The D.I.Y. FX Pedal Building Thread

[DrNomis_44]

i was a little bit worried at first Doc thought the mosquito had died after biting the honey eating Archaeologist lol.

Well, you never know with those mosquitos, it might have been one that had a penchant for biting only Archaeologists that happen to have a taste for honey, maybe the Archaeologist should have had some raspberry jam on toast for breakfast that day, but we can only speculate.....hahahaha.

[kimball492]

Hey doc did you get your firewire card if so how'd you get on getting everything working

[DrNomis_44]

Hey doc did you get your firewire card if so how'd you get on getting everything working

Not yet, I'm still waiting for it to turn up in the post, going by what the delivery estimation said, it should have arrived in the post last Wednesday, it might arrive this week, I'm also waiting on some spare parts for my 42Inch LG Plasma Screen T.V., I've been without T.V. since it broke down and refused to power up correctly.



Update:


I have just received the new PCI Firewire 400 card in the mail and I'm about to install it in my PC, wish me luck guys.


Update 2:


Just tried out my new PCI Firewire 400 card and the results are pretty much the same as for the other Firewire ports, my Saffire Pro 40 still seems to be a bit glitchy every now and then, I tried re-installing the latest driver for it and I got the same results as before, every now and then the audio will go a bit crackly and I end up having to power the Saffire Pro 40 on and off a few times, then change a few settings to get it to come good, it seems to be a very sticky device driver.


Update 3:


Just tried my Digi002 to see if it would work with the new PCI card, no joy, even tried a different firewire cable, same result, Device Manager could see that it was connected but it wouldn't work with my DAW software, so I reckon the Digi002 is faulty in some way.

[Dedman]

Geez, those smugglers are a devious lot, aren't they?

LOL........hmmm that could be my next get rich quick scheme

[DrNomis_44]

Update:

So I went to the Top End Sounds Pro Music Shop today to see if they had a TS-9 and an MXR Dynacomp in stock, they didn't, but they did have a TS-808 and a Boss CS-3 Compression Sustainer in stock, I ended up buying them instead plus an MXR DC Brick Pedalboard Power Supply, the really cool thing about the MXR DC Brick (well it's cool for me anyway) is that it features two 18V DC outputs in addition to eight 9V DC outputs, so I can use those two 18V DC outputs to power my Tonebone Hot British pedal and my UniVibe pedal, I just need to make a couple of custom DC Cables.

Part of the internal circuitry of my Univibe pedal actually runs at about 20V, the other part runs at 15V, so it should work fine, the MXR DC Brick is powered by an 18V/2,000mA Switchmode Plugpack Adaptor which I reckon should be enough to power all the pedals I wish to use on my Custom Pedalboard.

So, what's all that got to do with DIY Pedal building?, well, I'm planning on building myself a custom Pedal Board with the help of a great mate of mine, he's found a nice piece of plywood for me that's 80cm by 45cm in size, I was going to aim for 100cm by 50cm, but 80cm by 45cm is still going to be big enough to give me enough real-estate to mount my pedals on, there's only going to be about seven or eight pedals on my Pedalboard, so I'm pretty happy with that, anyway, I thought it would be a cool project to include in this thread so I'll include a write-up of the build process just in case any of you guys might be interested in building your own custom Pedalboard, stay tuned for more updates.

[wokkaboy]

sounds good Doc, I think the size of the pedal board will be ample for 8 pedals. Will you build some sort of cover for it when being transported ? Couple of forumites have built basic pedalboards I think Pablo has built one. Simple construction he just angled it to raise the back edge made accessing the pedals easier

[DrNomis_44]

sounds good Doc, I think the size of the pedal board will be ample for 8 pedals. Will you build some sort of cover for it when being transported ? Couple of forumites have built basic pedalboards I think Pablo has built one. Simple construction he just angled it to raise the back edge made accessing the pedals easier

Yep, I'm going to see if I can incorporate some kind of detachable cover for the Pedalboard, something along the lines of what they do with flight cases for amps and studio gear, maybe have it hinged at the back, but still detachable, I could also include a lock on the front edge so that none of my pedals get nicked during a gig, I'm planning on covering the top surface of the Pedalboard with carpet tiles so I can just use Velcro to hold the pedals in place, the good thing about that is I can easily move the pedals around as I see fit, my mate wants to use cable ties to hold his pedals in place on his Pedalboard, I should check out how those other members made their Pedalboards.


I just tried out my new TS-808 pedal with my LP Studio guitar and my white Ibby guitar, going into my Marshall's clean channel, seems to be working really well and I got some nice low gain sounds, might try out my new Boss Compressor Sustainer pedal later on.


I just checked the 80cm by 45cm dimensions for my Pedalboard again with a tape measure, I've definitely got enough real-estate to work with, best of all, it's not too big to manage.

[Dedman]

cool Doc, I'm planning on building one after my current kit and my 1 x12 cab (which I got the timber for today)

[kimball492]

Doc a few people have had this issue with the saffire pro. Not sure if this helps any but we have 2 saffire pro 40s and an Octipre and every now and then I have to go into the Saffire mix control and change the clock setting to ADAT on our system. Still haven't figured out why it changes to "internal" on it's own. Also try changing the hardware buffer in DAW software. Cracks and pops are normally caused there. Maybe switch it to adat then back to internal. id suggest taking the saffire pro into your friendly favourite music shop ask them to test for you. At least you will then know if its your audio device or your computer. if its a faulty audio device at least you will know one way or the other.

[DrNomis_44]

Doc a few people have had this issue with the saffire pro. Not sure if this helps any but we have 2 saffire pro 40s and an Octipre and every now and then I have to go into the Saffire mix control and change the clock setting to ADAT on our system. Still haven't figured out why it changes to "internal" on it's own. Also try changing the hardware buffer cracks and pops are normally caused there. Maybe switch it to adat then back to internal

Cheers mate, I'll give that a go next time it plays up and see if it sorts it out, the funny thing is Focusrite say something about the internal clock being jitter-free, or something like that in the user manual.