Simple Design, Low Price, Cool Sound....

[duhvoodooman]

Check out this special on the General Guitar Gadgets "BSIAB2" pedal (Brown-Sound-in-a-Box-2; cranked Marshall emulation). $54 for the complete kit. This would be a good first-time build for any of you who have been screwing up your nerve to try a DIY pedal. Check out the YouTube demo links on the GGG page:


GGG BSIAB2 (http://www.generalguitargadgets.com/index.php?page=shop.product_details&category_id=7&flypage=shop.flypage&product_id=21&option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=45)

[Spudman]

Thanks for the link and info. I also watched a video for the Blues Breaker and that one sounds really good too.

[street music]

:saw: Nice kits for those into building their own.

[duhvoodooman]

Geez, this is an even better deal than I thought! I just "ran the numbers" for what the pedal would cost if you sourced all the parts yourself from places like Mouser, Small Bear and Pedal Parts+. Came out to just about $50. Considering that you'd be looking at at least 3 sources and the associated shipping costs, it would likely cost you MORE to buy the parts directly than just getting the complete kit from GGG! I may have to pick one of these up, just to give it a try....

[Adrian30]

I, too found their prices to be fair. They have a good selection of interesting clones.

[Tone2TheBone]

When ga$ hits it hurts. Ow!

[jasongins]

Really nice prices at this site...thinking about the stratoblaster for my first attempt at a build-your-own...

[M29]

Thanks duhvoodooman:AOK: Man those BSIAB2 and Bluesbreaker utubes sure do sound good! Shoot just when I was going to splurge on a new speaker....

M29

[duhvoodooman]

At this price, I had to try one. Even if I decide it's too much like my Marshall Guv'nor Plus and I have to sell it, I want to check it out firsthand. Film at 11....

[Tone2TheBone]

You're on a roll Voo keep it up!

[tot_Ou_tard]

Is the design similar to any well known pedal?

[duhvoodooman]

Is the design similar to any well known pedal?
Not that I know of. This is touted as an original design by a fellow named Ed Guidry, and uses a network of five junction field effect transistors (JFETs) of two different types to generate the signal distortion. No opamp at all. The all-transistor approach is like many fuzz effects, but it sure doesn't sound like one.

[tunghaichuan]

Is the design similar to any well known pedal?

There was some speculation that this pedal might be the BSIAB2 circuit:

http://www.lovepedal.com/purpleplexi100.htm

http://lovepedal.com/bigEDWARDtone.mp3

They sound similar.

tung

[duhvoodooman]

There was some speculation that this pedal might be the BSIAB2 circuit:

http://www.lovepedal.com/purpleplexi100.htm
That's a lot of money for a pedal that contains $50 worth of parts. And that's at the part prices that I pay as a DIY'er! :eek:

Tung, was the speculation that the Purple Plexi was based upon the pre-existing BSIAB design, or visa versa?

[tunghaichuan]

That's a lot of money for a pedal that contains $50 worth of parts. And that's at the part prices that I pay as a DIY'er! :eek:

Tung, was the speculation that the Purple Plexi was based upon the pre-existing BSIAB design, or visa versa?

Again, purely speculation but maybe the purple plexi is a reverse-engineered version of the BSIAB2, or maybe Lovepedal came up with a similar design. It would be interesting to compare the schematics, but somehow I doubt Lovepedal would give me one :D

tung

[duhvoodooman]

Again, purely speculation but maybe the purple plexi is a reverse-engineered version of the BSIAB2, or maybe Lovepedal came up with a similar design. It would be interesting to compare the schematics, but somehow I doubt Lovepedal would give me one
Yeah, that seems like a bit of a long shot! ;)

I found two other commercial versions of this pedal (links below), but both explicitly mention that the design is licensed, and one mentions Ed Guidry by name. That would clearly indicate that the BSIAB is his original design.


Kaden Brown Creeper (http://www.kadeneffects.com/creeper.htm)

CMATMODS Brownie (http://www.cmatmods.com/portal/Home/Effects/tabid/62/Default.aspx#Brownie)

[tunghaichuan]

Yeah, that seems like a bit of a long shot! ;)


I agree, although I don't want to start rumors.

