Increasing Pedal Output Volume - GGG Blues Breaker

[robrash]

Hey Everyone-

I've built a few pedal kits this past year as well as modding quite a few others and I need some help. I built a general guitar gadgets marshall blues breaker pedal and I love it but I want to increase the over all volume a bit more... not the gain. I'm assuming I can swap out a different value resistor either after the gain stage or before/after the volume pot. Any help would be really appreciated. Thanks.

Here's a link the GGG schematic: http://www.generalguitargadgets.com/pdf/ggg_mbb_lo.pdf?phpMyAdmin=78482479fd7e7fc3768044a841b3e85a

[GibsonGM]

Hi Rob,

HERE is the actual schematic, I think you posted the board layout by mistake:  http://www.generalguitargadgets.com/pdf/ggg_mbb_sc1.pdf?phpMyAdmin=78482479fd7e7fc3768044a841b3e85a

Anyway - did you use 2 1N4148 diodes on each clipping leg? (4 total).  That will affect how loud the pedal is...you can add 1 more to each side, too, see what that does!  It will get louder, and also clip differently.

But first - make SURE R2, R3, R15 and R10, R11 are the right values and in the right places on the board.  They have the most control over gain, leading to loudness (but of course also distortion).

Make sure you put the right pots in the right place for each control. R10 is 100k?

Last ditch - jump the bottom of R9 over to the top of your 100k volume pot, bypassing the tone stack - THAT will give you volume!

I've built this one, and it was plenty loud enough, so I think something might not be quite right (?)  You could try following this with a booster, which is personally how I'd approach it.  Something transparent like the AMZ Mosfet Boost.

[robrash]

Thanks Mike... I'll give it a look. The pedal sounds great but I have to turn the gain and volume to about 3 o'clock for it to cut through. I'd rather have the volume at about 12 noon. And I built it to the exact schematic from GGG. I am going to replace all the polyfilm caps with box caps and see what that'll do tone wise but I really just want a bit more headroom.

[pappasmurfsharem]

I am going to replace all the polyfilm caps with box caps and see what that'll do tone wise but I really just want a bit more headroom.

It'd be a waste of time.

[ashcat_lt]

Thanks Mike... I'll give it a look. The pedal sounds great but I have to turn the gain and volume to about 3 o'clock for it to cut through. I'd rather have the volume at about 12 noon. And I built it to the exact schematic from GGG. I am going to replace all the polyfilm caps with box caps and see what that'll do tone wise but I really just want a bit more headroom.

You want it to be louder so that you can attenuate it more?   

[GibsonGM]

I am going to replace all the polyfilm caps with box caps and see what that'll do tone wise but I really just want a bit more headroom.

It'd be a waste of time.

+1 

Yeah, it's not that clear what you're trying to do exactly, Rob.  For more headroom, adding a diode would probably be the biggest bang for the buck.   As would bypassing the tone stack.

If something is designed for "X" gain, that's how it is.   You CAN alter the gain resistors, upping them - and then you have more distortion.  It's a play on the relationship between headroom + clipping.   More diodes requires more level to clip, so more headroom......last restort is to set the pedal at 12 noon, then run into a booster.     

IOW, more clean headroom at higher volumes generally = more stages needed.