What are the 8 main dirt pedals?

Sporky · April 5

It seems a good moment to remind the world that Wampler started out selling e-books composed entirely of mods and schematics other people made. Without credit, attribution, or recompense. I know because some of them were mine.

monquixote · April 5

If I think about pedals that commonly get breathed on and sold as the next thing I'd suggest:

TS / SD / OD1

Guvnor

Rat

DS-1

BD-2

Klon

OCD

Big Muff

Fuzz Face

Treble Booster

Blues breaker.

TimmyO · April 5

Sporky said:

It seems a good moment to remind the world that Wampler started out selling e-books composed entirely of mods and schematics other people made. Without credit, attribution, or recompense. I know because some of them were mine.

I remember this contemporaneously

Sporky · April 5

I wonder if it's OK to refer to him as a proven thieving scumbag?

thermionic · April 5

monquixote said:

If I think about pedals that commonly get breathed on and sold as the next thing I'd suggest:

TS / SD / OD1
Guvnor
Rat
DS-1
BD-2
Klon
OCD
Big Muff
Fuzz Face
Treble Booster
Blues breaker.

The Rat and DS-1 can trace their lineage back to the MXR Distortion+, and also I think, can the Bluesbreaker (clipping diodes to ground on an opamp output).

GoFish · April 5

TimmyO said:

Sporky said:

It seems a good moment to remind the world that Wampler started out selling e-books composed entirely of mods and schematics other people made. Without credit, attribution, or recompense. I know because some of them were mine.

I remember this contemporaneously

So, perhaps not "mostly harmless" at all then?

Sheeeeit, was his one good idea just taken from your love of MetalZone, Sporky? That's hilarious and sad in equal measure. Just think, it could've been Miku...

monquixote · April 5

thermionic said:

monquixote said:

If I think about pedals that commonly get breathed on and sold as the next thing I'd suggest:

TS / SD / OD1
Guvnor
Rat
DS-1
BD-2
Klon
OCD
Big Muff
Fuzz Face
Treble Booster
Blues breaker.

The Rat and DS-1 can trace their lineage back to the MXR Distortion+, and also I think, can the Bluesbreaker (clipping diodes to ground on an opamp output).

As my friend the electrical engineer says. "At some point it's all basically a resistor"

Dave_Mc · April 5

thermionic said:

monquixote said:

If I think about pedals that commonly get breathed on and sold as the next thing I'd suggest:

TS / SD / OD1
Guvnor
Rat
DS-1
BD-2
Klon
OCD
Big Muff
Fuzz Face
Treble Booster
Blues breaker.

The Rat and DS-1 can trace their lineage back to the MXR Distortion+, and also I think, can the Bluesbreaker (clipping diodes to ground on an opamp output).

That's what I'd have thought, most hard-clipping distortions can be more or less traced back to the Distortion+. Even the Klon you could argue is one of those ones. Covers the DS1, Rat, Guvnor etc. too.

Not sure if a treble booster would count? They definitely dirty up a bit when you crank them but I'm not sure I'd consider them an actual distortion. Whether Wampler or JHS do, I dunno.

CMOS ones like the Craig Anderton one which a lot of others (Red Llama, Hot Tubes etc.) are based on. Presumably that's one of them.

JFET cascading type ones I would guess. A lot of the more modern amp in a box type pedals are like that, including a few Wamplers I think, so presumably that's one of the categories.

So I would say:

Vintage-style fuzz (maestro, fuzz face, tonebender etc.) with cascading transistors EDIT: I think they're cascading transistors, aren't they?

Big Muff (cascading transistors- I think!- (apart from the op-amp versions!), clipping diodes in a couple of feedback loops, Muff tonestack)

Octave Fuzz

Distortion+ and all hard-clipping-to-ground distortions

OD1/Tubescreamer/SD1 and probably even including Timmy, Bluesbreaker, etc.- overdrives with clipping diodes in the op-amp's feedback loop

CMOS (Craig Anderton/Red Llama/Hot Tubes etc.)

Cascading JFET amp in a box type pedals

That's 7. I'm definitely forgetting about something really obvious there. Probably more than one. EDIT: Crap, the Electra. I guess that would count? That's 8. But I still would put money on my having forgotten something obvious! EDIT #2: Blues Driver? Is that different enough?

Paul_C · April 5

Miku ?

ICBM · April 5

The Fuzz Factory is probably in a class of its own too. It's roughly based on a Fuzz Face/Tonebender-type cascaded-transistor circuit, but a bit different and intentionally unstable.

monquixote · April 5

Dave_Mc said:

thermionic said:

monquixote said:

If I think about pedals that commonly get breathed on and sold as the next thing I'd suggest:

TS / SD / OD1
Guvnor
Rat
DS-1
BD-2
Klon
OCD
Big Muff
Fuzz Face
Treble Booster
Blues breaker.

The Rat and DS-1 can trace their lineage back to the MXR Distortion+, and also I think, can the Bluesbreaker (clipping diodes to ground on an opamp output).

That's what I'd have thought, most hard-clipping distortions can be more or less traced back to the Distortion+. Even the Klon you could argue is one of those ones. Covers the DS1, Rat, Guvnor etc. too.

Not sure if a treble booster would count? They definitely dirty up a bit when you crank them but I'm not sure I'd consider them an actual distortion. Whether Wampler or JHS do, I dunno.