However, I remember RG Keen of Visual Sound products saying that he independently came up with a circuit that was almost identical to Kevin O'Connor's London Power Standard Preamp. It is a four-stage tube preamp using two 12AX7s. Keen remarked that there were only two slight diferences in the component values, but otherwise identical. I have no reason to doubt Keen, he is a straight shooter. So it does happen, not likely, but possible.

Who knows? Maybe Lovepedal licensed the circuit from Guidry but doesn't say so in their advertising copy.



I found two other commercial versions of this pedal (links below), but both explicitly mention that the design is licensed, and one mentions Ed Guidry by name. That would clearly indicate that the BSIAB is his original design.


Kaden Brown Creeper (http://www.kadeneffects.com/creeper.htm)

CMATMODS Brownie (http://www.cmatmods.com/portal/Home/Effects/tabid/62/Default.aspx#Brownie)

Good sounding pedals, although I didn't like the sound samples as well as the ones on the GGG site.

tung

[pie_man_25]

looks good, good price, any reviews?

[duhvoodooman]

OK, the BSIAB2 kit was delivered late last week and I threw it together Saturday afternoon while taking a break from my Valve Jr mod work (hey, the soldering iron was already hot.... :D ). It may not be God's gift to pedaldom, but it does a pretty convincing cranked JCM impression. And you can't beat the price of the kit or the ease of the build.

In any case, here's a quick SAMPLE CLIP (http://www.box.net/shared/nyhifcs0s0), recorded with my Epi Elitist LP Std. through the Valve Junior. After a quick "clean" intro, it's straight to the effect, with a couple of riffs stolen from the guy who brought the term "brown sound" into the musical lexicon. The first one is just the BSIAB2 pedal, and the second brings in my cheapy Behringer flanger with it. Hopefully, the playing is adequate enough that you can at least recognize the source. The gain was only set at about 60%, so this thing has no shortage of crank....

[duhvoodooman]

To supplement the clip posted above, thought I'd just add a couple of comments re: the quality of the GGG kit itself. This was the first full kit I bought from them, and I was quite favorably impressed. Comments:



The PCB quality was very good. Through-plated eyelets on a nice silk-screened board. If there was anything to find fault with, it was that the layout was a bit crowded. If the BYOC boards are an "A" in quality, these are a solid B+. (NOTE: Not all the GGG PCB's are of this same type. Some of the kits and individual PCB's are a more rudimentary single-sided design. I haven't used one yet, but the board I bought for a Slow Gear clone is of this type. The GGG site has a photo of each board, so you know what you're getting.)
Typical electrical components, from my experience, and good quality hardware. The stock knobs are smallish, but commercial pedals use similar ones. You can always substitute larger ones, assuming they fit the layout.
Good quality aluminum enclosure, and the pre-drilling was well done. GGG uses a rather unique layout that puts the jacks and the pots all at the top of the enclosure, which frees up a lot of space below. Pretty clever. Makes it easier to add things like toggle switches without needing to go to a bigger enclosure.
Best of all was the price. Though on sale at $54, even at the normal $60 price, it wouldn't pay to source the parts yourself. The parts come to about $50 in even a simple pedal, and by the time you pay shipping from 3 or 4 suppliers, you're over $60. These kits are an EXCELLENT value!

[tot_Ou_tard]

Crank indeed! It's not something that I'd go out of my way for, but I can see how it might work for someone else.

[duhvoodooman]

Finally getting around to finishing this pedal. I decided to base the graphics on the UPS slogan of "What can Brown do for you?" (other than wreck your guitar in transit, huh guys!?) and used a trucking/transportation theme for the controls labeling. I've already spray-painted the enclosure with a copper metallic paint, so the finish is a lot snazzier looking than this simple GIF can show. The attached image shows the pedal mock-up with the graphics I put together. Next step will be decaling using the technique described in THIS STICKY (http://www.thefret.net/showthread.php?t=6235). I'll post a photo of the finished pedal by the weekend.


http://www.thefret.net/imagehosting/7447ea76b5a4725.gif

[duhvoodooman]

Here are a couple of shots--outside and inside--of the finished pedal. The decal came out pretty well, though the ink banded some during the print. You have to get pretty close to see it, though. You can see the small size of the PCB and the relative simplicity of the component layout. The blue trimpot just dials in the optimum drain voltage on the final transistor; set it once and forget it.


http://www.thefret.net/imagehosting/7447ed893c8e9bb.jpghttp://www.thefret.net/imagehosting/7447ed893cd4e87.jpg

[SuperSwede]

DVM, that pedal looks great! How about using a key instead of toggle to turn the effect on/off? Not very useful but it would be really cool!

