What should I build next?

[Dito]

The official Beginner Project is a lot like my first project. It's an Electra fuzz/overdrive clone, following a tutorial from Premier Guitar magazine: http://www.premierguitar.com/articles/21291-build-your-own-stompbox

I had fun building it - even if I swore a lot - and am looking for a new project already.

My guitar instructor - who gave me the PG tutorial article - says I'd enjoy an op-amp distortion build. I see we've got a special forum for an IC-based overdrive. It even looks like it's based on the exact model he specified - a DOD 250.

Is that the next logical place to go? The PG pedal was done on perf board. I want to do the next one on Veroboard, since I see so many handy layouts contributed by the fine members here.

If the answer depends at all on my playing style, well, the answer is that I really don't have one. I may be 46 years old, but I'm barely a beginning guitarist. I do like building stuff, though. I'd love to learn to play some Chicago-style electric blues, since that's home for me. My fingers aren't skilled enough for those solos, but I can't get enough.

I'm also a huge fan of everything Bob Mould has ever recorded (Husker Du, Sugar, solo - doesn't matter, love the guy, got to meet him, etc.) and he's definitely a distortion guy, but overall a straightforward sound. As opposed to an effects-heavy guy like Alex Lifeson or Tom Morello.

So throw out some ideas... the DOD 250? Something else?

Thanks!


-Dito

[deadastronaut]

hi dito, if your looking specifically for vero/stripboard projects

then you really can't go wrong with

http://tagboardeffects.blogspot.co.uk

plenty of projects to wet your appetite in there...

[dbp512]

I agree veroboard is very useful and there are so many layouts available. The link dead astronaut is one of my my favorites, and the source for most of my builds. I started a few months ago with a few boost/drive pedals until I felt comfortable soldering circuits. Then I moved up into a few more exciting modulation pedals; I finished a phase 90 and dimension p double chorus that I'm in the process of boxing up. There are a few circuits complicated enough that I want to use a PCB, but even so most of them have vero layouts anyway.

[Blitz Krieg]

The Dod 250 is very similar to the MXR distortion

[lars-musik]

If you etch your own pcbs (I started quite early with etching and think it really paid off), have a look at the Tonepad projects.

They are fantastic: Very well documented, clean and understandable layouts along with BOMs and schematics.

Here's the link (ordered by level of difficulty):

http://www.tonepad.com/projects.asp?projectType=fx&orderBy=difficulty

[Dito]

The only time I've ever used circuit board etching solution was to make pressure bombs out of 2-liter soda bottles. A few mailboxes were wrecked in my rebellious teenage years. Then my chemistry teacher helped us miscreants work out the reaction formula and we realized we were creating a nice cloud of toxic gas, not smoke. We stopped. :-)

When I asked "what to build next", maybe I should have been more clear. I was wondering what type of pedal I should consider, after overdrives or distortion. Like, what's the most useful or cool or common or whatever. Delay? Reverb? Like that. Or if there's a distortion pedal that's, y'know, the coolest one out there... which one is it?

[bloxstompboxes]

The only time I've ever used circuit board etching solution was to make pressure bombs out of 2-liter soda bottles. A few mailboxes were wrecked in my rebellious teenage years. Then my chemistry teacher helped us miscreants work out the reaction formula and we realized we were creating a nice cloud of toxic gas, not smoke. We stopped. :-)

When I asked "what to build next", maybe I should have been more clear. I was wondering what type of pedal I should consider, after overdrives or distortion. Like, what's the most useful or cool or common or whatever. Delay? Reverb? Like that. Or if there's a distortion pedal that's, y'know, the coolest one out there... which one is it?

What I think is the coolest or most useful will most likely be different from your opinion. Build something you need rather than something we randomly think you'll like. What is missing from your pedal board? Find out what that is and then maybe ask for some suggestions on that. Do you need another distortion or is a tremolo more important at this point?

[Dito]

I don't even "need" the one distortion pedal I've built. I'm a beginning player at best, with terrible practice habits. But I like building stuff and I like making noise.

So what's missing from my pedalbox? Either everything or nothing, depending on how you want to look at the situation.

One of these days, I'll round up my various musical friends and get a jam session going... but you know how it is being an adult, scheduling time, finding space, appeasing spouses, etc.

Until then, I'm just a duffer. A guy whose hobbies of guitar-learning and thing-making happen to overlap.

So instead of asking for what's necessary, if anyone cares to, tell me the favorite thing you've built, and why. I'm not asking that as a shortcut to reading the entire board, I'm just asking to make conversation and get ideas.

Thanks, all.

[bluebunny]

My favourite chorus is the EHX Small Clone (see Tonepad for a project).  My second-favourite chorus if the Dimension-P, mentioned above.  Some of the stuff at ROG is pretty good: Omega and Pepper Mill come to mind.  I quite liked the EZ-250 overdrive that Joe Davisson posted here a while back too.  Rob's Chasm reverb is awesome.

So there's a couple of my humble suggestions.  YMMV, of course... 

(BTW, I don't "need" most of the many pedals I've built since being around this place.  I play bass mostly, and 95% of the time with no FX at all...  )

[bloxstompboxes]

Sorry, I didn't mean to come off as snippy or an asshole. I just thought it might be more helpful to the op if he was more specific to what he needed rather than some random suggestions. I don't need 95% of the pedals I have either and agree that it is fun to just build them as I just suggested earlier in another thread today. I also, am just a one man show who doesn't play with anyone and actually stopped playing for about a dozen years before starting to build pedals and getting back into playing.

As my own suggestion, I would submit a chorus like the Small Clone or Zombie Chorus. A Rebote 2.5 delay would be a good one too. For a distortion, try one of these I just recently submitted in this thread: http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=112861.0

[Dito]

I never detected any snippiness in your reply. You were asking a very straightforward question and I gave a wholly honest answer. I'm happy with all the replies. (If I wasn't, it's likely you would know - heh).

I'm also trying to read up on electronics so I learn some of the "how" and "why" that make up these schematics. I can kinda read a schematic, but translating that to vero, PCB, or even breadboard - is still a work in progress.

My next build will probably be a bass distortion pedal for a friend, but it's a full-on kit.

But I can't ever have too many projects lined up, can I?

[deadastronaut]

have  a crack at the rebote delay 'tonepad'...always fun, and useful...and an easy build..

before you know it you'll be deluged with 100.. ' i must get around to that ' projects

have fun man..

[bloxstompboxes]

My list is at 140 pedals in queue to build and there are some not on the list too. lol. Kind of implies an obsession to build things I don't need.

[bluebunny]

My list is at 140 pedals in queue to build . . .

Lightweight!   

[chuckd666]

Man if you're a Mould fan you gotta get a Distortion+ going!

[Dito]

Is a "Distortion+" the proper name of a pedal? If so, will I find it here or on the stripboard site?

Thanks for helping the noob.

[deadastronaut]

hi dito...

google is your friend...take your pick..

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=distortion+vero&client=opera&hs=rKm&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwirjv61nJDKAhWGVRQKHUM6DXkQ_AUIBygB&biw=1118&bih=749

[Dito]

Sorry. Early morning pre-caffeine reply. I love google. And Bob Mould. And caffeine. And all you guys too.

[bluebunny]

Whatever you choose to build next (and there is always a "next"), tell us about it and post pictures.  It's the law.   

[Dito]

If a Distortion+ is (part of) that Bob Mould sound, then I've found my next project. Hellll-o Tayda! Time to make a shopping list.

My new soldering station and mini Panavise should arrive this week. What good are tools if you don't use them, right? Right.