This summer I decided to renew my board. I got a new guitar and suddenly my overdrive pedal wasn’t the right one. I had loved it for years, but with this new guitar it wasn’t the right one (they have grown apart, but are still friends). That made me start searching for a new overdrive. Fun but dangerous. My pedal board ended up with five new pedals, just because that overdrive wasn’t the right one. Try to explain that to you someone who doesn’t play guitar.
The technically stuff
Here’s something about the pedals and how the signal runs thru my pedal board 2016.
The signal from my guitar runs into my Empress Buffer+ (I love that one and can’t imagine a board without it). From the loop out on the Buffer+ it runs to my Cry Baby. That leads to my Plexi Drive Deluxe from Wampler. From that it goes into the Euphoria also from Wampler, which leads into the Compressor from Empress. It’s always good to have the compressor after the wah so you can control the peaks. From there it goes to my volume pedal from Ernie Ball. After that it’s time for returning to the buffers loop in. The reason for this? Well by doing this I have the possibility to boost the level for solos with my Buffer+’s clean boost. I can do this before I go into the time-related effects.
Mono vs stereo
My buffer isn’t stereo, but all my time related effects are. Therefor I have placed my time-related effects after the buffer. Luckily all the Strymons I use, have great buffers built in. (I know Empress make an awesome stereo buffer now, but it takes up more real estate, and the input levels on the mono version fit me perfectly).
The time effects are all from Strymon. First it’s a Mobius (chorus, tremolo and related stuff). Then the Timeline (an awesome delay, with a looper function too) and the last one is the BigSky reverb. As I mentioned do the time effects in my board have buffers. These buffers are turned on all the time. Therefore do they not effect my original sound from my guitar. By setting it all up this way – running the time effects in stereo leaves me the possibility of stereo, if I bring two amps.
Everything is powered by the Ciokolate power supply from Cioks.
From the Buffer+ I also have a lead going to a tuner.
At the moment I’m normally using this board in mono, with my Mesa Boogie Mark IV, but as mentioned do I have the possibility to go stereo if needed.
Below is the rundown after my guitar enters the input on my Buffer+, with tech information about my pedal board 2016.
Enjoy – Soren
My pedal board 2016
Brand | Volt | Polarity |
Power Consumption |
Output on PS | |
Buffer+ (send) | Empress | 9 | DC (Neg.tip) |
86mA |
2 |
Cry Baby Q95 | Dunlop | 9 | DC (Neg.tip) | ?? (ECB-03E for Europe) | 3 |
Plexi Drive Deluxe | Wampler | 18 | DC (Neg.tip) | 22mA | 5 |
Euphoria | Wampler | 9 (9-18) | DC (Neg.tip) | 8mA | 4 |
Compressor | Empress | 9 (9-18) | DC (Neg.tip) | 100mA | 7 |
Volume jr | Ernie Ball | (no power needed) | |||
Buffer+ (return) | Empress | 9 | DC (Neg.tip) | (already powered) | (2) |
Buffer+ (output) | Empress | 9 | DC (Neg.tip) | (already powered) | (2) |
Mobius | Strymon | 9 | DC (Neg.tip) | 300 mA | 8 |
Timeline | Strymon | 9 | DC (Neg.tip) | 300 mA | 10 |
BigSky (to amps (s)) | Strymon | 9 | DC (Neg.tip) | 300 mA | 12 |
Tuner from tuner output on Buffer+ | Tc electronic | 9 | DC (Neg.tip) | At least 40 mA | 6 |