Moding or creating a volume pedal with a FCV 100

[DeusM]

Hey guys. So I have this pedal and it sucks. It sucks tone and adds noise. So I was thinking. Since I really like a volume pedal and most of them are really expensive. Is there a ways to mod this one or build one from schartch and use the case of the FCV for ot?

[PRR]

http://www.newtone-online.nl/forum/index.php?topic=7145.15

[iainpunk]

That link redirects to a page in Dutch!?! Not that thats a problem for me personally

But thats some useful information, in the quote. Was thinking about getting a volume pedal, hearing those are cheap and "easily" moddable, im considering picking one up

[DeusM]

There is a huge quote in english and it goes straigh to the point wich is the modifications so that is awesome!. I'm concerned about the "raised floor noise" the mods will carry, beacuse after all there is no point of having a volume pedal that adds noise but it's great info. Maybe removing the buffer the noise will go away? Or maybe shielding the case beacuse irs almost pure plastic. There is not much on the internet about tis pedal so thanks!!

[ElectricDruid]

There is a huge quote in english and it goes straigh to the point wich is the modifications so that is awesome!. I'm concerned about the "raised floor noise" the mods will carry, beacuse after all there is no point of having a volume pedal that adds noise but it's great info. Maybe removing the buffer the noise will go away? Or maybe shielding the case beacuse irs almost pure plastic. There is not much on the internet about tis pedal so thanks!!

It's only a "raised noise floor" compared to the amount of noise generated by 10K resistors. Given the massive problems for guitar with an inverting buffer that uses 10K resistors (even before you tie the input to ground with 300K) it would almost certainly be a considerable improvement.

If you completely remove the buffer, the input impedance would go up to 30K, which is better than 10K, but not by a hell of a lot.

The underlying problem is that the V2164 VCA that they're using (sensibly enough - it's made by Behringer/Coolaudio) is inverting in its usual configuration. The VCA itself doesn't invert, but it's typically followed by an inverting I-to-V stage. So they've used an inverting buffer to avoid flipping the signal, which is a good intention at least. If they'd been willing to settle for a flipped signal, they could have easily avoided the whole disaster.

[PRR]

It begs for a proper unity-gain high-Z buffer before the whole thing.

Because it is SMT it may be too teeny to work more stuff in.

[DeusM]

I'm hinking more about using the case for a new volumen pedal. I don't realy care about the expresion function. Can you recomend me some schematich or where to start? I'm interested in something that is noiseless and doesnt suck tone, otherwise i'd rather sell the pedal and buy a good volumen pedal, although they are quite expensive.