Black Ice Overdrive

[adgators89]

Did anyone ever build the black ice overdrive and if so, what are your thougts on it?

[GreenEye]

I bought a so-called equivalent off Ebay awhile back, called the Redline overdrive.  He would sell them for 0.99 cents, then charge $5 shipping.  I'm sure I could have made it myself by the looks of it.  The Redline is supposed to clip harder.  I thought I'd have this secret weapon in my axe, but with passive components like that, you'd really need a 9V-driven onboard effect.  It's subtle - very subtle.  If you've got a straight clean sound, it will add a little bit of tweed crunch, probably only perceptable to the player's ears.  With a distorted channel, you really can't tell.  In short, I'll probably take it out someday and put in a simple DIY active device (easy face, easy drive, etc.).  I looked on Harmony Central at the reviews of the Black Ice, and people basically said the same thing.  Too subtle to even fool with.  Go active!

[Peter Snowberg]

I have a Ge diode pair attached to one of my tone controls in place of the tone cap. It seems to have the best effect when the control is somewhere in the middle of the range and the effect is along the lines that GreenEye just described.... a little bit of classic clipping sounding.... whatever that means. It works best if you're not using another fuzz or distortion. I like it.

Somebody here said forget the Ge diodes and use Schottkys like 1N5817 instead because they sound much better in this use.... I'll try at next string change if I remember.

I use it a little like a tone control. It seems to wipe out most of the higher harmonics when its on full.

[puretube]

is the "ice" those serial diodes?

or are they shunting?

EMI (excuse my ignorance...  

[Jason Stout]

is the "ice" those serial diodes?

or are they shunting?

EMI (excuse my ignorance...  

...Excused

The Black Ice diodes are shunting.

[Peter Snowberg]

The thing I find unique in this arrangement is that the attack of my single coils is greatly reduced in amplitude.

(As you all know I like to babble incoherently, so following is a run-on sentence that all English scholars should probably avoid :lol:)

Depending on playing style and pickup output, the dynamics are greatly evened out so when you add the right amount of amplification to make 'full volume' the level just shy of clipping, the guitar output and diode threshold conspire to limit amplitude to a level that also happens to be similar to the amplitude during the early part of the note decay. Whew...  Much of the strum is buried is clip-land as a result. Better for some people who like distorted droning rhythm parts