What do i need to do to become an awesome pedal builder of the future?

[RoboPimp]

 

that's amazing, I figured you had an EE degree at least

 

 

may the code be with you, always

[tape]

Maybe you fill the niche of making pedals focused on sounds of musicians who have actually been relevant in the past 20 years or so?

Fixed.

Guitarists aren't the only ones who use pedals.

[ShortScaleMike]

 

This is probably sacrilegious for a lot of engineers.

 

 

Nope. I have an Engineering degree, and I'm a Digital Design Engineer by trade, and this is a completely valid methodology. There are many schools of thought and not all of them are applicable to musical electronics. We don't to soak test and set outlier boundary conditions for extreme design/test pedal mods and designs like we do jet planes.

 

Engineering is applied science and not exact science. The best part about Engineering is the freedom to push boundaries, and create.

[HeartfeltDawn]

That'd be a great idea if there actually were any.

 

KT Tunstall, Ed Sheeran...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Carry on

[nightraven]

How many of the successful pedal builders on TGP have EE degrees?

[onyxrhino]

Fixed. Guitarists aren't the only ones who use pedals.

true (though personally, I only care about pedal effects for guitar). But my point was that it would be great to have someone making pedals that focusing specifically on guitarists and guitar sounds made after 1979. I mean, it seems like Skreddy has a pedal for every guitar part Dave Gilmour ever recorded. As someone who doesn't care for most dad rock, it would be cool to see stuff like that for less ancient artists.

[hotmess]

Regarding EE stuff:

 

I consider circuit building to be an artform just as much as it is a science. I build circuits as a form of art, and there's a lot of expression in somebody's unique designs. In that respect, there are a whole lot of Warhols in the pedal world, and a whole lot of paint by numbers. It's good to have a basic understanding of things to avoid this, just as there is a basic understanding and skills involved in any form of art. I like to make circuit collages, just as I like designing my own circuits. And just like a painting, you do your sketch (schematic), do your base (building. breadboarding), touch it up a bit (tweak and listen). It's good to have the artistic mindframe with it, and it helps build your passion and creativity.

[RedPandaCurt]

I started with an EE degree and an awesome wife that encouraged me to quit my corporate job and focus on my passion. There isn't any correct or incorrect path, because your life and experiences are what will make your pedals unique. A good example is that tape and I both designed granular delay / stutter / glitch pedals but took quite different approaches (and I think they both sound awesome).

As a kid I stayed up late listening to the Electrifying Mojo and studying Hal Chamberlin's book. I had a Commodore VIC 20 that didn't have enough memory for an assembler, so I had to convert my programs to machine code by hand and spent hours typing in hexadecimal to write simple games. My Electrical Engineering degree is a result of being a math nerd that loves to solve problems and build things, but it's not necessary. I guess the formal background and advanced math help me come up with elegant solutions to complex problems. And I can code an FFT in DSP56K assembly or design an op amp from scratch if I need to

While in college (early 1990's) I built pedals from Craig Anderton's book for guitarist friends and hacked the OS of my Mirage sampler. After college I wrote a real-time modular software synthesizer for the BeOS and spent 15 years writing software synths before coming back to hardware because it made music fun for me again. HCFX's eti (longtime friend/bandmate) suggested ideas and then amazed me with the sounds he got out of whatever I gave him. Finally, the number of ideas and work-in-progress projects got too big and my day job got too intense to allow any kind of progress, so it was time to go full-time.

The best part of the business is hearing someone use something you created in a way you never imagined.

[BrentMpls]

 

true (though personally, I only care about pedal effects for guitar). But my point was that it would be great to have someone making pedals that focusing specifically on guitarists and guitar sounds made after 1979. I mean, it seems like Skreddy has a pedal for every guitar part Dave Gilmour ever recorded. As someone who doesn't care for most dad rock, it would be cool to see stuff like that for less ancient artists.

 

 

What is it that you mean by this, though?

