i decided to rework the main board somewhat. i needed to swap the EMMA envelope filter for the MT IV and one thing led to another. my first move was to put the MT IV at the front of the chain right after the tuner. i don't know why such an obvious thing never occurred to me before other than that i take pains to keep my fuzz's output at or close to unity gain with the unaffected signal. next i decided to take off the Tone Bender Mk II...other than the EQD i used to have i've never found a TB variant that works for me and that one was too gainy to use. all this moving around on the near tier created space, which i mostly used to give the pedals on the front tier some breathing room.
then i thought about the top tier, and decided that it would be better to have both tremolos side-by-side in the center quasi-tier, making a little tremolo section that's away from everything else and easy to actuate. moving the Pleasure Trem 5000 down made space to re-space the upper tier as well. with the more crowded upper tier i had to stagger the Canyon to fit it next to the Flashback because their jacks were exactly parallel, but now everything can sit evenly. and taking the TB II off opened up a power supply spot so i could take the Distortion+ off of the tuner's DC line out. now that slot will be available for outboard equipment, e.g. a wah-wah pedal or the Headrush E2 as a stunt delay/looper. i put the Great Wall in the third middle-tier spot because it's kind of my Nuclear Option. i could have put the smaller Ghost Echo v.2 on, but the bigger box would make the Normie Board layout too long for a Pedaltrain Nano Max which is what i'd like to use...since the stuff on either end (tuner and reverb) never get turned on/off while actually playing (i use the always-on option on the Strobostomp) that effectively makes the space i'd have to cover only about 20-22 inches which isn't too far to reach from a stationary position at a microphone stand.
i'm happy with the result. it'll be way easier to pick out the switches that i want, and having the tremolos together just makes sense though it made the signal path a bit circuitous. i'm also happy because now that i have the EMMA off the board i can figure out just how much space i'll need for the Normie Board.
signal path: Peterson StroboStomp HD tuner->Mu-Tron Micro-Tron IV envelope filter->1978 MXR Distortion+->Fuzzhugger Algal Bloom->CMC Effects Buzzaround->Fuzzhugger 3-knob Great Wall (second left, middle tier->Mojo Hand FX Villanova optical Uni-Vibe->Fairfield Circuitry Randy's Revenge v.1->TC Electronics SCF chorus/vibrato/flanger (always in flanger mode)(far left, middle tier)->Boss CH-1 chorus->Ibanez PM7 Phase Modulator (wonky phaser)->Menatone Pleasure Trem 5000 (far right, center tier)->Zvex Sonar squarewave tremolo (center tier to left of PT5000)->EHX Canyon delay (top tier, center right)->TC Electronics Flashback delay v.1->Catalinbread Soft Focus reverb->EQD Ghost Echo v.1.
- main board with MT IV.jpg (105.55 KiB) Viewed 911 times
