Uncompressed Tubey Mild Transparent OD?

#82
2010P said:
Has the Broughton terraformer been mentioned? I am very pleasantly surprised at how transparent it is. This is the first od pedal I've tried that literally has almost no tone coloration. Just a nice drive sound over your base tone. And it shines in the low gain dept.
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*cough* ;)
NKBassman said:
Barbershop adds some mild compression, but in a very pleasing way.

The Broughton Terraformer recently kicked the Barbershop off my board. 3-Band EQ and Blend make it very easy to dial in just the right amount of grit. Has some pleasant compression at 9V, but that goes away if you run it at higher voltages.
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#89
Feral Feline said:
Add Dr Scientist's The Elements to your list. This pedal is extremely versatile, IMO it can be set up for a light OD as you've described in the OP/subsequent posts. Blend, EQ, selectable clipping and selectable gain stages enable it to do mild. If you don't like that flavour of mild, then you can dial in several other grittier sounds that you can set-&-forget. I'm sure there's something inside it you can use.

Having said that, I've got a Barbershop as well and am looking at getting some form of Blueberry-ish OD.






Did your Earthtone buddy build your Driver with stock specs or did he tweak it for bass?

In GPCB's build notes, it says if the Driver is to be used solely for bass, then C16 (the output cap) can be bumped up in value to let more bass through. Stock C16 is 100n, GPCP suggests bumping up to 220n for bass.

However, the input cap is also listed as 100n, which I think could also be increased to 220n. It's my understanding that input and and output capacitors have a key impact on the bass response of a circuit, and to some degree coupling caps as well.

For the "Bass Driver", I plan to use 220n caps for
C1 (input)
C3 (coupling, stock is 100n)
C16 (output)

Most likely I'll put 'em on a switch so I can select between 100n or 220n .
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Yes! He (Earthtone) knows me pretty well- we've been in an on again/off again band since 1987 (you could say we are the founding members of our little group, and certainly the only two that are still alive! LOL)!. He changed out the caps for a better bass response, and in doing so, made the bottom end of this thing the equivalent of an earthquake simulator, I think! LOL

I did do the changes to the bass driver that was suggested. In addition (and as you have noted), I increased the input and output caps; I used 220n on the input, and a 1uf on the output, as it was what I had in my "toybox" at the time!
 
#91
Grahams Groove said:
Had and flipped the Barbershop, Grizzly, and Beta (jfet/germ). Have the Phat Phuk B, Aggie THDI, and Lehle/Basswitch Sonic Spark.

I always want in depth personal reviews when I'm looking at dirt pedals - here's my contribution to the mess of info scattered around this board.

Beta is cool in the videos, but the low end boost on the model I had (cream/red) was pretty intense. It's baked in, so there's no way to really avoid it. I dig it for the motown vibe, but it was not my cup of tea for always-on grit.

Barbershop and Grizzly are definitely touch sensitive. I played both with active and passive basses (active jazz, passive jazz, passive P), and felt that the Grizzly could take the heat from my active bass where the BShop didn't deal quite as well. I think the barbershop sounds sweet, but it did get a little honky/kazoo-ish digging in on my active jazz, and that was without boosting any lows/mids on my jazz. I flipped it because of that, and I felt that it slightly compressed/rolled off some of the lower lows in an undesirable way. Perhaps nothing you would miss (may even welcome it) depending on the sound you're going for, but I definitely noticed it. My hope was for an OD/tube simulator to add harmonics and a bit of thickness or fatness. I thought the barbershop was almost too transparent in that it didn't thicken the way I like. YMMV...

Grizzly was more diverse in the amount and type of grit I could dial in, handled actives like a champ, and the funkulator & hi-cut knobs are cool - if you intend to use them. However, it sounds like you don't want any mid-scooping or major tonal changes, so the bottom two knobs may be unnecessary. I honestly flipped the grizzly because it wasn't doing enough to my tone, given how I was using it. This is just my opinion, but the grizzly simply sounded like a bit of hair or grit "on top" of my standard bass signal, since I was just using a hint of the mid scoop and hi-cut. I don't like rolling off too much high end, and thought the scoop sounded better with slap than fingerstyle. It's a great pedal, but I wanted a bit more character and more of that tubey fatness.

Wren & Cuff PPB - Maybe not top of your list, but this definitely has that magic something. First off - there is only one real demo (from WrenAndCuff) on youtube, and it sounds like he's pushing a tube amp with it. I don't think it's a good representation of what it can do on the more subtle end of the spectrum with a solid state amp. It adds some presence and girth to the entire range of your bass - a little sparkle in the highs, some harmonic thickening across the mids, and some fatness/punch in the lows. The internal trim pot allows you to tweak the way it responds, and the germanium transistor definitely has a sweet spot to it. The way mine is set, I get a tiny bit of breakup if I really dig in on the E string in the first position. Otherwise, it's more sparkly fattening, rather than breakup or distortion - it just makes my bass sound 'bigger' when kicked on (or kept on as it were).

Tons has been written on the Aggie THDI. I love this pedal for grit and tube-emulation. It can run clean, but I think the AGS is where it shines. Using standard EQ settings and super low gain with the AGS, I've been able to dial in some fairly transparent hair/grunt with just a touch of roll-off in the highs. The real revelation was reading this post and trying his last suggested setting ("Here's another trick..."). The THDi is not the most transparent pedal out there by any means, but I really dig the character it imparts. I think everyone hears and describes their ideal "tube tone" a bit differently, and the TH gets close to what I'm looking for. Bonus: I won't claim it sounds the same, but this pedal does a solid impression of a DB751 (minus the 750 watts of MOSFET power kicking you in the chest).

Lehle Basswitch Sonic Spark. Worth a mention if you want lots of harmonic 'richness', added punch, and don't need anything significant in terms of distortion. Ed Friedland has a great demo on it - I will say that even with headphones, the video doesn't fully display the sparkle and fatness you get from it in person. The lower Intensity/EQ knobs can do a lot on their own and have a pretty wide range. If you keep things on the deeper side and don't go crazy with the intensity, you can then use the enhance to bump up the amount of harmonic content and dial in your desired amount of punch/presence. It can get a little bright if you crank the "enhance" and/or roll the 'eq' knob toward "bright", but it's manageable by rolling off the treble/tone control on either your bass or amp.

Have fun...
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I was very close to selling the Barbershop at one point...really SUPER CLOSE.
...until I spent time with it and really got to know it properly.
Now I'd soooo not sell it!
 
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#92
basscapes said:
Yes! He (Earthtone) knows me pretty well- we've been in an on again/off again band since 1987 (you could say we are the founding members of our little group, and certainly the only two that are still alive! LOL)!. He changed out the caps for a better bass response, and in doing so, made the bottom end of this thing the equivalent of an earthquake simulator, I think! LOL

I did do the changes to the bass driver that was suggested. In addition (and as you have noted), I increased the input and output caps; I used 220n on the input, and a 1uf on the output, as it was what I had in my "toybox" at the time!
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Thanks. I may follow your lead and use 1µF on the output as well.
 
#95
Kenova said:


Here, I made video today for TC Electronic Spark Booster, it's not perfect but i tried to do my best and keep it short...somehow...
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Great video. I have a spark booster on the way from a TB'r and I'm pretty excited. It seems to fit the bill nicely and priced lower than most of the competition. Does anybody know if this is an analog or digital pedal?
 
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