Shipwreck: midwayfair (Jon Patton)'s clipper ship.

[ch1naski]

Here is a quick, crap quality demo of Jon's Clipper Ship Boost/Overdrive circuit in action.  
Jon has a better quality demo of it, played thru a clean amp.
I always play with my Dr Z Maz 18 set to drive the power tubes into saturation. And the preamp volume is at about noon.
That's how I roll.

I go back and forth between lollar imperial pickups, stock humbucker and split coil, on a custom made PRS.
The quality is just a digital camera mic, so, yea....don't expect Dolby.

And don't expect phenomenal playing, I spend more time soldering than playing nowadays.

I'm sure you all know how THAT IS....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3j9fKxk6_24&feature=youtube_gdata_player
Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk HD

[hammerheadmusicman]

Yeah man, sounds great! Cool to know someone else who has a maz, i literally don't know anyone in england that has one! Only one shop in England sells them!

[Cortexturizer]

Well, that sounded great!
I really like the zero gain volume maxed sound, really makes it sing and fat sustains it. But then again, I loved the gain all the way up sound as well, it really gave it a warm and bassy body and really just a tad more distortion I expected more, but that's alright. Sounds great friend And props to the man who designed this

[jprizz]

And don't expect phenomenal playing, I spend more time soldering than playing nowadays.

Gee, I wish i could solder as good as you then!
-Josh

[midwayfair]

Thanks so much for the demo! It would be tough for me to do a demo through a dirty amp (mine can't be overdriven), and this is how many people like to use their dirt pedals, so this is really helpful.

[ch1naski]

Yeah man, sounds great! Cool to know someone else who has a maz, i literally don't know anyone in england that has one! Only one shop in England sells them!

I love the Maz. My favorite amp, ever. I have a Tone King Metropolitan, I let my son play it, because for me, it doesn't stack upto the Dr Z.

Well, that sounded great!
I really like the zero gain volume maxed sound, really makes it sing and fat sustains it. But then again, I loved the gain all the way up sound as well, it really gave it a warm and bassy body and really just a tad more distortion I expected more, but that's alright. Sounds great friend And props to the man who designed this

the boost is really warm and full, not overly bright and in your face, like normal FET boosts. The overdrive is mild, but I think a silicon transistor with slightly higher gain would drive it a little harder. I've not experimented with different diodes yet. I had a bonehead issue   and spent a lot of time debugging when I could have been experimenting with components. I'm going to try this silicon transistor that I think may work well here.

And don't expect phenomenal playing, I spend more time soldering than playing nowadays.

Gee, I wish i could solder as good as you then!
-Josh

flattery will get you nowhere!

Thanks:)

[midwayfair]

The overdrive is mild, but I think a silicon transistor with slightly higher gain would drive it a little harder.

A silicon transistor would drive the diodes harder by increasing the output of the OD stage. Right now the transistor breaks up a little and then it's softened by the diodes (and the treble cut softens it further). If you want the Q1 transistor to break up more, you can gain it up by increasing the size of the collector resistor (and mess with the headroom by playing with the loading, e.g. R8). This would will also increase the output of the first stage and drive the diodes harder, so that would create quite a bit more distortion overall. I capped the gain in the design just before it turns into fuzz, but that first stage is pretty malleable and it's certainly possible to make it go all the way if you're so inclined. For instance: Increasing C2 to, say, 22uF would make a it pretty hot mess. Decreasing or jumpering that 270R would give you a grounded collector through that big cap, i.e. basically max gain at all guitar frequencies ... Whether or not it sounds as good or better to you with such changes would be another matter. Personally, I wanted to make sure it worked with the amp and the guitar rather than being total destruction on its own.

Or you can also feed it a boost and it'll break up more. It's hard clipping, so it breaks up linearly with increasing input levels.

[ch1naski]

I'm a big fan of using an already dirty amp, so it works for me. I don't like having to step on a pedal too often, especially to get back to a clean sound, so that works for me, also. I'm sure there is a happy medium in this circuit for those who prefer more gain and still like to have it clean up. I am going to do a little tweaking with the components you mention.

I like that the tone control is useable throughout it's range. Is it setup so at full treble setting, minimum high frequencies are attenuated? Or did you set it up for a certain cut off? I know there is some loss with this particular Tone configuration.....

I'm also thinking about a Tone control bypass mod....a toggle or footswitch-able bypass that would, in this circuit, cause a slight volume boost.

Only problem with that is that I've etched the box and didn't plan for it ahead of time.

[midwayfair]

I like that the tone control is useable throughout it's range. Is it setup so at full treble setting, minimum high frequencies are attenuated? Or did you set it up for a certain cut off? I know there is some loss with this particular Tone configuration.....

Anything past noon is functionally a treble boost in this configuration. More treble frequencies are allowed to pass through C9 than lower frequencies. Any "loss" of highs in this configuration has more to do with the 10K series resistance preceding the tone control (which is what allows the tone control to actually work -- remove that 10K and the tone control is ze goggles), which forms a voltage divider with the 100K output cap, essentially working like a 110K volume pot at ~90% max. There is some volume loss with this configuration, but we're only talking a few decibels (voltage divider or 10K + 110K, or like a 120K pot at 92%).

[ch1naski]

Even with the volume loss, the boost is still plenty to drive the front end of a tube amp.

This pedal stays on my pedal rug. (Yes, rug. I don't own a pedal board.)

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 2

[ch1naski]

i played this pedal for about an hour and a half this evening after work, trying to decide if i am going to mod it.

I like the flavor/tone of the circuit. never gets over-the-top. i played it alongside the MBP slambox.
the slambox is very FET-ish, whiles the boost on the clipper is more mellow in presence.
i very much enjoy the tone, i'm so used to a semi-harsh tone (my hearing is shot out, so i tend to blast those higher frequencies, which leads to more hearing loss, which makes me need more high frequencies, ad infinitum).

and the clipper handles the guitar volume control perfectly. it never gets shrill or dull as the volume knob on my guitar goes down. that's a huge plus.

and it's the only other boost that plays nice with the SHO-style circuits, that i have found, at least.

I still may try a slightly higher gain silicon, altho i dont usually like silicon.

maybe a  higher gain npn germanium, if i ever come across another one....and the suggestions mentioned earlier. just to see if i can get a little more drive out of it without losing the interactiveness of the circuit.