Coda
Well-known member
I’ve had this pcb for a while now. Ran out of steam last fall, and didn’t do any pedal stuff for almost two months. I ended up in jazz mode: archtop straight into amp, and started studying Barney Kessel…
Now I’m back and better than ever! (no promises). I decided last autumn that I I’d never really explored the world of OD. I ended up with a trio of “OD” pedals that for the genre, though they do spill out a bit. First it is the MOSFET Driver. This circuit is “inspired” by the Butler Tube Driver (can we get a REAL Tube Driver pcb? Can’t be that crazy, right?). The paint turned out horrible…it was the straw that led to my jazz journey. The knobs I bought for this didn’t fit, so I used what I had…
Sound-wise, I wasn’t really sure what to expect. I mean, I know what a real Tube Driver sounds like, but this isnt a real TD, it’s an emulation. It covers a lot of ground: you can set it clean as a boost, use it to add grit and drive, or crank it for a very focused, fuzzy, compressed distortion. It sounds very 1970’s to me, if that makes sense…kind of artificial, but honest about it at the same time. It sounds like a solid-state mixer overdriving…in a good way.
The build was very easy, but some of that was from my natural skill, I suppose. The only hiccup was not having caps rated above 25v. Nothing an extra order to Tayda could fix. The trim pots are interesting; they are basically volume/blend controls for each MOSFET, blending it in to the OpAmp distortion. I set them both in various configurations, and ended up like both set to noon best…
Now I’m back and better than ever! (no promises). I decided last autumn that I I’d never really explored the world of OD. I ended up with a trio of “OD” pedals that for the genre, though they do spill out a bit. First it is the MOSFET Driver. This circuit is “inspired” by the Butler Tube Driver (can we get a REAL Tube Driver pcb? Can’t be that crazy, right?). The paint turned out horrible…it was the straw that led to my jazz journey. The knobs I bought for this didn’t fit, so I used what I had…
Sound-wise, I wasn’t really sure what to expect. I mean, I know what a real Tube Driver sounds like, but this isnt a real TD, it’s an emulation. It covers a lot of ground: you can set it clean as a boost, use it to add grit and drive, or crank it for a very focused, fuzzy, compressed distortion. It sounds very 1970’s to me, if that makes sense…kind of artificial, but honest about it at the same time. It sounds like a solid-state mixer overdriving…in a good way.
The build was very easy, but some of that was from my natural skill, I suppose. The only hiccup was not having caps rated above 25v. Nothing an extra order to Tayda could fix. The trim pots are interesting; they are basically volume/blend controls for each MOSFET, blending it in to the OpAmp distortion. I set them both in various configurations, and ended up like both set to noon best…