[Ch0jin]

Well hi, your friendly neighbourhood thread resurrector here.

Thanks DVM for pointing out that you’d already posted about the BSIAB. It’s fun to see just how different the same kit can turn out from a visual point of view huh.

I read with interest your review of the kit components and I generally agree but wanted to offer a couple of points from my own experience. (I’ve made 7 GGG kits so far).

1. PCB’s have been good as you say, but they can be a bit cramped sometimes. The PT80 delay for example. It makes NO electrical difference, but some of the large 0.1 caps have to sit on a bit of an angle.

2. Plate through PCB’s (all my kits have had these) are awesome if you build it right the first time. They are a B*tch if you want to swap parts in and out. The BMP for example. To go from “triangle” to “GGG Tuned” requires at least a dozen resistor/cap swaps and it takes some fiddling to get the old bits out clean (and I’m coming at this as a guy who spent the better part of ten years with a soldering iron in my hands). A minor complaint though.

3. Sometimes the pre-drilled holes are great, sometimes not. I’ve got a couple of pedals with offset input/output jacks. Again not a big deal cause it beat the heck out of drilling it all myself.

4. The LED holders are crap. I buy nice chrome ones from the local electronics store that have LED’s in them already. If you plan to do this too, be prepared to add a resistor in series to drop the brightness if you go blue or white though. I dropped a blue LED in my trem and the sucker was like a spotlight. Same deal with the white LED in my BSIAB. I can see one (a resistor) in DVM’s pix too so I’m assuming he had the same issue.

5. One thing the supplied knobs do pretty well is sit almost flush with the surface as the insides are recessed to accommodate the nut. I went all fancy and bought a variety of knobs to try from different places and none of them fit as well as the ones supplied in the kit. The red chicken heads on my BMP look cool, but I needed to sculpt them a bit with a file and fine sandpaper so they didn’t interfere with each other. Then there are the silver aluminium knobs you can see on my trem and the BSIAB. I love how they look and feel, but if you look close you can see that you have to raise them right above the nut so they don’t rub. It’s a minor aesthetic thing, but hey.

Overall though I don’t want to give the impression that the GGG kits are bad. I think they are great. Just a couple of very minor points I wanted to clarify. Especially when it comes to value, as has been mentioned. I’ve seen Ibanez AD80’s on eBay for $500. My PT80 sounds the same if not better and cost less than $100 and it looks totally unique. I could say the same thing about the Fuzz Face too. I don’t have a load of experience with tremolo pedals, but the EA Improved Tremelo kit sounds simply wonderful to my ears. Use it in your FX loop and you can play “Bang Bang” by Nancy Sinatra all night long ;)

O one final thing before I go back to work.

Love the names of the controls on that BSIAB DVM!!! I wish I’d thought harder before I did mine as “Rock” “Tone” “Roll” haha

[tremoloman]

Well hi, your friendly neighbourhood thread resurrector here.

Thanks DVM for pointing out that you’d already posted about the BSIAB. It’s fun to see just how different the same kit can turn out from a visual point of view huh.

I read with interest your review of the kit components and I generally agree but wanted to offer a couple of points from my own experience. (I’ve made 7 GGG kits so far).


Do you have any audio clips of the pedals you've put together? I'm interested in doing one of these myself :)

[Ch0jin]

Hi Tremelo, I posted a fuzz face clip here a while ago but for some people it didn't work and those who did listen thought it to be a bit too dark and over the top as the fuzz was maxed and with the transistors I used, that results in a very thick, very dark sound (that I love by the way). So I thought I'd be better off recording some new ones which I'll do as soon as I get a bit of spare time, I've been really busy of late. So busy in fact that I've got two FX hanging out on my kitchen bench in bits waiting for me to put them in a box. (a Tube Screamer and another fuzz) :)

Soon as I have something I'll post up some links :)

[duhvoodooman]

Trem, here's a couple of video clips of the BSIAB2 on YouTube:

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