Articles in Tracing Journal

Today we’re releasing new traces of three Cornish pedals. First up is the NG-3, a variable-bias silicon fuzz that can go from class A (typical smooth fuzz tone) through class B (gated fuzz) to class C (“velcro” sound …

In this journal we’re covering three related pedals from King Tone: the Duellist, Soloist and Heavyhand. (We also traced the Blues Power, which is covered in a separate post.) The Duellist is a dual pedal that consists of …

In tandem with the Duellist-Soloist-Heavyhand triple trace, we’re also doing separate one for the King Tone Blues Power. Once again, here’s the official demo from Jesse Davey: The Blues Power was originally released in 2017 and described as …

Here’s an interesting one. The Darkglass® Duality is an all-original bass drive circuit that features two parallel fuzz paths that can be blended together in any ratio. Here’s a demo video showing what it can do. The first …

We’ve traced a whole bunch of Catalinbread pedals, and we’ve still got a few more on the way. The Supercharged Overdrive is an earlier design from their first few years as a company, predating their “Foundation” series of …

The gear community is not known for restraint when hyping cool pedals. But you don’t have to be part of the DIY pedal scene for long before you start to understand that very few of the drive-of-the-day pedals …

Some companies like to keep their product line as small as possible so customers don’t get choice paralysis. Xotic is not one of those companies. Think you might want a BB Preamp? Well, a few minutes of research …

The Catalinbread CB30 was first released in the summer of 2011 as their Foundation-series take on the Vox AC30. The tireless heroes at Freestompboxes traced it within a few weeks of release, with extensive photos detailing the process. …

The Karma Suture is Catalinbread’s take on the Interfax Harmonic Percolator, a unique and extremely rare fuzz/drive from the early 1970s. As with most of their pedals, they don’t settle for straight clones, instead using classic circuits as …

We’ve got a trilogy! The very first tracing journal we ever did was the Dinosaural OTC-201 Opticompressor back in August of 2019. A few months ago, we took apart the Tube Bender. And today, we tackle the last …

Here’s an interesting one. The Crowther Hot Cake is one of the original boutique distortion pedals, dating all the way back to 1976. They’ve been hand-built by Paul Crowther in New Zealand for the past 44 years. And …

Cornish says the CC-1 is an all-original design, but how accurate is that? Have a look underneath the goop.

We tear open a Cornish ST-2 to answer the question once and for all: is it an Overdriver?

There are only 150 of these pedals in the world. We were able to trace one of them. Check out the photos, schematic, and a DIY version you can build.

We took apart these three Xotic pedals to get definitive, accurate schematics.

Check out the tracing log for a schematic, 50+ photos of the degooping process, and… X-rays?

The second new Cornish pedal today is the SS-3 Soft Sustain. The SS-3 is an update of his earlier SS-2 circuit, an 1970s-style overdrive with roots in the MXR Distortion+. The SS-2 had already been traced… sort of. …

Xotic is best known for their AC & RC Booster pedals as well as the BB Preamp. The Soul Driven was released in 2016, making it a relatively new addition to the Xotic family, developed in collaboration with …

The Seymour Duncan Pickup Booster is a clean boost pedal with the added feature of being able to simulate the resonant peak of different pickups, letting a single-coil assume the character of either vintage or modern humbucker. It …

The SoloDallas Storm is a pedal conversion of the Schaffer-Vega Diversity System (SVDS), the first wireless system for guitar that was reliable enough to be used by major touring acts. The SVDS was designed by Ken Schaffer and …