What is it? Visual Sound (currently Truetone) V2 Son of Hyde Distortion. Made in china around mid 00’s. For several reasons, i’ve had mixed feeling about the Visual Sound products for a long time. I’ve repaired a number of the “V1” series pedals and sadly, i’d call the manufacturing methods sub-par. (Not to mention the…
Month: June 2015
Danelectro CO-1 Drive
What is it? Danelectro CO-1 Drive from Cool Cat series. Made in china, late 00’s. Last one i had missing from my Cool Cat series collection. Pretty rare specimen actually. Finally found one from polish auction site and a friend delivered it. I’ve seen only couple of units on sale, mostly in US and with…
Vox V830 Distortion Booster
What is it? Vox V830 Distortion Booster. Made in china around early to mid 00’s. Sharing the box and switching/power circuitry with V810 Valve overdrive, the V830 is nothing close. Obviously one would instantly assume this to be a DS-1 derivative. What makes this assumption obvious is the fact that V810 is a Tubescreamer. And…
TC Electronic Röttweiler
What is it? TC Electronic Röttweiler Metal Distortion, made presumably in china, early 10’s. TCE is quite highly regarded brand. And there are several good reasons for it. The brand’s rack units for studio use shook the recording professionals in the 90’s and they’ve been pushing solid products ever since. For example, it was TCE’s…
Danelectro DC-1 Cool Cat Chorus
What is it? Danelectro DC-1 Cool Cat Chorus, the original 18V version. Made in china, 1996. Again? Didn’t i write about this already? Well. I did, but with the later 9V version. This is the first edition that runs on 18V. Are there a lot of differences between these two? Well. Not that much, but…
Excalibur Holy Grail Distortion
What is it? Excalibur Holy Grail Distortion. Made in china, late 00’s. Got this one with the Tubescreamer derivative and the fake analog delay from the same “manufacturer”. The quotes are there for a reason. Since the brand is just OEM’ng stuff from chinese brand with questionable prestige, i wouldn’t exactly call Excalibur a manufacturer….
Ibanez GEL Graphic EQ
What is it? Ibanez GEL Graphic EQ. Made in Japan, 1985. Graphical equalizer from Ibanez Master series. Mine’s missing two of the slide pot knobs, but otherwise in decent condition. What comes to similar EQs, there is basically two ways to get the job done. First is the oldschool method of using inductors to create…