Pedal round up, the good, the bad and the ugly.

F

Flying

Well-known member
There are so many PCBs here, many I have no experience of, but it got me thinking that I have a few builds that I built out of curiosity rather than true desire, and others have been a burning, ‘can’t wait to try it out’ builds. I’m guessing many of us are building a respectable collection now, and some meet our expectations and some fall short, and I thought it would be interesting to hear your experiences:
  • Pedal that always boomerangs back onto your board?
  • The pedal that surprised you most in a good way?
  • The pedal that surprised you the most as it didn’t work out for you.
  • Pedals / circuits that frustrate you the most.
  • The guilty pleasure.
  • And of course any other notable/ honourable mentions.
 
Pedal that always boomerangs back onto your board?

Son of Ben & Paragon (Benson & KoT) I can’t justify both on the board, but I flipflop between them too often to be sensible.

The pedal that surprised you most in a good way?

Little Green Scream Machine(TS808), I think I was set up from all the internet forums to not like it, then had a bad experience with a none Pedal PCB kit, eventually breadboarded it to discover it does its thing and when I want that thing, it’s perfect.

The pedal that surprised you the most as it didn’t work out for you.

Mach1 (Lightspeed) All the youtube videos had me super excited about this one, but for me I wish it rolled off just a little bass, and I’m wondering if it is better with a tele or Les Paul, neither of which I have, but I feel it gets a bit lost in the mix with a Strat. I think this is very much a situation where it’s not a good match for my rig.

Pedals / circuits that frustrate you the most.

Anything optical, I just don’t seem to have any luck getting LDRs that are anywhere near to the specs they are supposed to have. This is bugging me as I really want to build a Univibe.

The guilty pleasure.

TC Corona Chorus, which will be replaced by a bucket brigade chorus pedal once they are available again. This is to accommodate my “friend" who likes chorus, I can take it or leave it, but mostly leave it on too much of the time. ;)

And of course any other notable/ honourable mentions.

Still thinking on that one.
 
Pedal that always boomerangs back onto your board.

Iset flanger. I love flangers, love the sound of this one, but hate the size of it. I'll step on it to turn it on and sometimes catch the rate knob with my big foot. I'll then get frustrated and not play with it for awhile. several weeks later, it's back on my board.

The pedal that surprised you most in a good way.

The Guvernator distortion. I'm not a pedal distortion guy and get my dirty tone from my Ceriatone 2202. It’s essentially a 20 watt JCM 800 clone and a pedal would have a lot to live up to by comparison. The guvernator gets really close to that sound. A lot closer than I thought it would. Fender purists will hate me for this but, I threw in front of my home built 5F1. And it sounds glorious 🤘.

The pedal that surprised you the most as it didn’t work out for you.

BYOC Li'l Echo. With the sucess of my Magnetron delay build, I thought a different flavor of PT2399 would work out great. Plus I wanted to attempt a mini pedal build even though I'm not a fan of that form factor. The build went fine but it's a noisy circuit. Much noisier than the Magnetron and much noisier than I like.

Pedals / circuits that frustrate you the most.

Little Angel Chorus. My god did that thing frustrate me. I went through 8 different PT2399 chips before I found one that was reliable. Some of them wouldn't work at all and some of them would just latch up on occasion. Finally get it working reliably but, I hate the sound of it. It's not lush at all, introduces white noise, and severely colors my tone. It's essentially just a display piece now.

The guilty pleasure.
Don't really have one.

And of course any other notable / honorable mentions.
The yet to be released XC Phase. This will be my first attempt at a phaser build. I have a matched quad of jfet’s just waiting for a home. Hopefully it all goes well.
 
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