 

Also from 1979 would be the last 33 years not 20, guitar players since 1992 would be the last 20 years.

 

The history of the electric guitar started around the 20's and 30's and while it was well established to the public by the 50's it wasn't until the 60's IMHO that is really exploded, especially in terms of effects. All the cool classic fuzz circuits came about in this decade, and partially while so many 'dad rock' as you call it players became so famous is not only because of their great ability and tunes, but because they were the first to use this stuff.

 

Innovation continued into the 70's and 80's, especially with simulation of modulation effects that required large/cumbersome studio equipment into pedal form, but has there really been new innovation in distortion or modulation 'discovered'/invented in the 90's any beyond?

 

I'm not sure what guitarists since 1992 (The year Nevermind came out and Grunge was exploding) have developed a sound that you don't feel could be captured with equipment that is not being produced in pedal format... but would love to hear about it!

[AluminumFalcon]

 

personally...the thing that brings a massive smile to my face is hearing something ive built being used by someone else...ive had a few insanely good bands aroudn my traps seek out my pedals ... and finding out that theyre being used on their recordings/live ...just makes all the time and effort worth it.

 

 

These are the reasons why I build pedals. It's my hobby, and as a horrible guitar player I'd rather see my builds be used by friends who are out there touring/recording. I would never dream of doing pedal building for a living, but it's a great hobby that keeps me busy during the hockey off-season.

 

If you're serious about starting a pedal business do your homework. Not just on building pedals, but on how to run a business. It's an investment in time and money regardless of how small scale of an operation you'd like to run.

 

I agree that you don't need an EE degree (but it certainly wouldn't hurt!) to build fantastic pedals. I learned most of what I know about pedal building from countless hours of reading stuff on the internets, and watching and learning what other builders are doing (our DIY thread is a great source of information).

 

I say if you're just starting out make sure to start small, do your research, don't waste time with cheap soldering irons, and have fun.

[onyxrhino]

What is it that you mean by this, though? Also from 1979 would be the last 33 years not 20, guitar players since 1992 would be the last 20 years. The history of the electric guitar started around the 20's and 30's and while it was well established to the public by the 50's it wasn't until the 60's IMHO that is really exploded, especially in terms of effects. All the cool classic fuzz circuits came about in this decade, and partially while so many 'dad rock' as you call it players became so famous is not only because of their great ability and tunes, but because they were the first to use this stuff. Innovation continued into the 70's and 80's, especially with simulation of modulation effects that required large/cumbersome studio equipment into pedal form, but has there really been new innovation in distortion or modulation 'discovered'/invented in the 90's any beyond? I'm not sure what guitarists since 1992 (The year Nevermind came out and Grunge was exploding) have developed a sound that you don't feel could be captured with equipment that is not being produced in pedal format... but would love to hear about it!

 

 

Hmmm...it seems I've offended you somehow, but I'm not sure why. The 20 years in my first post and the 33 years in my second post were each "for instance", no reason to quibble over an exact date, didn't mean to confuse you.

 

I never said that builders shouldn't continue making their dad rock pedals. On the contrary, I'm sure baby boomers nostalgic for their glory days (and many others influenced by baby boomer nostlagia) represent a huge customer base. I can understand why there are a million (note: this number is a slight exagerration) Gilmour "inspired" fuzzes.

 

However, I never quite got why there are hardly any pedals expressly designed to nail the tones of guitarists on albums made since the 70s. Clearly from your post, you think all innovations were over 20 something years ago, but I don't feel this way and I'm sure others don't either. To my ears it's far easier to get a Dave Gilmour muff>echo>tube amp sound than it is to get something that sounds like Kevin Shields on Loveless. Of course, there are already pedals out there and pedal combinations that can approximate these sounds and the sounds of other more recent guitarists too, but that can be said for Gilmour, Page, Townsend, etc. as well. It would just be nice to have the occasional pedal expressly designed to ape the tone of someone like Willaim Reid or Bob Mould to go alongside all the myriad baby-boomer-guitari-hero-in-a-box offerings. That's all I'm saying. No offense intended.

