Do you ever rebuild your pedals?

[falco_femoralis]

Do you ever not like the outcome of your pedals and decide to rebuild them? I have a few that turned out ok at the time, but now that my tastes have developed, I'd like to redo them. This means rehousing them and perhaps adding a modification to the board, like different EQ controls etc. And new artwork.

I thought about having each pedal being a representation of where I was in my path, but now I'm thinking that's bullshit. For example, I used to abhor 125b's and put a lot of 125b sized boards into 1590bb's because I preferred the shorter height. Now I'm getting over myself and slowly becoming one with the 125b master race, and I'm going to rehome some of those pedals. So I get to throw away the original enclosures which isn't motivating at all. It's a vicious cycle.

 

[jimilee]

Do you ever not like the outcome of your pedals and decide to rebuild them? I have a few that turned out ok at the time, but now that my tastes have developed, I'd like to redo them. This means rehousing them and perhaps adding a modification to the board, like different EQ controls etc. And new artwork.

I thought about having each pedal being a representation of where I was in my path, but now I'm thinking that's bullshit. For example, I used to abhor 125b's and put a lot of 125b sized boards into 1590bb's because I preferred the shorter height. Now I'm getting over myself and slowly becoming one with the 125b master race, and I'm going to rehome some of those pedals. So I get to throw away the original enclosures which isn't motivating at all. It's a vicious cycle.

Heck no! I just build a whole new one, because I can. I just did that with one in my last set of 5.

 

[Harry Klippton]

I disassembled a whole PCB and put the components on a new one. Does that count?

 

[Mentaltossflycoon]

Do you ever not like the outcome of your pedals and decide to rebuild them? I have a few that turned out ok at the time, but now that my tastes have developed, I'd like to redo them. This means rehousing them and perhaps adding a modification to the board, like different EQ controls etc. And new artwork.

I thought about having each pedal being a representation of where I was in my path, but now I'm thinking that's bullshit. For example, I used to abhor 125b's and put a lot of 125b sized boards into 1590bb's because I preferred the shorter height. Now I'm getting over myself and slowly becoming one with the 125b master race, and I'm going to rehome some of those pedals. So I get to throw away the original enclosures which isn't motivating at all. It's a vicious cycle.

Funny, I prefer 125b therefore I hate 1590bb and tend to use 1590bb2 because of the height difference.

I was using AI art as a goof for a while but it became less and less funny. I've since refinished some of those boxes on a few circuits that I actually intend to keep using in public.

 

[ICTRock]

Do you ever not like the outcome of your pedals and decide to rebuild them? I have a few that turned out ok at the time, but now that my tastes have developed, I'd like to redo them. This means rehousing them and perhaps adding a modification to the board, like different EQ controls etc. And new artwork.

I thought about having each pedal being a representation of where I was in my path, but now I'm thinking that's bullshit. For example, I used to abhor 125b's and put a lot of 125b sized boards into 1590bb's because I preferred the shorter height. Now I'm getting over myself and slowly becoming one with the 125b master race, and I'm going to rehome some of those pedals. So I get to throw away the original enclosures which isn't motivating at all. It's a vicious cycle.

sort of ... like I did the footswitch repair on the third man fuzz-a-tron but ended up adding the parallel resistors to make the pots the vintage values for a fuzzrite, added the pulldown resistor on the input, and added the missing 22K fuzzrite resistor on a switch

I was sort of disappointed in my take on a FTM and ended up getting the WA version on the cheap rather than rebuild it

I've been thinking about taking a second look at my jordan bosstone because it is a disappointment ... not nearly as aggressive as demos would make it out to be

 

[falco_femoralis]

I've been thinking about taking a second look at my jordan bosstone because it is a disappointment ... not nearly as aggressive as demos would make it out to be

My SD-1 came out like that, there's not very much gain. I shelved it. I wish there was an OD-3 PCB here, I like discreet transistor circuits

 

[falco_femoralis]

I disassembled a whole PCB and put the components on a new one. Does that count?

oof, I've done that too. It isn't worth the desoldering braid unless there's specialty components involved

 

[owlexifry]

actually yeah - a couple months ago i rebuilt my first ST-9 build.
because it was a socketed build, i was using it as an opamp test bed for other ST-9 builds (testing obscure metal can LF353 opamps from ebay sellers and such, to confirm/compare how they would perform in the same circuit without breadboarding)

eventually those sockets wore out and it became defunct/intermittent.

so i pulled the sockets, resoldered in some fresh opamps, replaced a couple other sad looking components, and then decided to redo all of the offboard wiring as well, cos the initial build was honestly pretty dogshit compared to other recent builds.

so the next question is, how poor form is it to post an update on a zombie build report?

 

[falco_femoralis]

so the next question is, how poor form is it to post an update on a zombie build report?

