Zvex wah probe, Diamond Comp, Catalinbread Harmonic envelope controlled pedals!

[claytushaywood]

I havent made a request in a while, but here's some stuff I'd like to see.

a wah like the zvex wah probe- I know there's a project on diystompboxes for this, but i'd love to see a board and have madbean make it easy for us to implement like he does on all these great projects.  I never really had an interest in this pedal before, as I saw it as a gimmick that was cool but not entirely useful.  Having just tried one out i have to say i freakin love it.  Its so much easier to control and just feels better than the typical wah enclosure- i dont know, i just like the way it felt and responded so much better than a crybaby enclosure and pot.

Diamond compressor- I dig the afterlife and its a great optical comp circuit.  But man the diamond compressor is so versatile and the fine tuning of the EQ control is amazingly useful.  Sabrotone has a freakin beast of a vero layout that I dont even want to attempt (even though i have like 50 vero builds under my belt)  I would just buy the Diamond Comp as I feel $200 is pretty reasonable for a compressor of this caliber.  However, there are a few internal controls that I would like to see externalized- and I would also like to be able to add a buffered blend circuit.  (i know this has been discussed before, and I know we're not gonna see the barber tone press on here, but how about the Diamond comp utilizing the blend circuit from the tone press--- now that would be the ultimate stomp box compressor!)

Catalinbread Harmonic Mesmerizer- or bajaman's vibratrem- those sound so freakin cool.

a vibrato that sounds like the old magnatone amps

a nice pitch vibrato with a ramp feature

maestro ring modulator

THROBBING GRISTLE!  I know there are boards out there for this, but apparently they arent true to the original.  This is such a cool freakin circuit and I want the real deal!

I'd also like to see more envelope controlled pedals.  an envelope controlled wah- i know, i know we have the mutron and I cannot wait to build the mutron- but i am talking about something that goes up and down like a wah with a controllable rate but is effect by pick dynamics... is this possible- i dont know.  Sounds awesome to me.

a dual delay with tap tempo and tempo subdivisions along with the skreddy echo style repeats that dont get super loud while maintaing a wash of echo, along with the multiplex modulation on each delay and an effects loop.  the super delay!

Thansk for reading!  anyone second any of these?  I'd like to go ahead and second all of them--- twice!

[madbean]

These are all pretty good ideas.

I've had a go at the Wah Probe a couple of times and have not successfully made it work

I think the Diamond compressor might have been traced on FSB. Not sure if anyone ever did a layout for it. I have part of a layout for the Pigtronix Philosopher whatever, but haven't finished it.

I actually have a layout for the Mesmerizer, but I have not built it, so it is not verified. There was a layout for it on FSB at one time.

GGG has the Maestro Ring Modulator. I will be doing the EHX ring mod (the old one).

I have a layout for the Gristle but never built it. I just dropped it because Taylor at musicpcb released a PCB for it.

For an envelope controlled wah, well I just put the Autobahn up in the extra projects section. That's exactly what you are describing.

For the dual delay, I'd say things are looking promising for doing tap tempo ANALOG delay soon. Molten Voltage is doing an clock IC for that right now. I've already been in touch with them, so you can bet that is something I will follow through on.

[midwayfair]

Just some suggestions:

>a vibrato that sounds like the old magnatone amps

The Magnavibe is a fairly easy project. Raulduke was going to do a PCB run and the guy who sells the pedal asked him not to. Jacob's doing a PCB of my Blue Warbler soon. You can change a few values on that board and leave off some other parts and build the Magnavibe on that. Haberdasher also will do an etch of Madbean's Quadrovibe, which just sounds better than the Magnavibe.

>Diamond compressor
Sabrotone has a vero layout for this. But I've breadboarded it and I can tell you it's needlessly complicated for what you get -- seriously, just build the Afterlife. The Diamond has a 3:1 ratio at max. The Afterlife can do this and more. The noise performance and tonal transparency are almost identical. And it uses a fraction as many components. I have a lot of respect for Diamond and they build really great stuff, but I think this pedal is overkill. The real test of a complicated design is whether it can go far beyond the simple circuits and this doesn't pass that test. I feel the same way about the Pale Green Compressor, which is only marginally better in the complexity-to-results ratio than the Diamond (it allows control of the decay and has a decent tone circuit, so they can have a few extra parts).

>Catalinbread Harmonic Mesmerizer- or bajaman's vibratrem- those sound so freakin cool.
There's a vero of the Catalinbread, but there may be some errors. RG Keen did a version of the harmonic tremolo (it's the "Fender Pro Vibrato") and there's an improved version out there. It's got lot of parts (10 transistors) but it sounds good and except for two sets of matched FETs (and they don't have to be that closely matched) and not much allowance for substitutions was surprisingly easy to build.

