20 years later and now it's a Wah

[kvb]

This thing was made in the 80's (thomas organ), purchased used in the 90's, and it sat doing nothing until 2006 because it was a piece of crap. This pedal might not be as sweet as those done with all the mods and a "halo", but now at least it can really be called a wah.

Thanks to R.G. and the "Technology of" series.  I mean it.  Thank you, thank you, thank you.

I changed two resistors in the signal chain to metal film and it was immediately quieter. Seriously!
After reading the notes, following the layout, and changing the easy stuff on Saturday, I spent a good part of Sunday screwing around trying the various mods.   I was not having any luck improving upon the sound with any of the mods.

I decided to run to the Shack and get a transformer. I hooked it up, and the wah sounded the same. Changed the transistors to 5089 (had to tweak the leads), and it doesn't seem any better. I played around with RQ and Q2's gain until I was bent: "why isn't this stuff working right?!"  I took a break.

I had already tried everything I was willing to do. I wasn't planing on doing a complete redo anyway. I just wanted to improve on the wah. Hmmm.   Thinking about both the mods pages, and what I had read in the tech notes, I remembered "inductors in series . . ."

Wah-lah!  I connected both of them.  I took the old inductor, flipped it over and used double-sided sticky tape to put it back where it had been.  the transformer was wrapped in elec tape and likewise taped to the enclosure, in-between the jacks.

So all told: 2 inductors, RQ = 52k, Q2 gain R = 250k, input R = 47k, new pot, and true bypass switch.

I'm not sure if this thing ever really was a wah, but it - sure as halo - is now.

Thanks to all.