gain and the bias in Q2. According to the doc it's a light fuzz at noon and once you get to 2/3 o'clock it becomes a traditional fuzz tone. I can see what you mean about a small range of fuzz tones. That would put me off tbh.

If you're looking for a more traditional fuzz I'd go for a silicon sun face clone or a JHF1 clone. The skreddy fuzzes are always worth a look too, great pedals.
 
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