Pedalboard - DIY or not?

[BillB]

Hi folks, I am planning a pedalboard, purely for fun, not gigging. Bedroom noodling only...

Pedals, picked out of current collection, will be:
Boss BE-5 (compression, overdrive, gate), then Send to
Tomsline Bluesy
Behringer Graphic EQ
Landlord Spinning Room (mult-mod)
Donner Dynamic Wah
Donner Yellow Fall (analogue style delay)
Return to Boss BE-5 (DDL, Chorus) then a possible
Donner Tutti Chorus on the dry output - to be determined by ear whether it adds anything to the Boss Chorus...
Finally stereo I/O to Boss RV-6 reverb

This fits comfortably in about 500 x 300.

Probably going to power it via a (Thomann) Harley Benton ISO-1 Pro - having noted previous SOS comments about the importance of good PSUs, I think this will be ‘good enough’ for non-gigging use.

The question really is about the board itself, and fixing the pedals in place. I can chop up and screw together bits of wood (ply, edging) fairly competently, but wonder if folks think that there are pedalboard bases out there that make it not worth bothering?

When it comes to fixing pedal in place, Velcro is the norm but I am not mad about the one-way trip (or messy removal) this entails.
These look fairly sensible:
https://www.thomann.de/gb/harley_benton_mounties.htm. Unscrew the pedal base, slip the bands over the screw holes, put back together then screw down to the board. But is there any other simple/ DIY system like this?


I don’t need gig-worthy reliability, just something that stays in place and looks reasonably neat.

Thanks for you thoughts

[Wonks]

Quite a few people just drill holes in the board and use zip ties to hold them in place. Not pretty but it works.

Not all pedals have convenient screwholes for that type of HB mountie pedal attachment, and some have very short case screws that won't work with that type of fixing unless you find and fit some longer screws, so it helps to have an alternate fixing method.

I use the 3M double-lock tape myself. Far grippier than velcro, especialy the glue on the back of it. You can hold the board upside down and shake it and even large heavy pedals stay firmly attached.

If it's for home use, then DIY should be fine.

[BillB]

Thanks, Wonks. One of my pedals doesn’t have suitable screws on the base (the Bluesy) but the rest should be OK. Probably worth trying cable clips as a first option, although I can imagine that the pressure of patch and DC cables would force the pedals out of square, which would never do!

I’ll check out the 3M, thank you.

[Wonks]

The 3M is expensive stuff for what it is, but worth it if you carry the board around a lot. You use the same stuff top and bottom, so you need double the length you would with velcro, as you don't get the equivalent of a hook and a loop piece being sold together. But you need less of it than velcro.

I often have to use a screwdriver to prise the pedals off the board, it's got that strong a grip. Probably means I used far to much, but better safe than sorry.

[BillB]

This stuff?
https://www.amazon.co.uk/3M-SJ354B-Recl ... r_1_3_sspa

Does it hold onto less dust and hair than Velcro?

[Wonks]

I used this version of it which (reading the descriptions a couple of years ago) is supposed to have the strongest backing adhesive.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00 ... UTF8&psc=1

Far less prone to dust and hairs than velcro. Certainly not a dust trap as the plastic interlocking arm,s are quite far apart. You may get some pet hairs in there, but nothing like as many as velcro.

[Drew Stephenson]

I have two pedal boards, a boss one with the thick foam matting cut to shape, and cheap one with Velcro on the pedals sticking to the fabric liner.
The boss approach works perfectly.
The other one... not so much. Firstly the Velcro grips to the liner more strongly than the backing glue does to the pedals. Secondly the Velcro grips more strongly than the liner to the box.
Superglue required in both cases...
That being said, they probably would have been fine for home use, but not for practice and gigs every week.

[Funkyflash5]

All my boards are pedaltrain boards, with industrial strength velcro. Makes it easy to swap pedals as needed, and the aluminum of the boards makes them lighter than I could make for myself from wood or steel. If I didn't gig them or take them between rehearsal spaces the weight wouldn't have mattered and a diy solution would have been my preference. If your pedal selection and layout aren't going to change, then screw down mounts and specific holes for zipties and cable runs could get you a very tidy board but if it needs to be flexible in layout it'll soon be swiss cheese.

[BillB]

Drew, nice idea about the foam matting, obviously a cut-once and don’t change anything solution. I’ll give that some thought though.

FunkyFlash, fair warning about Swiss cheese! I think I won’t be changing it around, but my experience with music tech and a bit of realism says otherwise. On the other hand, if it is just a question of replacing a holey piece of wood with another one in some years’ time, that won’t be too much of a problem. Just checked in the garage and there are a few suitable bits of ply...

I’ll probably lay it out on something lightweight using ties to start out with, and see how the cabling - and sound - behaves, then create a more durable version. Time to order the power supply!

