hamerfan
Well-known member
- Build Rating
The Story: A friend bought a Greer Lightspeed in 2020. At that time we did a shootout with several ‚transparent‘ overdrives at a music store. Our two favorites were the Lightspeed and the Southland. My friend leaned towards the Lightspeed, i was more on the Southland side. It was just a bit more beef i wanted for the Lightspeed.
In November 2023 i read about @szukalski ‘s version of the Mach1 / Greer Lightspeed. Chuck mentioned in a modding thread that a four component change can beef it up. Then came the Speedy Sheep with Chucks Mods for higher gain on a switch.
Szukalski placed an ad in Open Discussion about his surplus boards. I pm’ed David and asked him to sell me a Speedy Sheep with some of his handy breakouts. He sent me these and threw in two other boards. So this is today is a build report about his boards i got.
The boards: I instantly built the Speedy Sheep. (You can hear a demo on MichaelW thread about it.) The SS did everything i wanted and some more. Up to now I can’t decide between the standard lower gain or Chucks higher gain mod. If i use it with strat into a Tweed Champ clone tend to use the higher gain. In my headphone setup with a boost (Dragons Breath) in front i use the Mach1/Lightspeed setting. I put the mod switch on the pcb via a micro switch, since i am not keen about these levers on the faceplate.
The first extra board is the Freddie (Cowboy Brand). Its seems to be named after Freddie King, as its a great blues pedal. Life came into the way and it took me a while to make it. As i learned, it is the Pro-10 Blue with an additional bass pot as HamishR likes it. If you are playing a big setup with 4x12, you can control the bass with such a pot. Since i play only 1x12 combos and a headphone setup, i still can use it to clear the lows. Nevertheless its a great BluesBreaker variant and lives happily on my board.
Both sets have a nice layout and are really neat looking with their corresponding faceplates, which also make the drilling much easier. For drilling I just fixed them with some clear tape to the box and marked the cutouts with a sharpie on the box. Easypeasy. The faceplates make them look like professional product. Kudos to szusalski!
The second board he threw in brought me way out of my comfort zone. This is mini version of a Amentum boost (EQD Arrows) version with premanufactured smd parts. First thought was, this should only take some hours to make. Just a trannie and a pot. My second thought was to cram it into a 1590A, because i like tiny pedals. I misjudged the time it took to box it up. After i soldered in the parts i put it into the Auditorium and it fired up nicely. Cool pedal. It transforms the strat with a little roll-off in the lows and lower mid shift towards higher frequencies like a presence pot. If you crank it, it reduces the highs too. And it sounds also great with humbuckers.
My first calculation showed that its a tough game to fit the parts into the 1590a. I had to save space with smaller jacks instead of the closed ones i normally use. I also drilled the switch too near to the bottom, so it is tilting a bit. Reason: the inside of the box is curved, so you need a little more distance to the wall. I also had to use the jumper points on the breakout board for the LED. No biggie, the CLR is a 4.7k smd resistor on the main board. It took more than week to get the parts and to finish the box. Inquiring minds might want to know: The band logo says LTC which stands for Late Trade Company.
As my next szukalski project i look into ordering Texel boards and some switch breakouts from JLCPCB. Thanks to Dave for his projects under a Common Licence. https://github.com/szukalski/awesome-pedal?tab=readme-ov-file#readme
In November 2023 i read about @szukalski ‘s version of the Mach1 / Greer Lightspeed. Chuck mentioned in a modding thread that a four component change can beef it up. Then came the Speedy Sheep with Chucks Mods for higher gain on a switch.
Szukalski placed an ad in Open Discussion about his surplus boards. I pm’ed David and asked him to sell me a Speedy Sheep with some of his handy breakouts. He sent me these and threw in two other boards. So this is today is a build report about his boards i got.
The boards: I instantly built the Speedy Sheep. (You can hear a demo on MichaelW thread about it.) The SS did everything i wanted and some more. Up to now I can’t decide between the standard lower gain or Chucks higher gain mod. If i use it with strat into a Tweed Champ clone tend to use the higher gain. In my headphone setup with a boost (Dragons Breath) in front i use the Mach1/Lightspeed setting. I put the mod switch on the pcb via a micro switch, since i am not keen about these levers on the faceplate.
The first extra board is the Freddie (Cowboy Brand). Its seems to be named after Freddie King, as its a great blues pedal. Life came into the way and it took me a while to make it. As i learned, it is the Pro-10 Blue with an additional bass pot as HamishR likes it. If you are playing a big setup with 4x12, you can control the bass with such a pot. Since i play only 1x12 combos and a headphone setup, i still can use it to clear the lows. Nevertheless its a great BluesBreaker variant and lives happily on my board.
Both sets have a nice layout and are really neat looking with their corresponding faceplates, which also make the drilling much easier. For drilling I just fixed them with some clear tape to the box and marked the cutouts with a sharpie on the box. Easypeasy. The faceplates make them look like professional product. Kudos to szusalski!
The second board he threw in brought me way out of my comfort zone. This is mini version of a Amentum boost (EQD Arrows) version with premanufactured smd parts. First thought was, this should only take some hours to make. Just a trannie and a pot. My second thought was to cram it into a 1590A, because i like tiny pedals. I misjudged the time it took to box it up. After i soldered in the parts i put it into the Auditorium and it fired up nicely. Cool pedal. It transforms the strat with a little roll-off in the lows and lower mid shift towards higher frequencies like a presence pot. If you crank it, it reduces the highs too. And it sounds also great with humbuckers.
My first calculation showed that its a tough game to fit the parts into the 1590a. I had to save space with smaller jacks instead of the closed ones i normally use. I also drilled the switch too near to the bottom, so it is tilting a bit. Reason: the inside of the box is curved, so you need a little more distance to the wall. I also had to use the jumper points on the breakout board for the LED. No biggie, the CLR is a 4.7k smd resistor on the main board. It took more than week to get the parts and to finish the box. Inquiring minds might want to know: The band logo says LTC which stands for Late Trade Company.
As my next szukalski project i look into ordering Texel boards and some switch breakouts from JLCPCB. Thanks to Dave for his projects under a Common Licence. https://github.com/szukalski/awesome-pedal?tab=readme-ov-file#readme
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