Jack Orman Rat Ebooking
An overdrive guitar pedal is kind of like a less harsh distortion pedal. Technically speaking, whereas a distortion pedal clips an amplified waveform at a particular height, the overdrive pedal actually rounds the top of the clipped wave. While this still makes it a bit fuzzy when you crank up the gain, it sounds less extreme than a distortion or fuzz pedal. What is cool about this pedal is that it adds a little extra warmth to your signal when you are strumming gently, but when you really strum hard, the audio spikes up into crunchy distortion territory. While this is generally a very subtle effect, it is actually quite robust in terms of the different types of sounds that you can get out of it. It is great for adding a little something extra to any effects chain.
You will need:(x1) 2N3904 NPN transistor (x1) 0.1uF capacitor (x1) 0.047uF capacitor (x2) 0.01uF capacitor (x1) 100K logarithmic potentiometer (x1) 100K linear potentiometer (x1) 10K linear potentiometer (x1) 2.2M ohm resistor (x1) 33K ohm resistor (x1) 22K ohm resistor (x1) 3.3K ohm resistor (x1) 680 ohm resistor (x1) PC Board (x1) 9V battery snap (x1) 9V battery (x3) Knobs (x2) Stereo audio jacks (x1) Foot switch(x1) BB project enclosure(x1) 5' x 4' x 1/8' rubber sheet(x1) 5' x 4' x 1/8' cork sheet. Build the circuit as pictured in the schematic, with the exception of the potentiometers.The overdrive pedal schematic is largely based on two different circuits. Memorex electronics npower games of thrones.
Jack Orman Rat Ebooking 2
The transistor stage of the schematic is based on the by Beavis Audio Researsch (itself based on the Electra Distortion module). However, instead of using a rare Russian NPN transistor, I used a 2N3904. All-in-all, this part of the schematic is largely just boosting the incoming signal, controlling the gain, and doing a little bit of filtering.The lower half of the schematic is based on Jack Orman's page on, and it is in this part of the circuit where all of the real overdrive magic is happening. Basically, there is a high pass and low pass filter in parallel, each of which is followed by its own pair of clipping diodes. Aside from the filters themselves having unique tone charachteristics, each pair of diodes also has its own clipping charachteristics.The 10K potentiometer in the schematic sweeps between the two different filter / diode pairs. This potentiometer gives the pedal a very adjustable and unique sound. By swapping out the filter components and diodes for different values, you can experiment with the pedal and find your own perfect combination.