MXR Classic Overdrive Mod

[PDGoss]

Our family are friends with all the folks at our local Guitar Center, we and they sit in on shows together, handle their personal gear repair, etc.

The Request
So I walked in last week and got handed a new MXR Classic Overdrive and was asked to do whatever I could to make it more ballsy.

Rushed Into Action
I took it home, hooked it up and the thing was shrill, thin and just plain harsh, and for someone with mid and upper frequency hearing damage, it had to be painful to the average listener.

Oh Crap
I popped open the case and disappointment struck me immediately; as I realized it was constructed with SMD components. I've not reached the skill level to deal with those small surface mount monkeys and not to mention the eyes are feeling my age. Thank God for my geek visor (head mount magnifier with a light); that's what I call it.

Dealing with my limitation
So knowing I wasn't going to risk damaging his pedal, I still wanted to try and do something to come close to achieving what he wanted.

So, I got to thinking and had a little idea from guitar tone control with capacitors that ended up working out well; I just didn't know if the owner was going to dig it or not.

The Mod
I added a .047uF poly cap on the input jack jumpered to the gain pot and jumpered a .022uF poly cap on volume pot to the output jack. I tried a number of different cap combination and this one seemed to yield the best results. I know this wasn't ideal, but...

But what?
The end result was actually a beautifully sounding, very buttery, non-shrill overdrive pedal with just a little less output than the stock version. I took it back and let him try it out, thankfully he was thrilled with the results and it turns out it was exactly the tone he was looking for; I feel very fortunate. I assume that by running the caps parallel to (or around) the effects chain, it provided enough frequency filtering so that when the two source blended (effected in and jumpered in; same on the output) it created the nice tone. He want's me to do some cosmetic work on it, so when I get it back I'll get some gut pics and post them.

Conclusion
Could someone kindly/possibly point me to a good resource on working with SMD components? I really need to learn the techniques and expand my skill set.

Thanks,

PD