Ok what is you favorite and least favorite part of building pedals?

[Seasoned Novice]

I agree. The biggest changer for me was getting storage drawers/boxes. Now I just pick the parts in one big sweep, resistors, boom, soldered. Ceramic caps, boom, soldered! Etc.

You need to maintain an inventory and have storage for it, but it makes the build flow soooo much faster.

I usually kit them all at once using a spreadsheet for multiple projects using little bins for each. I have storage drawer units mounted to my wall for my inventory so I can pick the parts supermarket style. Takes some organizing and time in front of a screen, but it makes everything so much easier when it's all done. I also check every cap, diode, pot, and transistor with my TC1 as I go. I have some background in material kitting, so it's kinda 2nd nature. Wish I had a background in electronics and/or graphic design, lol, but we play to our strengths.

 

[Alan W]

I recently moved to lead solder and really enjoy it compared to lead-free. I should really get some exhaust system going on..

I’ll probably be corrected, but I believe that the fumes from lead solder are no worse than the fumes from no lead solder—lead has been melted, not nearly hot enough to vaporize it though. The fumes are bad due to the flux being vaporized. But you should wash hands when done working with the solder, which I am guilty of forgetting quite often.

 

[Harry Klippton]

I’ll probably be corrected, but I believe that the fumes from lead solder are no worse than the fumes from no lead solder—lead has been melted, not nearly hot enough to vaporize it though. The fumes are bad due to the flux being vaporized. But you should wash hands when done working with the solder, which I am guilty of forgetting quite often.

I use lead removal hand wipes as recommended to me by @peccary since becoming a parent, plus washing my hands

 

[Alan W]

Parts ordering! I keep a reasonable stock, to me, of standard parts, and I keep upping my storage organization, which helps with both pulling parts and quickly seeing what my current stock is. I tend to build in 5 or 6 pcb groups, and I seem to spend more time making sure I have all the parts, or have ordered all the parts I’ll need, from several vendors. I don’t know why I find this so tedious, but I do.

Hard to say what my favorite tasks are. Totally up on the zen pleasure of board stuffing, and “watching solder melt” would be a great title for my as yet unplanned memoir as a lifelong electronics DIY hobbyist. I like off board wiring, too. Less important for pedals, but for audio stuff, I love analyzing the circuits and figuring out where the parts matching is critical. As a retired prototype machinist, the enclosures have always been more a busman’s holiday. I do my best to avoid needing to trouble shoot; my many mistakes are usually so dumb, that I can sus them out pretty fast. (Sometimes I can’t laugh about them for a day or two though.)

 

[iamjackslackof]

Whoa that sounds really tedious and I don't do that

Lol it's not as bad as it sounds, and is similar to the way others do it here. It allows me to pick parts one day, and build another day, as I don't have long uninterrupted stretches of time often. I'll do a few pedals in one go, similar to @Seasoned Novice 's method. I have all my parts well organized in bags or binders, so it's not as tedious as it seems, and it works well in that I rarely build a pedal that doesn't fire up first try.

 

[Feral Feline]

I've just started to do that, group parts for builds. That way I don't come across a single obscure chip and wonder, "what the hell is this for and why did I order it?" — for example, found one M65831AP among a bunch of other chip-types that I had ordered multiples of and was scratching my head. Well, it's for one of only two known possibilities — DeadEndFX Inching Down ( don't have the PCB ) or it's for the Aion Elysium ( have the PCB ) — both of which are clones of the Ibanez EM5 EchoMachine from the SoundTank series.

Why not stick M65831AP with its Elysium PCB?

Then I won't need to wonder what it is or when I grab the PCB, wonder if I really have the IC despite what my inventory notes say.


An addendum to my earlier post...

Keeping the inventory and related notes up-to-date is a bit of a pain, but...

I hate board-mounted LEDs.

All they do is get mashed up between the board and the enclosure, they never go where they're supposed to especially if you've got two of them — one goes in the other doesn't, so you get the other one lined up and in and the first one pops out gets smushed...
I've tried the stir-stick stand-off trick and ... F'it, just stick the LED off to any side of the bypass stomper...

 

[andare]

I use lead removal hand wipes as recommended to me by @peccary since becoming a parent, plus washing my hands

Still trying to find any lead wipes in Poland. Might be a language issue but I can't seem to find any product for cleaning heavy metals off hands.

I usually wear a latex glove on my right hand so I don't touch solder directly, and I wash my hands every time I put the tools down and do something else.

 

[andare]

I've just started to do that, group parts for builds. That way I don't come across a single obscure chip and wonder, "what the hell is this for and why did I order it?" — for example, found one M65831AP among a bunch of other chip-types that I had ordered multiples of and was scratching my head. Well, it's for one of only two known possibilities — DeadEndFX Inching Down ( don't have the PCB ) or it's for the Aion Elysium ( have the PCB ) — both of which are clones of the Ibanez EM5 EchoMachine from the SoundTank series.

Why not stick M65831AP with its Elysium PCB?

