Deciding on manual wah.

[H4T]

A while back I bought the Rogue WP-101 wah (do NOT get this, lol) and the pot broke when I tried to grease it up (my mistake). I could fix it by getting an indentical threaded pot, but instead I gutted the pedal and I want to put my own DIY wah circuit in there.

I've heard of the Idiot Wah, the ColorSound Wah and a couple of other, no name ones.

Which wah would you recommend for a semi-n00b to construct? Idiot wah looks good, but unsure about which SOUNDS the best.

[Paul Marossy]

Haven't heard the Idiot Wah, but the Colorsound inductorless wah sounds really nice.  I think the Idiot Wah is similar to the CS wah, but I haven't really compared the two.

BTW, I had thought about buying one of those Rogue wah pedals to gut, but my intuition told me not to...

[H4T]

http://www.home-wrecker.com/idiotwah.mp3
There's a sound sample for the Idiot Wah...it sounds quite nice to me. I can't find any sound clips of the Colorsound inductorless wah...links?

Yeah, the Rogue pedal is nice and cheap, so theres a good pro to get it for the chassis...but you've proven you can make a more durable case for less, lol. The WP-101 case, however has front-mounted input / output jacks, as well as a DC In jack. The whole thing is made of plastic, but its actually pretty durable. Makes a loud noise when you step on it hard, but I'm sure others do as well (not electronic, just because of the hollow plastic case). The actual foot-operated part of the wah has large threads on the top, so if you have a rubber-soled shoe, you won't be slipping around a lot.

I would stick with making your own case...if they cost less than $25 that is.

Anyway, I'm currently looking for a sound sample of the Colorsound wah...I've found some information (no sound clips) for what appears to be a Colorsound auto-wah, but no manual wah.

[H4T]

I hope double posts aren't frowned upon here, just wanted to update the last post...too lazy to Edit, heh.

Found sound clip of Colorsound over at Tone Frenzy, and I must say it sounds a good deal better than the Idiot Wah...though it could be the difference of the skill of the player and the quality of the recording. But it does sound wonderful.

However, I'm struggling finding a schematic of the Colorsound wah...if someone knows where I can find it, let me know.

[NaBo]

http://www.home-wrecker.com/idiotwah.mp3
There's a sound sample for the Idiot Wah...it sounds quite nice to me.

Should however be noted that this sample is an idiot wah with an LDR control... not a rocker.  I have a longer but worse quality (can hear the acoustic string noise in the background  :roll:) sample of the same thing on my samples page below.

It's pretty great for a low parts count, inductorless circuit.  Perhaps leaves a bit to be desired if you're making an all out manual rocker.  Simple and you get your moneys worth out of it.  Certainly fun to experiment with.

As for best sounding wah?  Highly subjective.  I'm a fan of Dimebag's signature.  It's pretty damn sweet... adjustable sweep & centre frequency, onboard booster...  There was a schem posted here a while ago... definitely not a beginner's build, but one hell of a pedal.  Dunno if it'd even fit in your enclosure!

There's a morley power wah in the schematics section on this site as well.  I plan on making one with an LDR control some day.

To each his own.

[H4T]

When I asked about which wah sounded better I was mainly referring to between the CS wah and the Idiot wah.

If I didn't have this empty wah rocker / case I wouldn't even want a wah, but since I've got this rocker, I've gotta do something with it.

Besides a wah circuit, I was thinking, couldn't I also put some other sort of circuit and use the rocker to control it? Like distortion: more you hold the pedal down, more distortion. I would actually ABSOLUTELY love to have an octave-up blender out of this; like a Whammy, but only the octave up part...

Hm...so..recommend me a simple, good manual wah, or a good sounding Whammy-style octave up..that would rock.

[NaBo]

Ah, my bad, I thought you were just mentioning you're considering those two and then opening up for suggestions.  :wink:

And yes, you definitely DO need to do something with the empty rocker... else one of us that's been teeming with the anticipation of finding one might forcibly remove it from your possession for their own purposes

You could most definitely make a rocker into all sorts of things... the most versatile and probably the simplest would be an expression pedal.  Just add a switching jack in parallel with any pot in your other pedals that you'd wanna have dynamic control over.  I plan on doing that and when I know enough to get a good control voltage from a proximity sensor circuit, it'll be time to get crazy.

Whammy pedal is, I think, out of diy reach, unfortunately...  I know it's been asked before, might wanna check the archives

Anyway, where was I?  The idiot wah can be used with a rocker too-  It's just sort of a waste since some of the admittedly "better" commercial wah circuits require a voltage divider instead of a variable resistor as the control.  With those, it isn't as easy to incorporate other methods of control like the LDR.  It won't sound any different with a rocker, you just can't have as fast a sweep as waving your foot over the LDR.

But since you have a real live rocker set up, you might wanna use a simpler circuit for now, and then you can always upgrade it later.  Haven't heard the CS, but I'm sure either one would be pretty great.

