What are some quintessential DIY pedals?

[Jopn]

Hey guys,

I'm still fairly new here, but getting very hooked very quickly.  I've spent a few months tinkering on breadboard and finally am in the process of moving my first effect into a box (w00t!).

But enough about me, I have a question for you.

What would YOU say some of the quintessential DIY effects are?  I like tinkering around with my own ideas, but I also want to build the "standards".  An obvious example that I see come up over and over is Dr. Boogie.  What else is "everyone" making?

Don't worry about "well John, it depends what kind of style of music you like..." or "what sounds good to one's persons ears may not sound good to someone else's..."  I want to know what YOU think

Cheers,

John

[Seljer]

Fuzz face

[jymaze]

SHO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[artifus]

i've enjoyed a lot of these: http://folkurban.com/Site/GuitarEffects-681.html

[Mark Hammer]

"Quintessential" has a few possible, occasionally overlapping, connotations:

• something everyone builds and needs to build to learn certain core skills
• something regularly built because it is easy and cheap enough to compete favorably with a commercial product
• something built often enough and commented on often enough that there is a near-endless supply of useful information here
• somethng everybody seems to want to have
• something easy and cheap enough that folks feel a sense of empowerment by completing it

[Vallhagen]

There are a few in the OD / Dist / Fuzz families... I pick the Tube Screamer as the most quintesssssential.

Cheerio

[gcme93]

Big Muff Pi has a lot to play around with and lots of little mods here and there

Little Angel is a DIY designed, low part, fantastic sounding chorus,

Tubescreamer is the pedal that everyone seems to have, and there's a lot of resources on it

There's lots of fun little pedals like those Tim Escobedo ones posted above, and Rob Henry's Tiny Tremolo


Just check out all the resources on the "schematics" page at the top!

[gjcamann]

SHO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Second. Easy, try to super duper SHO too.

[Thecomedian]

"Quintessential" has a few possible, occasionally overlapping, connotations:

• something everyone builds and needs to build to learn certain core skills
• something regularly built because it is easy and cheap enough to compete favorably with a commercial product
• something built often enough and commented on often enough that there is a near-endless supply of useful information here
• somethng everybody seems to want to have
• something easy and cheap enough that folks feel a sense of empowerment by completing it

you could probably combine the core skill and empowerment ones.

[ghostsauce]

Tube Screamer's gotta be "The" DIY pedal to build. Cause everybody loves them, and there's so frickin' many well documented mods out there.

SHO is another great one though, it is by far my fav boost since I first fired it up. I think people usually go down the Fuzzy tunnel of love when they first get into building, and they end up with a muff, a fuzzface, and 3 or 4 other fuzzes they'll never use.. Lol, if money's an issue you should really go for your 'ideal' rig first, then the weird / oddball stuff.

[Jopn]

"Quintessential" has a few possible, occasionally overlapping, connotations:

• something everyone builds and needs to build to learn certain core skills
• something regularly built because it is easy and cheap enough to compete favorably with a commercial product
• something built often enough and commented on often enough that there is a near-endless supply of useful information here
• somethng everybody seems to want to have
• something easy and cheap enough that folks feel a sense of empowerment by completing it

Lol, Like I said, I haven't been around for long, but I definitely thought to myself while opening this topic: how do I word this, so that Mark Hammer doesn't bridge off into a "there is no right answer" reply

I would say if a project meets any of those very well defined criteria, list 'er up!

[Mark Hammer]

Gah!!  I've been outed!! 

Maybe I'm on auto-pilot about these matters but I generally recommend two particular builds:

1) A loop selector pedal, whether single or multiple loop.  It will always be useful to a stompbox user, and doesn't involve component values, biasing, sourcing special components or any of that.  A great way to get into things.

2) The MXR Distortion+ / DOD 250 is a very simple circuit that can generally be made from Radio Shack parts, and has near-unlimited possibilities for mods, all of which are searchable here.  It presents a very simple and straightforward platform for learning about what does what.  Plus, it actually sounds pretty decent in its native form.

[Jazznoise]

Fuzz Face, Tubescreamer, RAT, Super Hard On, Big Muff, MXR Dist+

Sometimes beginners start with something weirder - like a Tonebender.  As a first toes in the non-distortion world: Probably a Little Angel.

Previous to starting DIY I never knew why people would own more than 1 or 2 fuzz pedals. Of course I have 5 now, one on Vero unfinished and 2 more to build thereafter. 

[Resynthesis]

What about the Bazz Fuss - all DIY.

[Jopn]

Some others that I see often here:

Engineer's Thumb
Orange Squeezer
Tremulus Lune

[Jopn]

What about the Bazz Fuss - all DIY.

+1  I'm boxing up a version of that right now.  Sounds great, simple, extremely tweakable, etc.

[artifus]

please tell me we are not constructing some kind of top ten type list. please.

[Jopn]

please tell me we are not constructing some kind of top ten type list. please.

Nope, just thought it would be an interesting topic.  I'm more interested in people's actual opinions, rather than someone's opinion of what they thing someone else's opinion would be.

Actually, another interesting way to approach this topic would be the following:

Scenario: All your pedals are gone (Gasp!).  What would be YOUR first few builds?

[midwayfair]

"Quintessential" and "essential" are different things.

If it's the former, then we're talking about ... elemental circuits, things that are kind of the distilled bits of stompboxes, or near-irreducible complexity for what they do. Things like the SHO or AMZ MOSFET booster, the Fuzz Face, the Electra Distortion, the Son of the Screamer, the Bazz Fuss, and maybe things like the Nurse Quacky and the Orange Squeezer and RoG's Improved EA Tremolo. Or we can take quintessential to mean "perfect" and then you're opening a whole can of worms ...

If we're talking merely about "essential" (which is too often what people mean when they use "quintessential"), then a big ole list of the classics will suffice, with some consideration for whether we're composing it of circuits born in the DIY community or including booteek favorites like the TS and/or once-extinct effects like the Fuzz Face and/or super-moddable popular pedals like the Big Muff ...

[Thecomedian]

quintessential things are 5x more essential than regular essential, right?