Mike's Pedal Thread

Haze · Post by **Haze** » Thu Dec 18, 2008 4:50 am

quick q on the hot cake
is it going to function exactly like a crowther?
ie: acting as a clean boost w/ the presence + drive down
1 Megohm Input Impedance
Less than 13K Output Impedance
9-12vdc Operation

all the good stuff about the pedal

also, in some research i found that the newer ones have a switch inside of them to go to the bluesberry mod
think, in the future, you could wire in a switch to do the same thing?

Post by **Mike** » Thu Dec 18, 2008 8:26 am

Yeah, there is plenty of volume on tap with the Gain down low it only really starts to dirty the sound up right near the top of the dial, so bear that in mind. It's a Linear taper pot and the Hotcake uses a Reverse Log one which I couldn't get hold of on time, the pedal still has all the same gain sounds, just the dirt is further up the dial. The presence control adds a nice sparkle, and there is plenty of volume on tap.

As for input and output impedance, it's the same circuit, so yes!

9-12VDC - there is a Zener Diode to protect the circuit if you overpower it, but it just dumps all voltage over 8.7V to ground, so there is no benefit to running with a 12V supply other than the fact it is compliant with one.

It would be possible for me to add a Toggle to future pedals but it might be a bit tight on a case that small, it's pretty packed in there. That reminds me - please don't open the pedal up if you don't have to, since the circuit board is jammed in there under the switch, and I had some problems making sure I had enough insulation between the bottom of the circuit board (with the stubs of component legs) cutting through my insulation and grounding circuit points to the case. It is completely fine now but repeated opening and closing (and there's no battery to get at!) will scrape the circuit board against the case and increase the chance of those little pins scratching through the insulation.

Post by **Mike** » Thu Dec 18, 2008 8:32 am

Yeah, there is plenty of volume on tap with the Gain down low it only really starts to dirty the sound up right near the top of the dial, so bear that in mind. It's a Linear taper pot and the Hotcake uses a Reverse Log one which I couldn't get hold of on time, the pedal still has all the same gain sounds, just the dirt is further up the dial. The presence control adds a nice sparkle, and there is plenty of volume on tap.

As for input and output impedance, it's the same circuit, so yes!

9-12VDC - there is a Zener Diode to protect the circuit if you overpower it, but it just dumps all voltage over 8.7V to ground, so there is no benefit to running with a 12V supply other than the fact it is compliant with one.

It would be possible for me to add a Toggle to future pedals but it might be a bit tight on a case that small, it's pretty packed in there. That reminds me - please don't open the pedal up if you don't have to, since the circuit board is jammed in there under the switch, and I had some problems making sure I had enough insulation between the bottom of the circuit board (with the stubs of component legs) cutting through my insulation and grounding circuit points to the case. It is completely fine now but repeated opening and closing (and there's no battery to get at!) will scrape the circuit board against the case and increase the chance of those little pins scratching through the insulation.

Post by **Mike** » Thu Dec 18, 2008 11:15 am

Jason your pedal went out Airmail this morning. Hopefully should be with you just after Xmas, although it might be delayed by the Festive Postal Service

Post by **dots** » Thu Dec 18, 2008 6:57 pm

so epic! can't wait!

Haze · Post by **Haze** » Thu Dec 18, 2008 8:50 pm

good times mike, thanks for the extra info, always helpful
can't wait to plant that baby on my board!

finboy · Post by **finboy** » Sat Dec 20, 2008 4:45 pm

can you make one of these?

http://acapella.harmony-central.com/for ... ?t=2187244

reports say there are some hard to find parts used to assemble it, but going rate on ebay is silly high

this details the "hard to find components"
http://guitargear.org/2008/11/14/new-ge ... omp-pedal/

Post by **Mike** » Sat Dec 20, 2008 4:50 pm

Probably would be a pain to get hold of some NOS transistors or whatever, and not cheap - to be honest I think the current Dyna Comp sounds fabulous. When I borrowed euan's (for like 6 months) I was blown away by it.