[H4T]

lol, sorry about sounding like a bitch there for a second. Yes, I'm definately open for suggestions, I was just thinking about those two wahs at the time, wasn't really thinking I guess.

That idea to make the pedal into an expression pedal sounds sweet, but I've only got 2 pedals at my disposal, none of which would work well with an expression pedal.

Hm, looks like I'm a little confused about what LDRs are, I am a n00b in electronics. Light Detecting Resistor? I'm gonna do some Googling, but if all I have to do is wave a limb over the pedal to work it...then it MUST be built! lol

So..a simpler circuit..hm...how about this. If I built the Nurse Quacky pedal, and had the rocker control the Range...that ought to produce some pretty noticable, interesting tones, right?

http://www.home-wrecker.com/nurse-quacky.html

[Paul Marossy]

I would stick with making your own case...if they cost less than $25 that is.

I estimate it cost $12 for my last DIY wah shell, counting the rack and pinion parts.

I'm struggling finding a schematic of the Colorsound wah...if someone knows where I can find it, let me know.

Look here: http://img9.exs.cx/img9/4021/cswah.gif
This is what I used to build mine.

looks like I'm a little confused about what LDRs are, I am a n00b in electronics. Light Detecting Resistor?

Yep, that's what it is. Here's a quick explanation of what it does: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photoresistor

[NaBo]

Light Detecting Resistor?

I think it's "dependent", but either way, same principle... they're really cheap too, and no need for a rocker.  With a little experimenting and this article http://www.geocities.com/thetonegod/rockncontrol/rock.html, you can put them pretty much anywhere!  Looking at the colorsound schem that Paul posted, you could actually just substitute one in there same as the idiot wah (sweep will be "backwards" though).  The only problem with them is controlling or compensating for changing light conditions, but it can be done.

If you're interested in a light controlled wah, I'd suggest the Photon Filter, also on Tim's circuit snippets page.  It's basically an idiot wah designed for use with an LDR, by using an LED as the variable resistor to ground, so that uncovered corresponds to toe up covering it corresponds to toe down.  You could probly tell from my sample, but getting used to a "backwards" sweep is difficult

[Paul Marossy]

Oh right, dependent, not detecting. Although they are very similar definitions.  :wink:

[mrsage]

I estimate it cost $12 for my last DIY wah shell, counting the rack and pinion parts.

Hey Paul--

I don't mean to hijack thist thread...but is there another thread where you discuss how you made your DIY shell?

I'd be interested in what you ended up doing...

[Paul Marossy]

I estimate it cost $12 for my last DIY wah shell, counting the rack and pinion parts.

Hey Paul--

I don't mean to hijack thist thread...but is there another thread where you discuss how you made your DIY shell?

I'd be interested in what you ended up doing...

Yes, there is: http://www.diystompboxes.com/sboxforum/viewtopic.php?t=34472&highlight=simpler (this is the one I would recommend)

And this is my first one: http://www.diystompboxes.com/sboxforum/viewtopic.php?t=34136&highlight=scratchbuilt (this one was for kicks, just to see if I could do it)

[mrsage]

Yes, there is: http://www.diystompboxes.com/sboxforum/viewtopic.php?t=34472&highlight=simpler (this is the one I would recommend)

And this is my first one: http://www.diystompboxes.com/sboxforum/viewtopic.php?t=34136&highlight=scratchbuilt (this one was for kicks, just to see if I could do it)

Perfect!

Thanks for the links...the final product looks great!

[Paul Marossy]

Thanks mrsage.  

[H4T]

Hm, a LDR controlled wah would rock my socks, but I don't need one, and I still have a rocker, lol.

The ColorSound wah looks very, very simple, that could be fun, but it doesn't seem to have any controls whatsoever, except for the LDR. And I'm assuming all I've got to do is replace the LDR with a pot for the rocker?

And about my other idea, would a weird circuit like the Nurse Quacky work, having one of the pots work on the rocker?

[Paul Marossy]

Hm, a LDR controlled wah would rock my socks, but I don't need one, and I still have a rocker, lol.

The ColorSound wah looks very, very simple, that could be fun, but it doesn't seem to have any controls whatsoever, except for the LDR. And I'm assuming all I've got to do is replace the LDR with a pot for the rocker?

And about my other idea, would a weird circuit like the Nurse Quacky work, having one of the pots work on the rocker?

On the Colorsound wah, check out the 100K variable resistor at the bottom of the schematic - that's your control.  :wink:

[H4T]

Yeah, but I have a rocker...so is all I do is replace the LDR with a pot, to be worked by the rocker?

[Paul Marossy]

Yeah, but I have a rocker...so is all I do is replace the LDR with a pot, to be worked by the rocker?

Are we talking about the Colorsound wah? There is no LDR in that particular circuit, just the 100K pot.

[H4T]

Oh snap...I thought the 100k thing was an LDR...I've never seen that symbol before, lol.

Is that 100k pot a rheostat? If its just a pot, I don't understand where the 3 lugs go to.