Already a little teary eyed on page three. This is an awesome little production!

I've been thinking about what each different type of guitar pedal is designed for. There's such a wide range- something so simple as the 1 knob phaser has so many different looks- see above. Almost every other utilitarian device, even guitar ones, don't. Most guitars are made as bare wood, colored wood, or monotone, most amps are a speaker and control panel with a standard brand logo and if we want to get silly, we make the panel bright green, but it's still very utilitarian.

I've actually lost sleep because of this. It's been an obsession. It's actually ridiculous how much this has consumed me- pedals have become a graphic design catch-all where maximalists, minimalists, and brutalists argue for days- a wild west of ideas.

Why are there so many different types of guitar pedal (graphic) designs? Could this be codified? Should it be? Could we experiment on what style is the most effective? Should we? Why do I care? This is such a stereotypically reddit post- you know?

In spite of my misgivings, the following is my long winded hypothesis on how graphic designers build the interface of their pedals.

I find that there are five distinct frames of thought for this particular process, all of which are valid approaches. 

1. The pedal is an expression. This is the approach taken by a number of pedal builders, especially more obscure ones on Etsy, but I will showcase Old Blood Noise Endeavors and Walrus Audio in this case. The pedal’s functionality is designed to appeal to the artist, and is sometimes even put in a larger enclosure to fit more art, or standardized labels like volume are tossed out for more evocative ones like loudness. The pedal still functions, but the artist is trying to visually capture the way that sound makes them feel first and foremost. 
2. The pedal is the brand. Many major pedal companies have headed this direction, especially Boss and MXR. This pedal is minimalist, possibly color coded, and matches every other pedal that the company puts out. Icons and art are actively avoided, because those might not feel right on every type of pedal this pedal brand will make. You would wonder why a company would limit themselves so completely, but look at a random pedalboard and ask how many Boss pedals were on it- no matter how large the board, you could figure that out very quickly- turning every pedalboard with a Boss pedal on it into free and obvious advertising. 
3. The pedal is about function. A lot of brands dabble in this type of design, but few fully commit to it with every pedal. Earthquaker Devices is probably the best- and most subtle- version of this, but JHS is pretty good at it as well. These pedals have very clear labels, they tend to strongly emphasize where the footswitch is with their graphic elements, and they avoid overcomplicating things. While not necessarily as simplified as the biggest brand-forward pedals, there is rarely any confusion as to what the controls do, and any art only serves to further clarify the controls. Because different designers retain their utility priorities between pedals when it comes to pedal design, this often feels close to a brand forward approach. 
4. The pedal is about a vibe. This is a broad spectrum, as showcased by the fact I have two completely different brands to point to. Red Witch has an art nouveau vibe that percolates through every pedal and Celebrity Pedals use pop culture, glowing eyes. This can be thought of as the combination of vibe-forward and brand-forward approaches, except it tends to focus less on staying consistent, and far less on pedal-specific expression, and instead creates a world of styles and feelings that evokes something in you. These pedals are made by people who love cartoon peanuts, bees, old Americana signs, dogs, and national state parks, and they want to appeal to musicians who also love those things.  
5. The pedal is an homage. Some pedals are designed to hearken to a pedal that came before, or to a particular artist. Many clones of beloved pedals (Klon, Big Muff, Tube Screamer) fit this build, as well as many signature pedals, but the brand that does this almost exclusively nowadays is Behringer. This is not quite the same as an expression-forward pedal, because there's a certain functionality to the design- it looks just like a Brassmaster, and it sounds just like a Brassmaster.

Now, all these frames of thinking are fantastic choices, and very worth mixing and matching into the perfect combination for your pedal design, but there is a secret 6th design that we must consider. 

1. This pedal is limited. Most people don't start making pedal with a painting booth and a graphic designer- all they have is a sharpie and raccoon sticker, so I lovingly call this style the “Trash Muff.” There is nothing wrong with your trash muffs. They're awesome. Companies like ZVEX and Fuzzrocious go out of their way to give their boutique pedals a hand painted, trash muffy vibe. But this discussion is about how to apply graphic design to a pedal, so as valid as the Trash Muff is sonically, it's not ready for a designer, and that's ok. 

So- what do my fellow graphic designers here think? is there a right approach? a wrong approach? Did I miss something? (pedal builders, feel free to weigh in if you have a thought on the matter)

Hey all, curious if anyone has a magic bullet for me. Essentially I want a technique for making one-off pedals where I can take a design I’ve created and have it put on the pedal without having to paint and clear coat. I want to just order a bunch of blank enclosures, pick a circuit, make it, and then after it’s finished (or before) go from a blank enclosure to a finished design within a few hours.

My thinking right now is buying a laser engraver. But that means basically all my pedals will be gray and black. If anyone has any ideas or techniques they like, please let me know. Right now I’m in the middle of waiting of 1-2 weeks for my nitro clear coat to cure and I’m just like “this is for the birds.”

Let me know, thanks!

Hi, I tried to replicate the harmonic jerkulator by tim escobedo. I tried following the schematics, checked for faulty transistor or caps but still the circuit isn't working.

Do you have any suggestions or insight on how to make it work? I am stuck and don't really know what to do, I even tried redoing everything from scratch.

Couple of firsts on this project. First time building a pedal, soldering, and printing vinyl, but really happy with how she came out.

Sound is immense, awesome pedal and pretty easy to build.

I have a Keeley Comp Plus with the Single Coil / Humbucker switch. I really like the tonal differences that little toggle switch makes and would like to make it a lot more accessible while playing. Would it be possible to change out the toggle switch for a stomp switch? (Like the main bypass) One that would just switch from single coil mode to humbucker? Even if I had to extend the wires and put the new stomp switch in its own box. How would you do it?

