MichaelW
Well-known member
I built this a couple weeks ago for my brother. I knew he had a cheap knock off Klon he was using and thought he ought to be using a better one. This was actually #2 attempt, the first one I built has an issue that I can't quite figure out. I finally gave up and built the second board I had which turned out fine. (I'll get back to the first board one of these days... )
I shipped the finished pedal off to him and didn't think much more about it. I didn't hear back from him but we were both traveling this week.
Well I saw him this week at a family reunion and turned out he LOVES it. It actually kicked the Paragon I had recently built for him off his board.
He says the Kliche is much more useful in a live situation and cuts through the mix a lot better. He likes the Paragon for hum buckers better but his cover band gig uses single coils a lot more.
Anyway, I called it the "Fat Pony" because it's got a couple mods I did to my own Klone.
Gain Mod - R9 lowered to 1k for a bit more gain
Warmer Treble Mod - C15 changed to 8n2 for warmer, fatter treble control (Hence "Fat Pony" since "Warm Pony" doesn't quite work...)
Asym/Sym clipping mod - DPDT switch with a mod board to toggle between asymmetrical and symmetrical clipping.
This turned out to be totally underwhelming as the diodes really don't impact the gain much. But I had already drilled the hole for the DPDT so I went and and installed it.
I went with BAT41's for the symmetrical and BAT43's for the asymmetrical sides respectively.
So the two least exciting pedals (to me) that I sent to my brother an RC Booster clone (Aion Malacandra) and the Kliche are turning out to be the most useful for his pedalboard. He loves the tonal shaping he can get with the RC and the overdrive from the Kliche.
I shipped the finished pedal off to him and didn't think much more about it. I didn't hear back from him but we were both traveling this week.
Well I saw him this week at a family reunion and turned out he LOVES it. It actually kicked the Paragon I had recently built for him off his board.
He says the Kliche is much more useful in a live situation and cuts through the mix a lot better. He likes the Paragon for hum buckers better but his cover band gig uses single coils a lot more.
Anyway, I called it the "Fat Pony" because it's got a couple mods I did to my own Klone.
Gain Mod - R9 lowered to 1k for a bit more gain
Warmer Treble Mod - C15 changed to 8n2 for warmer, fatter treble control (Hence "Fat Pony" since "Warm Pony" doesn't quite work...)
Asym/Sym clipping mod - DPDT switch with a mod board to toggle between asymmetrical and symmetrical clipping.
This turned out to be totally underwhelming as the diodes really don't impact the gain much. But I had already drilled the hole for the DPDT so I went and and installed it.
I went with BAT41's for the symmetrical and BAT43's for the asymmetrical sides respectively.
So the two least exciting pedals (to me) that I sent to my brother an RC Booster clone (Aion Malacandra) and the Kliche are turning out to be the most useful for his pedalboard. He loves the tonal shaping he can get with the RC and the overdrive from the Kliche.
