Pictures!

[davent]

Thanks guys, was my crack at capturing what i see as the "spirit" of glops's pedals without copying what he does so...  thanks glops!

Jim,  Acrylic mediums and paints, i deplore that brown/green whatever it is colour of every brand of  presensitized pcb material i've tried so took to painting them. Scuff them up with some 220 grit paper, been priming them with a mix of GAC200/Airbrush Medium from the airbrush, works ok but the Auto-Air Tansparent Base works well too. Colour here is Pthalo Green, Blue Shade (Golden Liquid Acrylic), it's transparent and like the way it can cover/hide the PCB, next  stamped with white then back to GAC200 for the Toner Transfer. Leveled out the top with a mix of GAC200/Self Leveling Gel/Distilled Water. Then drilled the holes. Started using that mix to level my rough and rolly uneven enclosure paint jobs, works great.



Test point now correctly connected to the node above it.

(More or less from Madbean's forum- posted earlier today.)

Tools; aluminum duct tape, embossing wheel, steel rule, heavy razor knife, cutting matt and India Ink. You cut out a well-squared, random sized rectangle of aluminum tape, 'rivet' the perimeter with the embossing wheel working on top of the soft cutting matt, peel the back off the tape and stick it to the enclosure. Continue cutting, embossing and sticking until the enclosure is covered, that's it.. then you get to play.

Added more texture to the individual panels by pressing files and rasps into the tape, used the thread of screws and bolts to leave an impression, hammer and a nail, anything handy that would leave an impression in the tape. Rolling a round rasp over the tape left an interesting pattern, used that for the back. The punching of letters was nasty, the Hammond enclosure was much harder then expected and needed a far harder whack to leave a good imprint then i was willing to deliver. Should have done the lettering to the tape before putting that panel on the box. At this point burnished the tape down with a brayer to ensure good contact with the enclosure.


Once textured, painted it all over with India Ink, let it dry a bit then wiped it off with paper towel, do that a few times until you get what you want. At this point i'll do an "isolation" clearcoat with a mix of GAC200/Airbrush Medium to protect the ink layer so if i don't like what goes on next i can hopefully remove it without messing up the earlier efforts. (The first go round i reached a point where i didn't like how it was going so used acetone and a scrub brush to take it back to the undressed tape.) After the ink-  it's paint  splatter, stencil, stamp, rub the paint around with your fingers, wipe it off before it's totally dried, (working one colour at a time let it dry before doing another so you don't get mud.. unless of course that's what's called for), sand it chew it up some more, there's some very old dried out dry transfers buried on there, anything goes really... Lots of isolation coats done through the colouring process.

Knobs and bezel thrown in a can of screws and bolts, shaken up, not enough damage so used files and sandpaper to chew things up more. I wanted to use gravel in the  can but at this time of year around here, no dice. Follow that with the India Ink treatment. These bits and the enclosure are lacquered, (waterbased).

Switch plunger-cap got roughed with sandpaper and a file and finally the  India Ink, lacquer

Brass hardware, ammonia fumed.

Switch's and jacks' nuts/washers, propane torched.



Take care... dave

[defaced]

Excellent writeup and execution!  I might try this on a preamp box I'm working on that has stalled because I have no idea how to do the type of finish I want.

[haveyouseenhim]

A new project I finished. It's a T-Driver by aresaudio.

[deadastronaut]

@mike: looks cool man...leds under the tube?

[haveyouseenhim]

Yep. I would take more pics but it's already boxed up ready to ship to Panama City.

Actually here it is before the enclosure.

[Jdansti]

@Dave-thanks for sharing your method-great use of ordinary stuff!

@Mike-looks great and appears that you might be able to write off your vacation!!!

[marcelloid]

This is a 4-1 in recently did.  Lunar Module + Phase 90 + Reverb + MultiPlex delay.  The verb and delay order can be switched via the FWD/REV control up top.

BEAUTIFUL

[duck_arse]

nobody should be allowed to own that many knobs.

is that perspex/acrylic on yr front panel? how did you get that so neat?

[Govmnt_Lacky]

Damn you people and your PERFECT laser etching!!! 

Can you detect the JEALOUSY? 

[deadastronaut]

''dear santa, this year ive been a bit of a .... as you know,  but could i have a laser please..''

[pickdropper]

@davent - I know I commented already on the Madbean site, but I keep looking at that build.  It really is an amazing finish.  Fantastic job.

[pickdropper]

@Mike - I really dig the cutout for the tube on that pedal.  The whole thing looks great.

I need to give a tubed pedal a go one of these days....

[pickdropper]

Thanks guys for the nice comments.

As  Govmnt_Lacky said, it is indeed laser cut acrylic.  The process was:

1.)  Cut a rectangular piece of acrylic
2.)  Paint one side of it black.  Leave the paper backing on the other side
3.)  Laser etch the writing through the painted side.  This is the bottom so the engraving must be backwards.   
4.)  Paint the backside of it white.  This is a very heavy paint coat as it must fill in all the caps of the lettering and other graphic bits
5.)  Laser cut out the panels.  It's very important that steps 3 and 5 are done on the same template or things will be misaligned.

[bluebunny]

Here are the latest suspects, though looking at the last few posts, I'm feeling a little inadequate...

UBE Screamer by ROG:

"Son of Clay Jones" overdrive:

UBE emblem is from the flag of Ube in Japan.  SRV is from "The Essential SRV".  Rats nest in both builds by yours truly.   

[John Lyons]

^ Nothing wrong with those. Look nice.

[pickdropper]

^ Nothing wrong with those. Look nice.

Agreed.  Nice looking builds.

[Ice-9]

Here are two PCB's of my latest builds. First is a standard 808 but with decent components, the second is a PCB for an FV-1 digital chip and it is sounding really good, as it's a single sideed PCB the smd chip and Eeprom are on the bottom of the pcb.

[jubal81]

This is a CB G@lileo I laid out and had fabbed at OSH. Managed to fit it in a 125B with room for batteries left over. Easily the best JFET OD I've ever built.

[SmoothAction]

Jubal81... damn son. Bitchin'

[bluebunny]

^ Nothing wrong with those. Look nice.

Agreed.  Nice looking builds.

Thanks guys.  I really enjoy the design aspect for the enclosures, but I'm hardly fastidious about the finish!  (Thanks goodness for Photoshop trickery...)  And I'm never too precious about the insides, which are hidden after all...  Though I do rather like John's approach to decorating the boards - they look sweet.  You need little windows on the bottom of your pedals, John!