[BrentMpls]

 

However, I never quite got why there are hardly any pedals expressly designed to nail the tones of guitarists on albums made since the 70s. Clearly from your post, you think all innovations were over 20 something years ago, but I don't feel this way and I'm sure others don't either. To my ears it's far easier to get a Dave Gilmour muff>echo>tube amp sound than it is to get something that sounds like Kevin Shields on Loveless. Of course, there are already pedals out there and pedal combinations that can approximate these sounds and the sounds of other more recent guitarists too, but that can be said for Gilmour, Page, Townsend, etc. as well. It would just be nice to have the occasional pedal expressly designed to ape the tone of someone like Willaim Reid or Bob Mould to go alongside all the myriad baby-boomer-guitari-hero-in-a-box offerings. That's all I'm saying. No offense intended.

 

 

I'm not familiar of Shields, but Reid and Mould aren't using guitar sounds that are unique to them IMHO.

 

Why so many pedals are branded to sound like a 'dad rock' is because they were the pioneer of that type of sound. Perhaps a reboot is in order for some folks to want to buy stuff - sort of like movies. It isn't a knock on Bob Mould (who has been rocking since Pink Floyd's The Wall came out) it just that distortion pedals were out before he was popular and used by others that are famous for it.

 

I think endorsements are where you are seeing more contemporary named slapped on existing gear. The crybaby might have been made famous by dad-rockers but now you can get the Jerry Cantrell or Dimebag Darrell versions, etc. Same pedal, made popular by dad-rock, but now rehoused and has a more modern name slapped on to it.

[hotmess]

Loveless is over 20 years old. :poke:

[RoboPimp]

Nope. I have an Engineering degree, and I'm a Digital Design Engineer by trade, and this is a completely valid methodology. There are many schools of thought and not all of them are applicable to musical electronics. We don't to soak test and set outlier boundary conditions for extreme design/test pedal mods and designs like we do jet planes. Engineering is applied science and not exact science. The best part about Engineering is the freedom to push boundaries, and create.

 

 

why dont you design more of your own circuits?

[onyxrhino]

I'm not familiar of Shields, but Reid and Mould aren't using guitar sounds that are unique to them IMHO. Why so many pedals are branded to sound like a 'dad rock' is because they were the pioneer of that type of sound. Perhaps a reboot is in order for some folks to want to buy stuff - sort of like movies. It isn't a knock on Bob Mould (who has been rocking since Pink Floyd's The Wall came out) it just that distortion pedals were out before he was popular and used by others that are famous for it.

 

 

Sorry man, you lost me here. What previous guitar sound is like William Reid's on Psychocandy?

[Lou Speed]

Sorry man, you lost me here. What previous guitar sound is like William Reid's on Psychocandy?

[A.P. Ryder]

^^ Who he?

Looks vaguely familiar.

[ShortScaleMike]

 

why dont you design more of your own circuits?

 

 

At the moment it's a time thing, demand is already outstripping the speed at which I can build pedals. I have a 20+ week waiting list so I'm kept in plenty of work (outside my day job) with doing Custom Builds. People are generally after circuits they can't buy or can't afford in a box with custom graphics or combined with something else, etc. This is what forms the majority of my customerbase beyond the bigger sellers in my "standard" line.

 

I'm often not building straight clones, and I do a fair amount of tweaking and modifications to a lot of the pedals I build as people want custom options. Sometimes it's simple, sometimes less so.

 

The Dist2 circuit I build on it's own and as part of the Dream Box was a complete re-engineering of the original MXR Distortion II to the extent that only aspects of the core audio path remain similar. That took a lot of R&D and time.

 

I also design the vast majority of the veroboard layouts I use, and all my PCBs.

 

If one day I can go fulltime on the pedals you'll definitely see circuits from me that are entirely my own, but at the moment when working 40 hours a week on my day job that's not really something I am investing time in while I have orders coming in on the work I do at the moment.

