Painting a pedal

Fibus · Post by **Fibus** » Wed Jun 18, 2008 6:52 am

I just got my first pedal kit in the post and i'll be putting it together at the weekend but first i need to paint the box. What kinda paints do you guys use and what process do you use to paint it? Also how long does it usually take? I am just talking about a basic single colour pedal.

Ninja Mike 808 · Post by **Ninja Mike 808** » Wed Jun 18, 2008 6:58 am

Which pedal did you get?

I've been thinkin' of leavin' mine raw, and writing AWESOME on it in pencil... Tha's jus because i like to have secret weapons.

Fibus · Post by **Fibus** » Wed Jun 18, 2008 7:26 am

I got this one from general guitar gadgets toobscreamah

I was gonna get a chunky cheese but i thought that might be a bit complicated for my first build so i tried to keep it simple.

Post by **Mike** » Wed Jun 18, 2008 7:27 am

Just get Halford's stuff, I posted this to Doog just yesterday

just went Halfords Own Brand all the way.

It's Grey Primer, VW Brilliant Orange and Clear Lacquer. 2 coats of each. They cost Â£5,70 a can so it's worth hunting for the primer in your Dad's shed/garage in case you have some already

Lay out the box and lid on Newspaper and weigh down the corners of the paper so they don't blow over the box when it's drying. Spray 2 coats of Primer 20 mins apart and then after 20 minutes do 2-3 coats of Colour 20 minutes apart. Leave it 6 hours or more if possible before clearcoating, you should do 2-3 clear coats and don't go crazy. then leave a full 24 hours before reassembling, or you'll leave marks when roughly handling it.

You can skip the Priming and Clearcoat stages if you want, just sand that fucker down and lay 4-5 coats of colour and leave for a day or so. It'll be fairly shiny, just not glossy. That way it only costs a fiver.

Fibus · Post by **Fibus** » Wed Jun 18, 2008 7:33 am

Sorry man i didn't see that yesterday. Thanks for the advice though, to Halfords it is!

Post by **Mike** » Wed Jun 18, 2008 7:44 am

What colour are you going for? Classic 808 Green?

Ninja Mike 808 · Post by **Ninja Mike 808** » Wed Jun 18, 2008 8:03 am

This is tight, I got a TS clone I need to get to buildin', too...

Fibus · Post by **Fibus** » Wed Jun 18, 2008 8:17 am

Mike wrote:What colour are you going for? Classic 808 Green?

I'm reckon since its a tubescreamer it kinda has to be green but maybe something else at halfords will catch my eye you never know. I'll probably take a wander up at lunch to see what they have.

Post by **Mike** » Wed Jun 18, 2008 8:30 am

They have tons of cool colours. I could happily spend Â£100 there.

Sublimedo · Post by **Sublimedo** » Thu Jun 19, 2008 12:33 pm

I like my zvex paintjobs n all, but my favorite pedal artist is Rochelle Joya

VB-2 clone

script phase 90 clone

Post by **Mike** » Thu Jun 19, 2008 12:37 pm

Didn't realise you'd done some BYOC stuff mate, nicely done.

Sublimedo · Post by **Sublimedo** » Thu Jun 19, 2008 12:49 pm

i've actually got quite a BYOC collection. I'll have to make a thread with pics soon.
I'm looking foward to wiring up a 5-knob compressor from them.

Post by **Mike** » Thu Jun 19, 2008 1:08 pm

I've never built one of their kits, but I'm a fan - it gets people into making pedals, which is ace.

Sublimedo · Post by **Sublimedo** » Thu Jun 19, 2008 1:22 pm

in my first year of uni in early 2004, i took a "guitar engineering" introductory-level class and they came recommended for a project. I've been a hooked on them since. They are actually what kept me going with EE and ,in a way, guitars in general. The board i put together for that project is now in Rochelle's Astro Step Delay.

Post by **Mike** » Thu Jun 19, 2008 1:27 pm

Nice one. That sounds like a really cool module. The only remotely applicable stuff I did for Guitars at university was a simple Bipolar Headphone amplifier (hello SALTBOOSTER). The rest of the analogue stuff I did was all RF, control system design and the lark, and loads of theory about solid-state physics, materials and processing of devices etc.

This stuff I've done recently along with guitar wiring and amplifier stuff is the only application of Analogue Electronics that I've done since university. I'm a digital design engineer by trade, I write VHDL and Verilog.

Sublimedo · Post by **Sublimedo** » Thu Jun 19, 2008 1:37 pm

haha I'm kinda known for being the "analogue" guy in my classes since we're all supposed to be doing DSP. People tend to like my projects and presentations for the fact I end up bringing amps for them, where other people mostly do voice recorders or solar-powered whatevers. The teachers actually get a kick out of the tubes in the amps. "You still use those??". There's also a fascination they have with BBD chips, so bringing back delay pedals as an example is points for me.

Post by **Mike** » Thu Jun 19, 2008 1:53 pm

Yeah, we had some great analogue guys who would talk valves with me which was great. They had been around for the advent of the transistor so they'd designed tube circuits anyway.

Post by **Doog** » Thu Jun 19, 2008 4:39 pm

My dad assured me we had some primer, so I bought some darkish (according to the can label) orange acrylic paint, and some enamel gloss spray varnish. Buuuuuut it's for enamel paints apparently.

But I'm not for rules- I'm spraying some shit tonight.

Post by **Mike** » Thu Jun 19, 2008 4:40 pm

Why did you buy that varnish? Did you not go to Halfords or summat? I'm sure it'll be fine either way

Post by **Doog** » Thu Jun 19, 2008 4:49 pm

Nah, both Halfords & B&Q are a good 40 minute walk from town and it's hottttttttttttt.

Bought the varnish first in the electronics shop, then just had a final check that there was no spray paint in the craft shop but there was this time! Hidden behind the counter.. i.e. right in front of me when I asked the cute sales assistant

I'm gonna spray an old box a little alongside the CC casing, so I can do a test spray of the varnish with the paint before fucking up the real thing.