I'm normally a fan of transistors over op amps, but honestly I think it would be better for someone to design a harmonic tremolo from the ground up using the LM13700 instead of FETs or photocells instead of copying an existing design. Catalinbread is cool with the DIY crowd, but why copy their stuff if you don't have to? The Bajaman circuit is fair game of course, but for best performance I think you'd need to match optocouplers for best performance. Expensive proposition.

>i am talking about something that goes up and down like a wah with a controllable rate but is effect by pick dynamics... is this possible- i dont know.  Sounds awesome to me.

It's perfectly possible! Here's how I'd do it:
Use a Colorsound Inductorless Wah's audio path with the sweep controlled by an LDR. The audio path from the Lightwah has the work done for you. (I did an LFO-only version of it in the member's projects section.) You can chop off the LFO section and ...

... Use the envelope section + LFO section from my blue warbler. The sentitivity control will let you have wah only on the decay of notes or only on the attack of notes, and the rate and depth of the sweep are still controllable.

I could actually whip up a schem or perfboard layout of this fairly easily ... unverified of course, but logically sound ...

>a nice pitch vibrato with a ramp feature
Can you explain this further?

>I'd also like to see more envelope controlled pedals.

Brian's got this coming up, an envelope controlled op-amp trem: http://www.madbeanpedals.com/forum/index.php?topic=6831.0

Envelope controls are some of my favorite effects, too (especially because compressors fall into this category). If the desire to see more has legs, I believe Brian mentioned at some point that he has a "generic" envelope layout that he uses when testing effects ... maybe he'd be willing to release it as a utility project or post it as an extra?

[claytushaywood]

Thanks for the responses guys!  glad to see that you two have similar interests as me!

madbean- as far as the auto wah- I was under the impression that the snow white was an envelope filter like the mutron iii.  am i wrong?   I've listened to the snow white and it does seem to sound different than the mutron- but i dont know if that's exactly what i'm talking about. 

midway- that's what i'm talking about, but the problem is, i've actually had quite a bit of trouble with the colorsound inductorless wah- just making it work in a standard wah enclosure- I've tried messing with different pots and tapers and whatnot but i just cant get the sweep to work well.  I suppose i'll just try the lightwah project- trying to tackle this kinda chop up project with cutting the envelope from your blue warbler is just the project i need to try to advance myself in this arena. 

vibrato with ramp- the boss vb2 has a ramp function and latching functions- you hold down the pedal and the vibrato starts off at a slow rate and the rate increases over time.  I just found out about the behringer uv300- a lot of people are saying the difference between this $20 pedal and the $300 boss vb2 are negligble!!!  i love me some vibrato, ordering that today. 

regarding the brownface vibrato circuits- have you tried bajaman's vibratrem circuit?  there's a vero layout for it at sabrotone and apparently it's not too picky about LDR/LED combos.

And regarding the quadrovibe- I was under the impression taht was just a volume modulation tremolo... am i wrong there?

Cant wait to get going on the phobos trem!!!

[gtr2]

I'm actually working on a vibe/rotary type thing with ramp.    It's a few months off though. 

Josh

[claytushaywood]

I'm actually working on a vibe/rotary type thing with ramp.    It's a few months off though. 

Josh

When I say vibrato I mean true pitch vibrato rather than univibe/rotary.  already ordered the behringer uv300, supposedly it's damn near exact compared to ridiculously expensive boss vb2.  i dont like plastic foreign made pedals, but damn it's nice when you can get something that sounds good for $20.  I do wanna try the malekko omnicron vibrato too- i love pure pitch vibrato

[GVC66]

I'm actually working on a vibe/rotary type thing with ramp.    It's a few months off though. 

Josh

That sounds awesome!  Count me in when they are done.  I have been waiting for a reason to get another mini plex and cardinal.  This might push me over the ledge.

[GVC66]

I'm actually working on a vibe/rotary type thing with ramp.    It's a few months off though. 

Josh

When I say vibrato I mean true pitch vibrato rather than univibe/rotary.  already ordered the behringer uv300, supposedly it's damn near exact compared to ridiculously expensive boss vb2.  i dont like plastic foreign made pedals, but damn it's nice when you can get something that sounds good for $20.  I do wanna try the malekko omnicron vibrato too- i love pure pitch vibrato

This would also be an awesome project.  I was thinking of rehousing the uv300 but I like the latching feature so....

[gtr2]

Still in the works but months off.  I've been sidetracked by restoring some tube amps at the moment 

Josh

[BuGG]

I just built two Harmonic Mesmerizers last week with the PCB layout from FSB.

Worked great, very cool effect.