[MarkOne]

As a keyboard player who’s wandered n here by accident, surely it can all be done with a Helix now?

I’ll get my coat…

[BillB]

As a keyboard player who’s wandered n here by accident, surely it can all be done with a Helix now?

I’ll get my coat…

For sure. I have four multi-fx boards (two Boss, a Digitech and a Korg) but a) I can’t choose the order of the FX on any of these (I know you can on the newer gear) and b) I just fancied playing with some of the stuff I already had.

If I was really looking for a neat gigging pedalboard then yes, probably a Helix or similar. Andertons did a fun cost/flexibility video on exactly this topic.

[MarkOne]

Cheers Bill.

I wasn’t really trying to stir the pot, but a bottle of great Italian red with lunch is my excuse

[BillB]

Cheers Bill.

I wasn’t really trying to stir the pot, but a bottle of great Italian red with lunch is my excuse

And a fine excuse it is

[BillB]

Even better - I see it was a birthday bottle. Happy Birthday (I should probably take this elsewhere!).

[BigRedX]

As a Helix user, I am currently thinking of adding a Linn Adrenalinn to my set up simply because it does some stuff I'd like to use (synchronised filter effects) that can't be done with the Helix.

[BillB]

Before shelling out on a rare Adrenalinn, check out the M-Audio Black Box, designed with Roger Linn, to see if does the particular things you are looking for.

https://www.soundonsound.com/reviews/m-audio-black-box

There was a V2 firmware update ('Black Box Reloaded' - downloadable) which added many more FX and patches.

They don't come up very often but when they do, they are often around the £50 mark. I was thinking of getting rid of mine, but before I did, I tried running a MIDI clock into a MIDI-USB converter, plugged the USB into the Black Box USB port and, without further ado, had MIDI synced everything: Delay, Pan/tremolo, random Filter or Flanger, even arpeggios (not my thing). Lots of fun, so it is now dedicated to an aux output of my Novation DrumStation, so any sound can be assigned weird synced steppy FX when the mood takes me. Obviously this would also work with a DAW outputting MIDI Clock.

It is not a great all-round mutli-fx, but those particular things, it does well.

[BigRedX]

I've already got an Adrenalinn - cost me £50 NOS in the early 2000s.

[BillB]

Wow, that was a good price. You are sorted then

[BillB]

I am digging this one up again because I came across this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AXwqL2ZQ7z4

Using Command Strips (often used for picture hanging) to secure pedals.

The author is talking about using them (alongside many other options in related videos, such as nylon ties and Velcro) with his Holeyboard pedal board system, but it looks like it would work with pretty much any pedalboard, particularly a metal one. I wouldn’t want to try this for live gigging (at least not without lots of stress testing) but for a bedroom guitarist it looks great. Reasonably secure but without the semi-permanent mess of Velcro on the bottom of every pedal.

Has anyone tried this?

[Murray B]

Have you got a jigsaw?

You could make the board from two separate piece of ply, one plain and the other with pedal shaped holes in.

Screw / glue them together than you have some recesses for the pedals to fit in. You'll need to do a bit of checking on the pedals to see what the maximum thickness of the top layer can be so as to leave access for the cables and power supples.

You'll be committing yourself to a layout if the pedals are different shapes and sizes of course.

I used a DIY board for three boss size pedals like this live for a long time and it worked well in keeping them put.

Edit - If you have a router you could customise the depth of the holes in a thicker piece of wood, but this is a lot more work and frankly routers are a dangerous tool for the inexperienced - they look like a premature ending to guitar playing waiting to happen for me.

[BillB]

Thanks, Murray, that’s a good idea, albeit a fairly fixed one. I think I probably want something a bit more flexible to play around with. But I will keep it in mind for any more permanent pedal installation.

[Drew Stephenson]

My pedals are held in place with a bit of sleeping mat. Lay 'em out, mark it up, cut the holes slightly smaller than the pedals (or with a bit of a chamfer) so they grip nicely and then you can make any additional notches for cables / power etc.
And you can get several layouts from a single mat so if your set-up evolves you can just cut another mat. Or have an A and B layout.

[adrian_k]

Good thread. Sadly 10 years too late for me, I’ve just spent more time than I’d like cleaning goo off of my pedals so I can sell them.

[BillB]

My pedals are held in place with a bit of sleeping mat. Lay 'em out, mark it up, cut the holes slightly smaller than the pedals (or with a bit of a chamfer) so they grip nicely and then you can make any additional notches for cables / power etc.
And you can get several layouts from a single mat so if your set-up evolves you can just cut another mat. Or have an A and B layout.

Aah, sleeping mat… I knew that there was something suitable off the shelf, just couldn’t think what it was.

Photo please?

[Drew Stephenson]

Thought I had one to hand but it appears not, will have to wait until tomorrow.