[gambit]

Mike - if you ever need a hand putting some pedals together i'd be happy to help.. maybe too inexperienced or whatever but if there's a work around where i can pay you the cost of parts, go away, put a pedal together that doesn't look like a {censored}ing mess and return to you to sell, it might be mutually beneficial

 

obviously in an apprentice kind of way where i just get experience (no money) and you're fully covered if i {censored} anything up because i've paid for parts up front etc.. ? or if there's a better method of going about it?

 

and just to reassure you i've got no problem if thats something you wouldn't want to get involved in. no ego here.. just thought i'd throw the idea out there.

[fortytwo]

I'm not sure what guitarists since 1992 (The year Nevermind came out and Grunge was exploding) have developed a sound that you don't feel could be captured with equipment that is not being produced in pedal format... but would love to hear about it!

 

 

Nevermind came out in 1991

[fuzzface71]

IMO, the booteek pedal making "business" (if you wanna call that) is just way too saturated right now. People are just making pretty much, the same clones or a different variation of what's already out there . Only with a different name and box.

 

After more than 14+ years in the forums will make you jaded. (me)

 

IMO, you're way too late in the game. Unless you have something so awesome to put out. Sorry, bud but that's the TRUTH,

[tape]

IMO, the booteek pedal making "business" (if you wanna call that) is just way too saturated right now. People are just making pretty much, the same clones or a different variation of what's already out there . Only with a different name and box. After more than 14+ years in the forums will make you jaded. (me) IMO, you're way too late in the game. Unless you have something so awesome to put out. Sorry, bud but that's the TRUTH,

Had I taken this to heart, and had I been minded to start a business 5-6 years ago, I might've never started, never to know that eventually it would be within my capability of building original effects.

I agree the market is oversaturated with clones, but 100% disagree with your main point.

[fuzzface71]

 

but 100% disagree with your main point.

 

 

I just checked out your site. And like what I've said above. "Unless you have something so awesome to put out". Then more power to ALL starting pedal builders.

I mean as long as you love what your doing right?

 

 

I also want to add. That right now. Not only, that you guys are up against "boutique". Now even the big and famous companies are also cashing in, on this pedal explosion.

[tape]

I just checked out your site. And like what I've said above. "Unless you have something so awesome to put out". Then more power to ALL starting pedal builders. I mean as long as you love what your doing right? I laso want to add. That right now. Not only, that you guys are up against "boutique". Now even the big and famous companies are also cashing in, on this pedal explosion.

 

 

But what I meant is that 5-6 years ago, I *didn't* have anything special to put out. I didn't know I ever would. Had I not started building clones I would have never figured it out eventually. Thus my disagreement.

[ShortScaleMike]

Mike - if you ever need a hand putting some pedals together i'd be happy to help.. maybe too inexperienced or whatever but if there's a work around where i can pay you the cost of parts, go away, put a pedal together that doesn't look like a {censored}ing mess and return to you to sell, it might be mutually beneficial obviously in an apprentice kind of way where i just get experience (no money) and you're fully covered if i {censored} anything up because i've paid for parts up front etc.. ? or if there's a better method of going about it? and just to reassure you i've got no problem if thats something you wouldn't want to get involved in. no ego here.. just thought i'd throw the idea out there.

 

Appreciate the offer but this isn't something I'm looking to do at the moment, particularly if you don't have any experience of building pedals at all.

I would give you the same advice I give everyone that contacts me about getting into building pedals:

 

1. Get yourself some simple kits from BYOC or Musikding and build them. If you have success and are still enjoying things, then:

2. Get hold of some of the excellent veroboard layouts around and build some more esoteric stuff. Still happy? then:

3. Get a breadboard, get some components and get cracking with making new sounds from the building blocks that are out there.

4. Come up with something new or something you can't get hold of these days that people want, and build one. If it's interesting enough, and well enough made you can maybe sell it. Lather, rinse, repeat.

 

I reiterate there is no money in this, particularly starting out.