Then I won't need to wonder what it is or when I grab the PCB, wonder if I really have the IC despite what my inventory notes say.


An addendum to my earlier post...

Keeping the inventory and related notes up-to-date is a bit of a pain, but...

I hate board-mounted LEDs.

All they do is get mashed up between the board and the enclosure, they never go where they're supposed to especially if you've got two of them — one goes in the other doesn't, so you get the other one lined up and in and the first one pops out gets smushed...
I've tried the stir-stick stand-off trick and ... F'it, just stick the LED off to any side of the bypass stomper...

I hate splicing CLRs to LEDs so I really dig board-mounted LEDs, though it can be a pain to get them seated.

 

[andare]

I agree. The biggest changer for me was getting storage drawers/boxes. Now I just pick the parts in one big sweep, resistors, boom, soldered. Ceramic caps, boom, soldered! Etc.

You need to maintain an inventory and have storage for it, but it makes the build flow soooo much faster.

I have a 9x9 card folder for resistors and various other parts. Better than the one big box I had before but still fiddly to pull out the blister packs and put them back.
I'm debating buying a cabinet but I guess I'd need one with 50 drawers + partitions

 

[Feral Feline]

I hate splicing CLRs to LEDs so I really dig board-mounted LEDs, though it can be a pain to get them seated.

You can use the board's CLR and then just run wires to the LED instead of splicing;
or
I have a shipped-tonne of breakout-boards from GPCB that have the CLR and LED right on the breakout board.
Robert has the new 3PDT-with-LED breakout-boards in the PPCB shop.

Just had a few builds lately where I wasn't using/couldn't use the 3PDT-breakouts — on one, I should've used a bezel-mounted LED and then wired up quick-connects to the board... in fact, I may revisit that build and do so.

 

[Harry Klippton]

Still trying to find any lead wipes in Poland. Might be a language issue but I can't seem to find any product for cleaning heavy metals off hands.

I usually wear a latex glove on my right hand so I don't touch solder directly, and I wash my hands every time I put the tools down and do something else.

This is what I use

 

[andare]

This is what I use
View attachment 45380

Yes that's the brand I couldn't find here. Do Poles just shrug lead off?

 

[andare]

You can use the board's CLR and then just run wires to the LED instead of splicing;
or
I have a shipped-tonne of breakout-boards from GPCB that have the CLR and LED right on the breakout board.
Robert has the new 3PDT-with-LED breakout-boards in the PPCB shop.

Just had a few builds lately where I wasn't using/couldn't use the 3PDT-breakouts — on one, I should've used a bezel-mounted LED and then wired up quick-connects to the board... in fact, I may revisit that build and do so.

I've seen those new breakout boards, will buy those with the CLR and trimmer with the next order.

I forgot to mention that I have to add the CLR to the LED in my eyelet board builds, which is all I've been building lately.

 

[Feral Feline]

Yeah, getting a CLR/LED on a perf or vero build (turret/eyelets et al) is a PITA.

 

[Harry Klippton]

Yes that's the brand I couldn't find here. Do Poles just shrug lead off?

Aggressively American suggestion incoming: lead cleaning soaps and wipes are also often sold where firearms, shooting, and reloading supplies are sold

 

[szukalski]

I have a 9x9 card folder for resistors and various other parts. Better than the one big box I had before but still fiddly to pull out the blister packs and put them back.
I'm debating buying a cabinet but I guess I'd need one with 50 drawers + partitions

I hate anything fiddly during a build, pulling out components from bags is such a pain.

I went the cabinet route, with partitions. Then bought more cabinets and got rid of most of the partitions. Partitions worked but made it a lot more fiddly to get components out, and I would have to pre-cut resistors which was pretty boring..
Anything I need on-hand during a build is readily available and pre-tested to be the correct value (I won't test an entire resistor strip, but the first one and then I trust the rest are correct). My resistors, capacitors, diodes, and transistors are all on-hand when I need them.
Then I bought some component boxes for ICs and Ge transistors. I have the luxury of space though.

 

[Harry Klippton]

I miss building one pedal start to finish in one session. I haven't done that in years now, since I started doing graphics. Decals need to be batched because I'm compelled to use every mm of available space on a sheet. That and I don't have that much free time in one go. It's way too much delayed gratification the way I do it now, and there's very little dopamine to be had in doing it this way.

 

[PunchySunshine]

I love it all. If I had to choose its organizing all my parts right before a build.

I've just recently started taping my tested parts to the BOM in prep. I really enjoy the soldering. All the small and big stuff! I really, really hate troubleshooting. Luckily I've only had one pedal require this!.
Sure do miss Fig!

 

[steviejr92]

Cant wait till Fig gets back!

I dont mind troubleshooting kind of lets you know what to stay away from the next time you build or at the very least how to go about not making the same mistake again!

 

[peccary]

Yes that's the brand I couldn't find here. Do Poles just shrug lead off?

I don't know what the gun laws there are, but if you have a hunting/gun store near you you may find them there.