Pair of Zappers

peccary

Well-known member
I have a buddy who wanted "something interesting" so I decided to make him a Zapper and figured I would make myself one as well. It's the first time I used the no-film waterslide and I really love the way that it turned out. I have a lot to learn about getting it done more cleanly, but I am really happy with how it looks. I did have some issues with the powder coating on these pedals though in that it chipped off a few places when I did my drilling, which is not something I have had happen before and almost all of the enclosures I've used have been Tayda powder coats, so that was a little strange. Not too big of a deal as most of them are covered up, but there is one that shows a bit around the LED bezel. Maybe it was a bum batch, or something particular to the color, or I was doing something differently. Guess I'll find out next time I do some drilling.

When I finished these the other day I had one that didn't work and assumed that the one that was working was not working properly. I was more frustrated with myself than anything and let that spill over in to this. Anyways, I'm just a dummy who put an IC in upside down so it was an easy fix.

The guts are not as clean as I expect from myself - I had some heat-shrink fall off while finagling things and didn't notice (I need to use a different color than the wire I use!) and left the sleeve and +/- wire too long but it's not terrible and everything works well so I'm happy.

This is a strange beast and requires some time and experimentation, especially on bass, but it can do some really interesting things once you can get a feel for how changing the frequency and bandwidth play with each other, but there are some very usable tones in this thing. I do wish that the gain had some more grit and drive to it, though. That would be a good area to come back to some day and try to improve upon when I have more experience.

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Looks good to me. Did you use a step drill?

Thanks, Chuck.

I did use a step bit. I use a center punch and then drill a pilot hole and then use the step bit. It's worked each time till now. I thought the issue may be that the bit was dull so I changed to a new one, but still had the issue.

Now I am wondering if baking the enclosure for the waterslide decal maybe did something to the paint. I had the temperature set to about 150, but honestly who knows what the real temp was because the oven I used doesn't start counting till 200 😄
 
Nice work !!!

I have used masking tape on my enclosure before putting any type of drill bit to it. I do the same when working with anything that has a finish applied, like guitar body or head stock. Normally that's just enough to keep it from chipping...

My 2 cents...
 
Nice work !!!

I have used masking tape on my enclosure before putting any type of drill bit to it. I do the same when working with anything that has a finish applied, like guitar body or head stock. Normally that's just enough to keep it from chipping...

My 2 cents...

After I got the first few chips I put some masking tape over the remaining areas that needed to be drilled and I think that mitigated most of the damage, but I did still have one that flaked off even with tape. I think it was either a bad batch or my baking it had something to do with it.
 
After I got the first few chips I put some masking tape over the remaining areas that needed to be drilled and I think that mitigated most of the damage, but I did still have one that flaked off even with tape. I think it was either a bad batch or my baking it had something to do with it.
I wouldn't think baking would be an issue, how old are the bits your using?
 
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