Aurum Drive (Friedman Golden Pearl)

[southpaw-dd]

Build Rating

4.00 star(s)

I've got the Friedman version of this pedal which is a favorite for boosting the front end of my Dirty Shirley Mini tube amp. If the drive is set higher on the no diode or LED modes, it can get grainy and has an unpleasant note decay. Much better for pushing level without much drive/clipping. The diode voice does sound pretty good, but not my favorite drive for that purpose.

The real pedal sounds a bit sweeter in the mids than my build, but it is pretty subtle. I'm going to change out the LM833N to see if another op-amp makes any difference at all.

My first attempt at the Tayda UV print was a fail - I had reversed the voice and hi-cut sides on the front panel. This is the Metallic Light Gold enclosure color, with black UV print and matte gloss layer on the black printed areas.

I like using the pre-bond ribbon cables from Stomp Box Parts for connecting the 3PDT board to the main board.

Overall, an easy build and sounds good for low gain boosting or medium gain boosting in the diode voice. The high cut feature is nice and something I'd like to see on other pedals.

 

[cdwillis]

The graphics turned out great! I really gotta figure out the whole graphic design and UV printing thing.

 

[jessenator]

That turned out wonderfully. Nice work!

I keep saying I don't need another overdrive, but the GAS is strong.

The graphics turned out great! I really gotta figure out the whole graphic design and UV printing thing.

Steggo and GotA have got great tutorials, and they lay out the process in detail for the art prep side. I've learned too that there's a checklist on the cart items side to always double check, especially on the first go with the service.

I've forgotten to buy the right "items" for a print—learning the hard way is something of a specialty of mine. Hopefully I didn't miss this time around… triple and quadruple checked the art files, wrote down detailed lists of everything. Anyhow, i don't want to hijack the thread any more than I've done. Feel free to pm me if you'd like.

 

[southpaw-dd]

Steggo and GotA have got great tutorials, and they lay out the process in detail for the art prep side. I've learned too that there's a checklist on the cart items side to always double check, especially on the first go with the service.

Thanks for the complements on the graphic. I agree on the great resources here and they helped me a ton! I'm using Affinity Designer 2 and a lot of my graphics are Etsy SVG files or similar ways to get started without much 'designing'.

The Aurum posted here was artwork created by my wife who actually has the patience to draw using software tools vs. me being more of an integrator of images/art. I'm happy to answer any Tayda UV print questions as well - and I've also learned from all the mistakes at least once.

 

[jessenator]

The Aurum posted here was artwork created by my wife who actually has the patience to draw using software tools vs. me being more of an integrator of images/art. I'm happy to answer any Tayda UV print questions as well - and I've also learned from all the mistakes at least once.

That's very cool to team up like that I should my the mrs if she could do some hand-lettering one of these times. She's brilliant at calligraphy.

 

[southpaw-dd]

If you can get the calligraphy in a digital format (preferably a vector graphic format like SVG), it makes it easy to work with for Affinity Designer 2 or other programs that can generate the PDF necessary for Tayda.

My guess is that an iPad or similar with a drawing device could be a solution for hand-drawn or written art. I may give that a try and see how it works.

 

[jessenator]

She's done several wedding announcements for friends where I scan it and vectorize it and we arrange it—ha, now I think about it, I guess we have done collab, just not on a pedal

I have my ancient version of Illustrator on my old Mac Pro. Missing some of the new features, but it gets the job done. I have thought about Affinity Designer (I bought Affinity Photo for my new'ish PC), but with 20+ years in Adobe, it's hard to switch. Like having to move from Eagle to KiCAD

 

[southpaw-dd]

I used to use OrCAD to do work related schematics and PCBs in the early 2000's and I attempted Eagle once and stopped within minutes. Not happening for me...