This is a fourth post of our Shin-ei Uni-Vibe controller – a mini option to replace the massive rocker footswitch that the original uses. Above we have two formats:

1. Unpainted, Vertical, Footswitch
2. Black, Horizontal, Toggle Switch

Both controllers come in a tiny 1.5″ x 3.5″ enclosure with an attached cord that measures 2′ long and terminates in a 5-pin DIN connector.

Follow the previous versions here.

The Electro-Harmonix Freeze Sound Retainer has always been a favorite and a pedal that sits on my personal pedalboard. It’s a really unique effect that can add a lot of texture for such a small package. The biggest complaint by far has always been the footswitch on this pedal; It uses a momentary switch that has a physical click when depressed. This can be particularly annoying if you’re repeatedly triggering the pedal. We’ve offered an Overhaul Mod to replace the footswitch with a soft touch footswitch and also a 1/4″ jack so you can use your preferred remote footswitch. Connecting a sustain pedal designed for a digital piano immediately became my preferred way of using this pedal but let’s take it one step further and rehouse the entire EHX Freeze’s circuit board inside of the sustain pedal.

The rehousing started off with trimming down the Freeze’s PCB to fit into the new enclosure. The sustain pedal is large but the inside has a massive spring and hinge mechanism so there isn’t as much room as it appears. The casing is plastic so the inside needed to be shielded with copper tape. After that we’re installing a DC jack on back, 1/4″ jacks on the side for in and out, volume on the side, and a red LED on top. This pedal had the toggle switch removed and has been wired to permanently be in the “Slow” mode which allows the sampled sound to slowly fade out. Otherwise there are no surprises or add-ons as the goal for this project is to have a simple pedal that does one thing very well.

I look at this rehousing and I think this is how the sound retainer circuit should have been packaged. The smooth, long taper of the sustain pedal feels natural and doesn’t introduce mechanical noise that might be picked up by microphones when recording an orchestral string instrument. Rehousing everything into one package not only saves space but also simplifies setup. This rehousing is definitely not for everyone, but I think I’ll see some people that can appreciate the modifications!

And now for the bad news: this project was incredibly time consuming and isn’t something that we’ll be offering again. It was a fun project but it’s not a good business offering.

It’s been about 12 years since our last Mu-Tron III Rehousing blog post. Since then we’ve made a few refinements and now have what we’d consider a standard combination rehousing and overhaul. The goal is to shrink down the footprint of the original pedal while also adding in modern features from our standard Mutron Overhaul modification.

We start off this mod by taking the circuit board out of the stock enclosure and removing the multi-colored rocker switches. The circuit board is then installed into the new enclosure measuring about 4.7″ x 5.7″ now with the in and output jacks on the sides instead of the back of the pedal. DC input jack just barely visible on the left side as well.

For modifications we go with the three big ones that make up our Overhaul mod:
1. Install a new footswitch that’s wired for true bypass and put in a status LED that lights up when the pedal is active. No more turning the gain knob and having it adjust your bypassed volume level once the pedal is converted to true bypass.
2. Install a standard 9V DC jack and a voltage inverter so you no longer need to track down an original 18V power supply. Unfortunately after the rehousing there’s no longer a 9V battery option due to space limitations in the casing.
3. We add a sensitivity knob to fine tune how wide the filter opens. You can still use the stock Gain knob to roughly adjust the volume and then dial in the filter’s sensitivity separately without impacting the overall volume. The sensitivity knob is designed to complement the Gain knob.

So there we have it. Same original tone, some nice-to-have updates, some expanded controls, all in a smaller package.

My favorite part of running a custom shop is when I have time to work on these oddball projects. We’ve had a few similar prototypes over the years but decided to finalize the design in what you see on this page. The goal was to create a circuit that triggers when physically tapped anywhere on the casing. Then we can tie that trigger into existing circuits such as turning a pedal on or off (as shown below) or functioning as a replacement for a tap tempo pedal.

So you might be wondering what the point of this is- why not just press the on/off switch on the Boss pedal shown below; or why not just use a standard momentary switch for tap tempo? The simplest answer is preference. Footswitches work great for feet but can be clunky and imprecise for musicians sitting at a desk, keyboard players, or anyone using their hands to activate. Tapping a pad is easier to tap on beat than pushing a foot switch. Drummers can trigger a device by tapping the device with a drum stick. This device is for a very specific purpose and likely doesn’t apply to most guitarists.