That reminds me, I was having a problem with noise from the clock knob on my Deflector build until I finally replaced the Ti CD4049 with a NOS one from small bear. But I feel updating the thread isn't worthwhile without a new pic and that means remembering to bring the pedal downstairs...yuck

 

[owlexifry]

That reminds me, I was having a problem with noise from the clock knob on my Deflector build until I finally replaced the Ti CD4049 with a NOS one from small bear. But I feel updating the thread isn't worthwhile without a new pic and that means remembering to bring the pedal downstairs...yuck

if you're gonna do that, i reckon it'd be worthwhile even going the extra step and capturing the difference between the x2 4049 chips with a couple quick sound clips to show the difference.
otherwise it's another 'trust me bro' scenario. like when folks post build reports and talk all about how great it sounds with no clips for context.

 

[zeropluszero]

I've just finished jamming soft switch relay boards into most of my keeper pedals, used the opportunity to do some little things to each pedals, predominately taking out 4.7K ohm CLR and replacing with 33K - much better.

 

[HamishR]

My SD-1 came out like that, there's not very much gain. I shelved it. I wish there was an OD-3 PCB here, I like discreet transistor circuits

Heliodor Amp Overdrive / BOSS® OD-3 Overdrive

The final entry in a series of legendary pedals using BOSS’s “discrete op-amp” topology that overdrives more like an amplifier than traditional drive circuits.

aionfx.com

 

[jcpst]

so the next question is, how poor form is it to post an update on a zombie build report?

My experience on this forum has been that zombie posting is normal. I regularly see updates to threads that have been cold for months or years.

I think about rebuilding pedals more than I actually do it. The first pedal I rebuilt for myself was just to see if I could pull off a point-to-point build (it worked).

I’ve upgraded my existing builds a number of times. New art, swap knobs, add a mod. What’s tricky is I don’t waste enclosures. So if I do a rehousing, I figure out how I can reuse the old enclosure.

One thing I find appealing is ways to fit circuits I like into smaller enclosures.

 

[falco_femoralis]

if you're gonna do that, i reckon it'd be worthwhile even going the extra step and capturing the difference between the x2 4049 chips with a couple quick sound clips to show the difference.
otherwise it's another 'trust me bro' scenario. like when folks post build reports and talk all about how great it sounds with no clips for context.

Yeah you're right, probably not worth the effort to update the thread at that point

On here, I don't worry about burden of proof. I mainly post build docs to show the construction process, as that's what's the most fun for me. Actually, finding an overdrive pedal I really like is a double edged sword because it takes away the motivation to build more.

Speaking of context, your guitars, amps, combination of other pedals all contribute to your sound. Plus being that we all source different components, and use different building techniques, it's very very unlikely that if you and I build the same circuit, it would sound the same thru your setup vs mine. Because of the inherent variation, and the fact that I don't want to haul my amp downstairs to my workbench, I don't worry about sound clips.

 

[Passinwind]

Do you ever not like the outcome of your pedals and decide to rebuild them? I have a few that turned out ok at the time, but now that my tastes have developed, I'd like to redo them. This means rehousing them and perhaps adding a modification to the board, like different EQ controls etc. And new artwork.

The vast majority of my builds are modular, and modding or near complete flushing of individual modules is routine. But rehousing is rare, and I often tend to keep many if not most offboard wired components (i.e. pots and switches). If I don't end up digging my artwork or control layout that box ends up being a demo unit or being sold, typically. That can be problematic at times, since I often prefer side or front jacks for some of my own use cases, since I hardly ever put pedals on the floor.

 

[owlexifry]

the fact that I don't want to haul my amp downstairs to my workbench.

what if you haul your pedal build upstairs to your amp instead?

yeah nah i get what you’re saying, but what i was moreso getting at was that it would actually be valuable to demonstrate the difference in noise between the x2 chips, as others, myself included, would probably find that quite interesting/informative. (one person's 'noise' is another person's 'standard background hum', and so on...)
i’ve built a deflector and had noise problems initially, but after i had another go on a second board it was all good, and i just used a bog stock TI 4049 in both occasions, but i wonder if it’d be worthwhile opening it up to drop in a NOS RCA 4049, or just save it for a CMOS big muff..

 

[jimilee]

what if you haul your pedal build upstairs to your amp instead?

yeah nah i get what you’re saying, but what i was moreso getting at was that it would actually be valuable to demonstrate the difference in noise between the x2 chips, as others, myself included, would probably find that quite interesting/informative. (one person's 'noise' is another person's 'standard background hum', and so on...)
i’ve built a deflector and had noise problems initially, but after i had another go on a second board it was all good, and i just used a bog stock TI 4049 in both occasions, but i wonder if it’d be worthwhile opening it up to drop in a NOS RCA 4049, or just save it for a CMOS big muff..

What if, stay with me here, what if you had more than one amp?

 

[jcpst]

What if, stay with me here, what if you had more than one amp?

The great thing is that no matter how many amps you have, you can always ask this question.

 

[Feral Feline]

"Do you ever rebuild your pedals?"

Basically every build of mine needs rebuilding, most of the time it's needed... uhm, right straight-away.


For all you people rebuilding with new enclosures — feel free to send your old enclosures to me, or some newb builder close to you. I'd hate for any enclosure to go to recycling or become land-fill.

 

[Chuck D. Bones]

Yes.