Aion's Spectron (Lovetone Meatball) & Dwarven Hammer (Horizon Precision Drive)

[eh là bas ma]

It has been a busy weekend. I read somewhere on this forum the Precision drive sounds good with leds, so I built it with a led clipping option (green). I tried to boost some distortions and overdrive with it, but it doesn't sound really good. I have yet to find how to use this circuit in an interesting manner. Any suggestions ?

The Spectron is amazing, you can even trigger the wah with an external source, like your finger touching the tip of a jack ! The artwork is white acrylic coating and a piece of a cheap rice packaging with an elephant printed on plastic.

 

[Paradox916]

I had built a dwarven hammer with green LEDs with the attack all the way down it is just a tube screamer but smoother as I turned up the attack it became more like a clean boost as it cut out all the low frequencies it clips at (I believe, could be totally wrong on that) but I thought it played pretty well with a compressor and noise gate into a Mesa. No two pedals ever seem to sound exactly the same, some just don’t get along with one another. And tone is in the ear of the beholder one mans holy grail tone is another’s wall of noise, lackluster, run of the mill nothing to write home about. The hammer does really well if you are into the different genres of modern metal .but if you aren’t trying to tighten up a high gain amp there are other pedals that probably do a better job getting the tone you are looking for.

 

[BuddytheReow]

I really like the artwork on this one!

 

[eh là bas ma]

I had built a dwarven hammer with green LEDs with the attack all the way down it is just a tube screamer but smoother as I turned up the attack it became more like a clean boost as it cut out all the low frequencies it clips at (I believe, could be totally wrong on that) but I thought it played pretty well with a compressor and noise gate into a Mesa. No two pedals ever seem to sound exactly the same, some just don’t get along with one another. And tone is in the ear of the beholder one mans holy grail tone is another’s wall of noise, lackluster, run of the mill nothing to write home about. The hammer does really well if you are into the different genres of modern metal .but if you aren’t trying to tighten up a high gain amp there are other pedals that probably do a better job getting the tone you are looking for.

If I understand you correctly, this circuit is calibrated to be used on its own (not for stacking) with an overdriven amp. That would give some "modern metal" sounds. Any idea what gives this modern metal character to this circuit compared to a TS ? Could it be as simple as the amount of bass allowed in the op-amp ?

My amp's overdrive doesn't sound bad, but it is quite casual. I like to stay away from the amp when i play, I never use the amp's distortion. But i'll give it a try, just in case there are some interesting sounds this way.

I am not sure what i am looking for with this drive, I built it out of curiosity, as always. As a player, i don't chase one tone, I like to explore and find some kind of use for every tones.
I noticed today that it works better with the Drive control set before 9' when I try to plugg it before an other high-gain circuit, such as a TweedMan (catalinbread 5f6) or a Derailer (Trainwreck od).

I already built a Palissade clone, wich is a TS with all the features you can imagine. I am considering to give it as a Christmas present : I guess it may be redundant since it is possible to tweak the Palissade to sound and to behave just like the Hammer, don't you think ?

 

[Paradox916]

Take my opinion with a grain of salt ( because thats all it is )and 90% of the members here have waaay more knowledge than I do.) I believe the only difference between the hammer and a standard tube screamer circuit is the “attack” switch that just changes between different filter cap values and a high gain jrc4558DD instead of a D. There might be some other components of slightly different values but I think the difference in sound and operation is probably negligible.. you should be able to stack this pedal in the same manner you would a ts9, I don’t personally do a lot of pedal stacking myself in the front chain as I can achieve the sound I like with a compressor, OD, noise gate into a tube amp.
The palisades seems like it could do everything the hammer can and more with the use of the bandwidth and clipping options... but I’m not certain as Ihave never played one. Hopefully that helps a little.

 

[peccary]

Looking good! I like the artwork and love how you did it. I was taking a hard look at the Spectrom board I have. Trying to decide if I want to tackle it, the Quadratron, or the Edge Lord first.

 

[eh là bas ma]

Thank you for the kind words !

I always keep my eyes wide open in the supermarket, looking for potential boxes and pictures...
This is where i got it, 5 euros for 2 kilos, and it tastes good once washed with water !

Not my first try. Here is a redshift phaser in the same spirit, different flavor...