25.4. We added a variant of our well established Pig Hoff pedal - Pig Hoof MkII.
11.4. Rob O'Block has finished The Wall tour of his band, he was using our Pig Hoof, and he sent two fresh new videos that you can find at the Pig Hoof page.
There is a waiting list for our pedals at the moment. New orders for Moon Vibe MkII can't be completed before June, 2013. New orders for our other pedals can't be completed before November, 2013.
Birdie is an enhanced clone of the famous Rangemaster treble booster by Dallas Arbiter. This unit is a germanium booster that works the best with kind of muddy English amps like VOX or Marshall. It is a booster, so it has just a minimal distortion on its own - it kicks the powered signal into your amp and lets the amp to do the rest. We recommend using this unit with tube amps only. Boosted transistor amps just don't sound right.
Unlike the original unit, Birdie has a switch to swap between the treble boost and full range boost.
Rangemaster circuits suffer from the same flaw as Tonebenders, Fuzz Faces and some other 60's pedals - that is an extremely low input impedance. Unfortunately, this unpleasant feature can not be helped without making major changes soundwise, and therefore even Birdie has been left that way to preserve the unique sound. The main impact of the low input impedance is that while switched off, the original units caused a massive loss of trebles, especially when fed by humbucker pick-ups - this has been fully corrected in Birdie by installation of the true bypass switching. The low input impedance also drives wah-wah pedals nuts (wah-wah pedals don't like to be fed to a low impedance input at all). Wah pedals then either don't work properly or oscillate.
The best way to help it is:
- to place such a wah pedal after Birdie
- to install a buffer to the output of the wah circuit
Original units used by: Eric Clapton (supposingly the whole 'Beano' album), Jimmy Page (studio only - treble booster was inbuilt in his VOX), Tony Iommi (the famous Black Sabbath sound), Marc Bolan ...
Controls: Voice, range switch
Contemporary trend: LED, DC socket, True Bypass ON/OFF foot switch
1. Power supply: Use either 9V battery or a proper power supply. We do not discourage our customers from using a power supply, since we have no reason to believe that a unit that draws less than 1 mA(!) may sound differently under 9V battery or under a fine 9V wall wart. The current draw of these units is so low, that the battery last usually for about more than a year, so there is no reason to be bothered with additional cables. The only thing worth keeping on your mind is that these units contain obsolete PNP transistors, that are fed by negative voltage. That is all fine unless you want to feed more pedals from one single power supply.
You do not connect a vintage PNP pedal together with modern NPN pedals on one common power supply unless:
- the power supply contains more than one transformer, where one of the transformers gives the negative voltage (to feed the PNP pedal)
- the transformer provides a symmetrical voltage (+ <> 0 <> -)
If you do otherwise, the power supply will get shorted and that is a dangerous moment. You can always use separate wall warts for each of the pedals in the chain.
2. Beware of the buffers: Companies like Boss or Ibanez (and others) employ in their pedals a special switching system that uses buffers. These buffers are engaged even if the pedal is turned off. This fact have a major impact on the vintage unit's sound that is placed right behind it. This applies mainly to tuners, as they are usually placed at the first position in the effect chain. Place such a tuner in a loop switch or put it behind the vintage unit.
The price includes:
10V battery
Cliff foot switch
true bypass switching
low capacity jack sockets by Cliff
hight quality battery clips by Cliff
top quality Panasonic Low Voltage capacitors where needed
thick wires for the maximum sound fidelity and overall durability
firm and durable internal design
NOS hand-picked germanium transistor Matsushita
The battery life will be extended by unplugging the instrument jack when the pedal is not in use. Plugging in a wall wart jack also disconnect the battery and saves its life.
Testing Birdie. Les Paul standard 1977 & VOX AC15.
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