Adventures in starting a pedal company!

[BassManMike73]

So, some of you may know that towards the end of last year, I got started building pedals for some of my TB brothers! At first I started with a few kits from BYOC and moved on to building pedals from scratch. I now have a website up and have a local band that I sponsor (with a discount on pedals) and things have had a nice start.

What I'd like to do is return the kindness and support I got here and start this little thread showing a bit about how I build my pedals right now.

I've got several projects that are in the build process and a few I have yet to start. The first I will be sharing some pics of is a project that was originally started quite a long while ago for TB member Coldmilk. It started off as a simple mod project on an MXR Distortion Plus, but the old circuit board wouldn't have any of its solder being removed without having traces fall off. In an attempt to salvage the board I used as many original parts as possible and built an all new deluxe distortion+!!

This pedal is the basis for what will become my company's take on a distortion pedal. There are many features and modifications I plan to make before I consider this a "stock" McNees pedal, but this is certainly a good first step! Without further ado, here are some pics of the completed build!




More pics coming in a moment...

 

[BassManMike73]

 

[BassManMike73]

 

[BassManMike73]

Soon to come!!

I'm undertaking a rehouse project on a GK Diesel Dawg! I'll be posting all of the info on that as I go through the process as I know a few people have asked about it!

 

[TussinBot.]

I know I asked about this one a long time ago, with the addition of a blend and housed in a smaller enclosure it could be a great pedal.

 

[BassManMike73]

I'm not adding a blend to this one, but that's a simple enough mod, I might have to do a little walk through on that one!

 

[Journey55]

Hello, I've soldered my basses, some guitars and some basic circuits and I was thinking about taking a shot at building like a fuzz or something from a kit...any advice? Your's looks really organized and I'm obviously not gonna have it look like that but was your first pedal successful?

 

[BassManMike73]

My first pedal was successful! It was a tube screamer clone from buildyourownclone.com I highly recommend them for kits! If you have any experience sourcing parts, I'd also recommend MadBeanPedals.com mammothelectronics.com also have a bunch of kits from a couple different companies on their site. And with them you can customize your enclosure color.

Kits are a great way to get started!

 

[ryansalmond]

Mike, that distortion looks awesome! Very impressive

 

[gregmon79]

I am all over this thread!! Great start to one I myself am starting to realize and want to start building my own pedals and mod others. SUB'D!!! Thanks again for the start of the thread, great idea!

 

[kleinenenten]

Soon to come!!

I'm undertaking a rehouse project on a GK Diesel Dawg! I'll be posting all of the info on that as I go through the process as I know a few people have asked about it!

Hey, that's my Diesel Dawg! Woo! I'll definitely be subscribing now!

 

[BassManMike73]

So, to start off the Diesel Dawg rehouse, I ordered a Hammond 1590J enclosure. It is wide enough to comfortably fit the circuit board, and not be overly large. The enclosure is just under 2" deep, so the circuit board will have to be trimmed slightly, but the traces are far enough away from the edge, this shouldn't hurt anything.

To start with disassembly, I remove all screws holding the two halves of the case together, and then remove the battery holder.

 

[BassManMike73]

Remove the 3 screws holding the battery holder to the battery door.

Then remove the screw and washer holding the battery door to the enclosure and the battery holder will lift right up!

 

[BassManMike73]

With the battery holder detached, we can move onto removing the rest of the internals. The footswitch comes out once you unscrew it's nut. The two jacks come out once their respective nuts are removed, and the circuit board comes out once the 5 nuts and washers holding the pots to the enclosure are removed. The knobs take a bit of force to remove, so use a pair of pliers or whatever you can use to hold it tightly.

 

[chubfarm2001]

Sub'd. Very interesting. I may have to order something in the future.

 

[BassManMike73]

We now have an empty enclosure.

And all of the electronics loose from the enclosure.

That completes the first phase of the project, up next I'll be making a drilling template for the new enclosure and removing some components from the circuit board!

 

[BassManMike73]

After taking measurements of the new enclosure and the circuit board I put together a drilling layout in Adobe InDesign.

I had initially planned to use the original power jack from the board and just drill a large enough hole that the square jack would fit through it. But that wouldn't look very nice, and I wasn't able to do that due to a lack of space in the enclosure.

So, after making the layout and drilling the enclosure I did a test fit of the board to better visualize where I could put the jacks. I decided on doing top mounted jacks because that was where there was the most room. After drilling the holes and mounting the new power jack I realized that there is a huge 2200uf capacitor that was right in the way of the input jack. I removed the cap from the board with my de soldering pump and put it on a small piece of veroboard.

 

[BassManMike73]

Using a small plastic standoff I bolted the cap board to the enclosure just behind the main board.

At this point, all that is left is to remove the old power jack from its board and add wires connecting to the new power jack.

 

[CauliColin]

Looks very interesting! Just out of curiousity, what are all the controls on the distortion pedal for?

 

[BassManMike73]

The top three are Gain, Tone, Volume, the toggle switches are compression mod, bass boost, and smooth mod, the knob that's lower down is clean blend.