CMOS ones like the Craig Anderton one which a lot of others (Red Llama, Hot Tubes etc.) are based on. Presumably that's one of them.

JFET cascading type ones I would guess. A lot of the more modern amp in a box type pedals are like that, including a few Wamplers I think, so presumably that's one of the categories.

So I would say:

Vintage-style fuzz (maestro, fuzz face, tonebender etc.) with cascading transistors EDIT: I think they're cascading transistors, aren't they?

Big Muff (cascading transistors- I think!- (apart from the op-amp versions!), clipping diodes in a couple of feedback loops, Muff tonestack)

Octave Fuzz

Distortion+ and all hard-clipping-to-ground distortions

OD1/Tubescreamer/SD1 and probably even including Timmy, Bluesbreaker, etc.- overdrives with clipping diodes in the op-amp's feedback loop

CMOS (Craig Anderton/Red Llama/Hot Tubes etc.)

Cascading JFET amp in a box type pedals

That's 7. I'm definitely forgetting about something really obvious there. Probably more than one. EDIT: Crap, the Electra. I guess that would count? That's 8. But I still would put money on my having forgotten something obvious! EDIT #2: Blues Driver? Is that different enough?

I wasn't going for the circuit lineage so much as when someone like Joyo or TC or Wampler for that matter decide to make a range of derivative pedals what are you most likely to find in the line up.

Sporky · April 6

GoFish said:

TimmyO said:

Sporky said:

It seems a good moment to remind the world that Wampler started out selling e-books composed entirely of mods and schematics other people made. Without credit, attribution, or recompense. I know because some of them were mine.

I remember this contemporaneously

So, perhaps not "mostly harmless" at all then?

Sheeeeit, was his one good idea just taken from your love of MetalZone, Sporky? That's hilarious and sad in equal measure. Just think, it could've been Miku...

I didn't know he'd had a good idea!

thermionic · April 6

Sorry I meant the Guv’nor not Bluesbreaker to be in the diode clipping to ground category. It’s also the basis of the drive channel in the first series of Valvestates (the two lower-powered amps in the range didn’t actually have a valve!)

GoFish · April 6

monquixote said:

....

I wasn't going for the circuit lineage so much as when someone like Joyo or TC or Wampler for that matter decide to make a range of derivative pedals what are you most likely to find in the line up.

With chops like these, you should start your own pedal company - bespoke Rat, TS, Muff, Bluesbreaker, 250 coming soon!

Lazy graphics!

Poor punning titles - or just plain impenatrable!

Jacks directly onto circuit board!

No attribution!

An army of youtubers who, on the same day, release videos praising your pedals using generic descriptions!

Sharp videos of yourself playing at being some sort of guru, regurgitating information that your "researchers" pulled off Freestompboxes etc presented to your scriptwriter... oh wait, that enables you to charge three times the ammount and get praised by the credulous.

monquixote · April 6

GoFish said:

monquixote said:

....

I wasn't going for the circuit lineage so much as when someone like Joyo or TC or Wampler for that matter decide to make a range of derivative pedals what are you most likely to find in the line up.

With chops like these, you should start your own pedal company - bespoke Rat, TS, Muff, Bluesbreaker, 250 coming soon!

Lazy graphics!
Poor punning titles - or just plain impenatrable!
Jacks directly onto circuit board!
No attribution!
An army of youtubers who, on the same day, release videos praising your pedals using generic descriptions!
Sharp videos of yourself playing at being some sort of guru, regurgitating information that your "researchers" pulled off Freestompboxes etc presented to your scriptwriter... oh wait, that enables you to charge three times the ammount and get praised by the credulous.

Josh... Is that you?

slacker · April 6

Stone deaf seem to be different or maybe it's a normal circuit with a parametric.

Anyway as far as I am concerned there's only 2 types of gain pedal the ones I like and the ones I don't.

This thread has made me count my gain pedals. 11. So maybe there's 11 types of pedal.

slacker · April 6

Forgot a booster and octave fuzz 13 pedals

TimmyO · April 6

Sporky said:

I wonder if it's OK to refer to him as a proven thieving scumbag?

Thief is well defined but not sure we could rely on a commonly shared definition of 'scumbag' to not draw a challenge...

Dave_Mc · April 7

ICBM said:

The Fuzz Factory is probably in a class of its own too. It's roughly based on a Fuzz Face/Tonebender-type cascaded-transistor circuit, but a bit different and intentionally unstable.

You may well be right, I've never got as far as trying the Fuzz Factory!

I was also wondering about the cascading transistor fuzzes which also have hard-clipping diodes to ground, like the Jen Fuzz III or the Jordan Bosstone... I forgot about them. Whether they're a different category or sort of in-between a fuzz and a distortion, though, I'm not sure. I'm thinking in-between...

monquixote said:

I wasn't going for the circuit lineage so much as when someone like Joyo or TC or Wampler for that matter decide to make a range of derivative pedals what are you most likely to find in the line up.

Oh yeah absolutely. I just thought it was interesting looking at the actual circuit types. I've probably got the wrong end of the stick regarding that, though, I know just enough about electronics to usually come up with the wrong answer!

thermionic · April 8

We forgot Devi Ever.

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What are the 8 main dirt pedals?

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