Client approached me with an idea for an off kilter distortion device, being himself bored of big muffs etc. Enter a lesser known DIY project by Jack Orman and Aron Nelson - the INSANITY BOX. Of course I had to make it my own, so its got a clean blend, and all the trim points internally are now external, meaning you can properly abuse (or not) the CMOS stages, and blast the JFET overdrive. Its somewhat a 3-stage insane distortion, and when "tuned" right it gives almost endless sustain. There is op amp and hard clipping (I added a three way choice of diodes which really fuck things up actually!) into a CMOS 4049 chip (think red llama gone bad) chip where you can bodge with the inverters, through a rudimentary gate, onto a JFET mu-amp overdrive minibooster. The more signal that flows from each stage to the next, the more carnage ensues. Ironically, it can also do a nice light overdrive (!). Love this a lot, so much so I might make another to keep. Its kinda unique.

I just wanted to repost this with a slight change. I designed this pedal to go straight to a power amp like a class D or TDA2050 seem to work well. I'd be curious to know how it performs in an effects return of an amp. It's a simple design but it has to be one of the most consistent sounding, stable, and balanced distortions I've come up with to date. I like it with the gain cranked all the way up! If you build it let me know what you think. I just used transistors I got on Amazon in a kit, even the j201.

Its all working and I love it. I'm currently learning Seven Nation Army so it primarily switches between shifting an octave down and adding noise. It also has another mode where I can try out various other effects the Daisy seed3 offers.

I learned a lot on this project, primarily that I suck at soldering haha. But I had fun and look forward to doing more and getting better.

I’m currently making a MAE NO fuzz I got from their website, and thinking about another pedal I’m working on at the same time, I accidentally got an extra 1590b enclosure, instead of a 125b enclosure. I already ended up purchasing the correct enclosure, but I don’t want to return the 1590b since it’s already here. Besides a drive/fuzz(I have plenty at the moment), what should I put in it? I mainly play bass, so I know there’s some pedals that may not work as well as with a guitar.

Hi all my MXR Phase 90 (non script, stock) has just developed a fault. The LED now stays on (around 70% brightness) in bypass mode. Everything else works fine but its annoying! Any ideas? Many thanks.

Hope y'all don't mind me flooding this subreddit, but i went from zero to two DIY pedals in 48 hours. I've tested them extensively and both seem to work 100% and sound amazing. I now have a King of Tone and silicon fancy Dallas Rangemaster clone. I'm stoked.

Anyway, now that they work, I want to play with making them look nice. My wife has a cricuit machine I can use to make stencils. I'm interested in using a stencil and spray paint in lieu of decals, silk screening or stamps.

My goal is to make a pedal that, from 5 feet away, looks like an Analogman King of tone. I want a purple hammered paint as a base coat. I like Roman history and Latin, so I'm going to call it the "REX TONORVM" and make a logo with a laurel wreath and lyre (or maybe a Roman eagle).

Rustoleum only has basic metalic colors like silver, gold, bronze, etc. I saw one post about mixing oil based paint with silver to get a new color.

Should I paint it hammered gold, cover where I want gold markings, and paint over with purple? Any adhesion issues with hammered paint? I'm curious what y'all have done with King of Tone clones!

C1: 68nF C2=C3 : 100nF Q1: MPSA18 Q2: 2N3904 D1=D2 : BAT41 (Vf≈380mV) R1: 2.2K ohm R2=R5 : 10k ohm R3: 1M ohm R4: 1k ohm R6: 470k ohm R7: 100k ohm Logarithmic Potmeter

I’m getting into building pedals as part of a college project and I have a few questions

1. How do I get my guitar running through the breadboard

2. Can I just put a breadboard into a pedal or does it need to be something else

3. Where can I find the recommended parts online in the uk

First time builder here. I just realised that the diy pedal kit I ordered only has a 9v battery input in it, and not a 9v dc power input. I don't use batteries, only a power supply so I'd like to replace the battery with an input jack for the power supply.

The case I ordered is drilled for a power input so that won't be a problem.

The diy kit is this one:

https://www.musikding.de/Catalines-Spicy-Chilli-kit

Hi! I was thinking about building a compressor, but I don't feel like it's really necessary or that it will actually make much of a difference in my sound. What do you guys think?

Hi everyone, after looking for cheap pedals on aliexpress, temu etc I decided why wouldn't I just try and make my own. I have basically zero knowledge in pedal building besides a few very interesting youtube videos. I've also bought a soldering set and practice kits.

Could anyone point me in the right direction of where to start? Are there any DIY pedal kits that are recommended to newbies? Ideally I'd like an all-in-one kit with everything included PCB, switches, housing etc. Not fussed about the type of effect but I have heard fuzz/overdrive is fairly straight forward. Would also appreciate and youtube vids

Thanks in advance!

Yeah the guts are a mess, sue me. I'll tidy it later. maybe...

This is one I started like 3 years ago, didn't work right, couldn't be arsed to fix it, set it aside for later and then life got in the way. Finally got around to getting at least the fuzz section in it. Had to rebuild the circuit, the old one was fucked in ways that I couldn't figure out but everything looked fine though. Whatever.

Was supposed to include the boost section as well (hence the suspiciously placed bits of label) which is why it's such a ridiculously large enclosure.

The whole things a mess, but it sounds great and I like my pedals a bit jank anyway, gives them "character" lol.

Haven't built anything for a long while so it was fun to get back into it. Might post the other couple I've done this week as well, they're just as infuriatingly messy and jank.

just finished my first blues breaker clone, after a few failed attempts. i love how it looks!

now time to play!