How stomp boxes work

[ingrowing_whale]

Hi. I study electronics at highschool and know quite a bit but I haven't done audio electronics yet (I'm gonna study that at UNI). So could some people explain the basics of what happens in a pedal (just simple things like how eq works and how to make distortion), that would be great cos I'd like to create my own stompboxes as well as just cloneing ones. cheers

[Peter Snowberg]

Welcome to the forum.

The first thing to do is to read everything you can at the GEOFEX and AMZ links you see at the top of the page.  R.G. and Jack have a vast amount of worderful knowledge available on-line. I don't think you could ask for better teachers too.

For distortion basics, check out this article: http://www.geofex.com/effxfaq/distn101.htm

Welcome to the world of DIY audio. 

[wampcat1]

Study: http://www.geofex.com/fxtech.htm - it will explain alot of your questions.

Take care,
Brian

[Mark Hammer]

When you are done all of that, go to your local library and see if they can get any of the Craig Anderton books through interlibrary loan.  These would include Electronic Projects for Musicians ( http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0825695023/ref=pd_sim_b_1/102-2668044-8404941?%5Fencoding=UTF8&v=glance&n=283155 ) and DIY Projects for Guitarists ( http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/087930359X/102-2668044-8404941?v=glance&n=283155 ).  Another overlooked classic of Craig's is Guitar Gadgets ( http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0825622948/qid=1140815102/sr=1-8/ref=sr_1_3_8/202-9185711-7767838 ).  This one was given to me by a student of mine long ago, and it still holds up nicely.  While it does not include any projects or schematics, it steps through essentially every category of effect known about in 1983 and explains how it works and what each control does.  Lots of pictures of commercial pedals included.

You can also go to my site and download all the back issues of DEVICE magazine (links found on web pgaes 10 and 11).  This was published for a single year only and still managed to cover an enormous amount and explain it very well.

[PenPen]

I second all of the suggestions here. GeoFex is a mountain of information, AMZ adds to that mountain, and the DEVICE articles on Mark's site are a fantastic read as well.

There's some useful stuff in the DIY FAQ link above too.