Congratulations on getting it running! Having to desolder an IC, not to mention having such a complex build as your first build, that really is something to be proud of!
I'm messing with the trim pots and controls. I'm not sure if it works correctly because the controls are pretty wild but the more I watch demos and replicate the settings the more I'm confident it does what it's supposed to do. I'm almost in tears, goddamn it.
I will learn how to tame the beast and eventually come here to either confirm it was a success or come here for more advice. You've been so incredibly helpful that it caught me off guard. Thanks to all of you! (so far, haha)
The controls aren't too bad once you get your head around them. Here are more in-depth explanations of the trimpots and how to set them up
https://forum.pedalpcb.com/threads/low-tide-no-modulation.10898/#post-109633, but the tl;dr is "Set the BBD so that you get the most modulation with the least amount of distortion", and "the gate trimmer just controls the range of the Gate pot, so set it to where the Gate pot is the most useful from start to end". The DIP switches are literally just a boost and a pad, so one increases the signal coming in to the pedal, the other decreases. Depending on your setup use one or the other - not both. You can also leave both off.
Once the trimmers are fine, the controls are not that tough to figure out. Volume and mix are self-explanatory - you might need to change volume when changing the mix though, but you will notice that from the signal dropping or being too loud. Gate sets the sensitivity a low pass envelope filter - so it adds a low pass (as in, it cuts the high frequencies but lets lows through), and it reacts to playing, so when you play hard it lets more signal through, if you play soft it lets less signal through. It might be most useful to set the trimmer so that with the pot fully open you don't get the low pass effect, and with the pot fully closed you get a very muddy signal - so you get the whole range on the pot.
So we have Rate, Skew and Depth left. The thing about the Low Tide is that it's not quite like a chorus pedal or a phaser. It
shifts the pitch of your signal around in random intervals. Once you understand that, it's easier to understand the controls too. Rate controls how often the pitch changes, Depth controls how much the pitch changes (or in other words, how deep is the change in pitch), and Skew controls
how quickly the pitch goes to where it's going. So Skew completely off means the change is instant, with more skew the change is slower and the pitch glides smoothly from your normal pitch to the modulated depth.
I usually use it with Depth and Rate a bit over half, and Rate a bit under half, Mix full, Volume to taste, and Gate so that it cuts out the high frequency whine from the BBD chip (that is normal). With a clean sound and delay and reverb I could play chords with that for ages. Another fun thing is to set the gate more aggressive so you get the envelope filter thing and play single notes. If you want a more chorus-like sound, set the mix to around half (so the pitch-shifted signal and dry signal both interact together, causing chorusing).
One final note, I (and someone else too) had a sharp "pop" in the attack of my notes with the gate fully open, but I got that fixed by just lowering the gate trimmer, just in case that also happens to you.