Post by **Mike** » Sun Dec 21, 2008 2:18 pm

This is a Saltbooster I built into a case Markleton had drilled out. I also widened the DC jack hole for him. It's ready to be refinned, Mark. Just take care when removing and reinserting the circuit. Recommend you undo all the nuts (lolz) and loosen the 3DPT, pot, DC jack and jacks and then pop the circuit board off it's standoff. When reinserting but the circuit board in first and then the 3DPT, then the LED, DC jack and pot, and finally the jacks.

This is the board for the modded RAT I'm making:

And it's case ready to be drilled and finished:

And this is the replacement board for Proggie's Box Of Mike which I'm still waiting on his Dad to post.

markleton · Post by **markleton** » Sun Dec 21, 2008 6:31 pm

Looks amazing mike, thanks for not letting my shitty skills with perfboard ruin all that stuff i bought and drilled. Though to be fair, using the pedestal drill at school was pretty sweet, took me back a bit. Rat looks sweet too, anything special about it? I build the BYOC Rat and love it's different clipping modes, more than the stock Rat setting.

Post by **Mike** » Sun Dec 21, 2008 6:42 pm

markleton wrote:Looks amazing mike, thanks for not letting my shitty skills with perfboard ruin all that stuff i bought and drilled. Though to be fair, using the pedestal drill at school was pretty sweet, took me back a bit. Rat looks sweet too, anything special about it? I build the BYOC Rat and love it's different clipping modes, more than the stock Rat setting.

No worries man, it was fun to not have to do the marking and drilling. You did a fine job on the placement and drilling of the holes.

I'm using a drill press at work these days for pedals and it's great, way more accurate than by hand. My RAT has the "Reutz" resistor (the 47 ohm in one of the filter paths around the op-amp) replaced by a 1k pot so you can tune the gain level and frequency response of the rat, and also two toggles - one switches between LEDs and 1n914 diodes, and the other pulls the diodes completely for op-amp only overdrive.

Post by **Mike** » Mon Dec 22, 2008 10:04 am

Mark your pedal went in the post 1st class First thing this morning. Cheers.

markleton · Post by **markleton** » Mon Dec 22, 2008 1:38 pm

Sweet, if it arrives before xmas you get a happy holiday blowjob. Thanks a lot dude. Demo will be made once my shit gets made louder.

Post by **Mike** » Mon Dec 22, 2008 1:45 pm

You bloody Scots!

stewart · Post by **stewart** » Mon Dec 22, 2008 1:47 pm

haha, we're all getting up mike's nose today!

markleton · Post by **markleton** » Mon Dec 22, 2008 5:17 pm

And i thought i was spreading Christmas cheer! I wasn't going to do it personally, I'd have paid the finest rent boy England could offer to do the deed. Really appreciate the speedy service Mike. Thanks.

Haze · Post by **Haze** » Mon Dec 22, 2008 7:43 pm

The hotcake showed up in the mail today. only thing i saw wrong with it was the led wasn't orange
guessed from the original mix up, but it's all right, looks good as is
but the thing sounds damn good, great tubescreamer type tones without being mush
presence knob adds a lot of mids and, well, presence. gain has a fuck tone in the last 20%, which is nice because i got it mainly for the low drive stuff
but cranked it sounds as hot as the box of rock surprisingly
but fully satisfied Mike, thanks a lot, once again

Post by **Mike** » Mon Dec 22, 2008 8:03 pm

That's as Orange as LED's go I'm afraid mate! The Yellow ones are more yellow but Orange ones are that colour, or just the same as a Red one. Glad you like it, I think it's a cool sounding pedal. Thanks again

Haze · Post by **Haze** » Mon Dec 22, 2008 8:06 pm

guess it's hard for the orange colour to not look yellow next to it!
seriously, that thing is YELLOW

markleton · Post by **markleton** » Tue Dec 23, 2008 3:53 pm

Mike! Pick a man, he's sucking you off, i'll foot the bill. It arrived this morning and makes my shit way louder. Also distorts my tiny terror to hell hough, sounds amazing when boosting my Rat clone. Thanks a lot.