wah-flanger(autowah)

[kaboom]

Hey there, I was messing around with my wah and I found that I like the sound of an auto wah, I mean, when you slowly put the wah pedal down and then up.It creates kinda flanger-phaser oscillation, but with wah sound.So, Could it be possible to make this kind of auto wah?

[Mark Hammer]

Possible?  Yes and no.

An autowah certainly does what a wah does, but the question is whether it does so in the way you want/expect.  The chief concern/challenge is that a wah-wah does what you want exactly the way you want for as long or as quickly as you want.  Au autowah corresponds to your playing, where a wah is independent of your playing and dependant on your foot.

[kaboom]

It is not an autowah as the commercial autowah you think. Just imagine you are playin anything(chords) while you slowly press the wah-wah. Then you continue playing(no stop) while you are releasing, at the same speed, the wah pedal. Rinse and repeat. What you get is a flanger-like oscillation. Just think the wah as a potentiometer. While you play, you are moving the pot at a fixed speed. That certainly isnt an auto wah as we buy them, but is an automatic wah.
Now, about the stompbox, it would need 1 or 2 pots. First, rate("the speed you press the wah") and amplitude(how up can be the wah). The second pot is, let me explain, as if you put a lock on the pedal so you can only rise it up to some level
do you understand me now?

For example, take a view on "stockholm syndrome earls court 2004" you will hear it

[B Tremblay]

Something like this? http://runoffgroove.com/salvo.html#phozer

[kaboom]

well, That "phozer"(at least the first clip) has the oscillation rate I want(more or less) but even in clips 4 it still sounds as a phaser.Hear this:(4:00 in advance)http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMWPDtr93sM
Now I do it with a wah, but if i wan to have that effect during all the song I have to stand there on the wah.I want to move xD.

[Thomeeque]

 What kaboom wants is wah-wah controlled by LFO. There must be such a FX already - I'm sure! Anyway auto-wahs like Dr. Q or his Nurse Quacky could be easily adapted to use LFO instead of envelope detector for control (personally I would prefer to have both options switchable). For the "real" Vox-type wah-wah (e.g. Cry-Baby) this would be significantly more complicated, so kaboom, maybe check first Dr. Q and Nurse Quacky sound-samples, if this is good enough wah-wah sound for you..

T.

[Top Top]

I feel like I have seen an LFO controlled wah before. The first few chords on the beginning of Beck's "Mutations" album, which I was listening to yesterday, tells me something like this has existed.

One could EASILY be built with any number of wah circuits (Tim Escobedo's Ghost Dance is a personal favorite for it's simplicity), an LDR for the variable resistor, and your LFO of choosing with an LED on the output (hint, there are some LFOs using three inverters from a 4069, meaning you could build the whole thing out of one 4069 chip).

I've actually built this exact thing for a synth I made, but don't have a proper layout handy as I sort of winged it on perf.

[G]

The Boss AW-2 does LFO controlled wah.  Doesn't go as slowly as that video though.  To be honest, I'm not even sure that the sound on that video isn't phaser or flanger with a dry mix.  Or even produced independently of a guitar.
  Seems to make scant difference to the sound of the played notes and just goes on by itself in the background.  I have only listened to it once though.


Anyway, the AW-2 was not popular and is now very cheap on ebay.  The lack of popularity is reflected in the lack of diy projects.  Not much call for constant wah really, or that feature would have driven sales of AW-2s.

[Thomeeque]

To be honest, I did not listen/watch the Muse video before I did now and I agree with G, it's not just a slow wah, it's more like mix of non-modulated signal, very slow flanger and maybe something else yet. T.

[G]

To be honest, I did not listen/watch the Muse video before I did now and I agree with G, it's not just a slow wah, it's more like mix of non-modulated signal, very slow flanger and maybe something else yet. T.

You were dead right in what you said though - he's describing an LFO wah, he's already used a normal wah to get a sound he likes: doesn't really matter that much if the people in the video use something else.

There is a distinct shortage of projects like this - maybe it is worth tacking the LFO from something else onto Dr Q or Nurse Quacky...  I think that sawtooth, triangle, and sine waves might sound interesting as an option.  Having said that, maybe the shortage is down to the problems using such a thing.  Where will you be on the LFO when you activate the effect?

[kaboom]

The Dr.Q and the Nurse Quacky sound as a wah to me(at least for what I want).As G said, I tried using different settings: normal wah, wah+flanger, wah+flanger+phaser and flanger+phaser.And honestly, using only the wah is what fits me

"Where will you be on the LFO when you activate the effect?" -> I think I don't understand your question,I think you mean, "what position(tone) should the wah have when you activate it?"; right?. If it's that , let me say that I don't really mind, but I will try to explain.
Let's say the wah has the position 0%(no tone, the pedal's up) and the 100% position(a lot of tone).I don't mind if it starts at 100% and goes back to 0% or if it starts at 0% and goes to 100%... Or even if it starts at 50% and goes to 100%, Really, that doesn't matter. The only thing is that, if possible, I prefer to have a lot of tone than no tone.I mean, I prefer(but not necessary!) that the wah always start at 20% and finishes at 80%. But really, that doesn't matter!.

About the video, I think it's a wah, because on some forum/youtube video I heard that he has this auto wah(yeah, It was the word wah, not flanger or phaser) integrated on the guitar.

Anyway, I checked an aw-3 review and I think it (more or less) fits me in the tempo mode.