Pea Souper!

Pea Souper! : Quasi Ring Modulator

Features

• Ring Modulator style dissonance
• "Smoke", "Fog" and "Smog" knobs (equivalent to Tone, Tuning and Intensity)
• Upside-down decals on the back for ease of reading when leaning over in a playing situation
• Battered chrome finish
  
• Hand wired
• Hand drilled
• True bypass
• Green LED

Notes

Battered case finished in shiny chrome paint
Decals of the dry-rub variety (N.B. decal borders are not nearly so noticeable in person as they appear in these pictures)
No PCB - stripboard used instead

Photos

Angle 1
Angle 2
Angle 3
Angle 4
Rear lean-over view
Rear view


Samples
All samples were recorded with single coil pickups direct to PC.

Detuned

Tuned to A

Tuned to E

Tone (Smoke) control

Extended Notes

This was a difficult project at first. The idea was to make a simple ring-mod but as it turns out, there's really no such thing. I experimented with many circuits, mostly the simpler end of those freely available throughout the home-brew effects communities (I dare say you can do much more sophisticated things if you've got sufficient skill, patience and parts). The biggest problem by far was carrier signal bleed-through; almost every single circuit I tried suffered from this to some degree, and none presented a clean enough effect to be useful in any real band situation, save perhaps for (very) select studio use or (very) crass noise-nikkery. The circuit I wound up with is not a true ring mod, but the effect is pleasing, similar enough for the purpose and most importantly - useable. If you are after a true ring mod, my advice is to go the old-fashioned route and wire a couple of transformers to some diodes - just don't expect to fit it in a small stomp box.