The D.I.Y. FX Pedal Building Thread

Update:


While visiting the big green shed for a couple of tools and some materials to do some restoration work on my Gold Standard Strat, and also to do some work on the Headless Guitar project, I decided to stop by my local Jaycar Electronics shop to buy some bits needed to finish off an Overdrive Pedal I started building last year, since it's a relatively simple design, I thought that it would be cool to include it in this thread and do a write-up for it, I'll also be making a layout diagram so that anyone interested can make one for themselves if they like, the design is based on the TS series of Tube Screamers and the Boss OD-1, stay tuned for more updates.

Cool Doc what chip does the OD-1 use

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Originally Posted by kimball492

Cool Doc what chip does the OD-1 use

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I think it's the venerable, and much sought-after, JRC4558D chip that was used in the OD-1, I could be wrong though, but it is the most likely chip that was used due to it's cheapness, there are a few alternative chips you can use in the circuit, which are pin-for-pin compatible with the pin-out of the JRC4558D, a couple that come to mind are the TLO72CP, and the LM833, there are a couple of high-end chips which are also pin-for-pin compatible too.


The TS Tube Screamer circuit and the OD-1 circuit are very similar to each other, the only difference being that the OD-1 doesn't have the extra tone-control stage included, so you only have a Drive control and a Volume control.

Supposedly there are better chips than the JRC4558D but most of the collectors of the old Tubescreamers love its sound.

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Originally Posted by kimball492

They say there are better chips than the JRC4558D but most of the collectors of the old Tubescreamers love its sound.

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Yep, apparently that's got a lot to do with the way the chip behaves as it recovers from being overdriven, there's an article I read somewhere that talks about this behaviour, I can't remember where I found the article but I do remember reading it, I might see if I can find it again cause it's an interesting read.

Update:


Had to put my cordless drill on charge so it could recharge it's battery overnight, it's all charged now so we can go ahead with the build-process of the new Overdrive pedal, going to be working on it today and will post some pics of the build-process for you guys.


I'm thinking of calling the pedal "Dr Overdrive", what do you guys think of that?


Here's a pic of the circuit board that's going in the new Dr Overdrive pedal:


Attachment 13237


Here's a pic of the underside of the circuit board:

Attachment 13238

not much to it is there?

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Originally Posted by Dedman

not much to it is there?

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Yep, it's a very basic circuit so that you get all the goodness out of it, and there are no buffers so it's a true-bypass pedal, I have noticed that the best sounding pedals tend to be the ones that don't have a lot in them.


I'm just going to add a pic of the underside of the circuit board.

Update:

So I worked on building the new Dr Overdrive pedal all last night and it is now all finished and working, I'm pretty surprised at how good it sounds through my Marshall Amp, it sounds a bit like a Tube Screamer and is pretty smooth, I'll upload some pics of the build-process and do a bit of a write-up for it later on, will also see if I can record a demo so you can hear what it sounds like too, so stay tuned.

Good job Doc Thanks for the time and effort.
Much appreciated