A quick run down of the controls on the red tap tempo prototype:
• Big Rubber Pad for tapping
• Sensitivity knob – controls how hard you need to tap to trigger the device
• Red LED – indicates when the device triggers. Great for troubleshooting and confirming the device is firing when expected
• Override Toggle Switch – this functions as a backup for when tapping isn’t needed. This momentary toggle switch will short the tip to ground like any traditional tap tempo switch.
• Output jack – 1/4″ out to connect to control device
• 9V DC jack – very low power draw (a few mA) but does require external power.

Below is what this tap tempo prototype looks like when tied into the bypass switch of a modified Boss NF-1.

This circuit board was then trimmed down to be smaller than a 9V battery and fit in the battery compartment of any standard pedal. Below is an install of the circuit to control the bypass of a Boss DM-2W. The pedal should only activated when the pedal itself is tapped and should not be sensitive enough to trigger on or off when the jacks are bumped.

This circuit board started out as a way for us to test some PCB design features that we wanted to bring to other products that we offer. In the first photo you can see our first shot at making tubescreamer circuit board and our revised board (lower) that was cleaned up a few years later.

This 54mm x 21mm layout can fit in a 1590B enclosure (think MXR Phase 90) or we could put two in a single 125-B enclosure. This is a great option to be installed in a Big Muff like in our Tripel Big Muff.

Overall this was a fun build. Some key upgrades include using film caps instead of 1uF electrolytic caps, a socket for the op amp that holds a vintage JRC4558DD, Nichicon high voltage caps so it can operate at 18V if needed, and TS808 resistors are labeled separately since that’s a common swap on the TS9 circuits. Another design choice was to place the diodes on the back side of the PCB. This gives easy access for installing diode-selecting switches in the future or if we wanted to try some oversized or oddball diodes. Below is a quick video of what a typical assembly process looks like. It’s a 2 minute video but covers about a 30 minute process. Please enjoy the generic, royalty-free rock music.

A customer sent in this feature-rich ISP Beta Bass because it has a footswitchable distortion but oddly enough no volume control. The addition of a volume control allows us to boost or cut the distortion section so the user no longer needs to compromise gain and volume levels. After the mod the distortion section can also work as  a clean boost.

We’ve had quite a few requests to put modulation and delay pedals into a wah pedal casing. The problem is that in order to hit the bypass switch you need to rock the treadle forward which means you lose the setting you were currently at. This add on plate allows a box to be mounted to the side for a bypass switch and a status LED (not yet installed in the above photo).

The Scalpel is a passive volume pedal which allows you to quickly cut the volume of your instrument to a specific level without needing to play around with a large volume pedal or using your hands to adjust the volume knob on your instrument. It also happens to be the most commonly modded pedal that we make.

This custom Scalpel has two key differences from our base model (which can be purchased through our online store). Since this is being used with bass we decided to install a toggle switch to bypass the treble bleed circuit. This circuit was designed to prevent a guitar from sounding dull when turning down the volume by bleeding through some treble. We’ve used this for years on guitar with excellent results but without having time to experiment fully with a bass we went with a toggle switch option. The other change we made was to add a momentary switch to quickly bypass the pedal for short bursts at full volume.

Check out our main page (in the links above) for contact info on custom mods and view the gallery for some of our other custom creations.

Electro Harmonix has a wide variety of old pedals that sound awesome and totally unique but they lack some of the modern features that modern musicians have come to expect. The Hog’s Foot is a unique pedal because it cranks the bass and cuts the treble as opposed to most modern boost pedals which either sound neutral or boost the treble to overdrive an amp.

Some annoyances of these old pedals include a terrible sounding bypass, lack of external power supply (and no battery door at the least!), no status LED, and the battery doesn’t even disconnect when the input plug is removed. In the process of updating this pedal we removed the battery on/off switch and wired up a new input jack to switch the battery off when unplugged the way almost every pedal in the past 40 years has done it. A “Boss style” 2.1mm barrel jack was added for power options as well. The pedal was converted to true bypass and had a red LED installed next to the switch.

Now that the power switch is no longer in use it would have been a shame to leave it without any purpose. The solution we came up with was to allow it to switch from a bass boost to a lower mid / bass boost. This adds a bit more low-mids for punch and helps the pedal cut through the mix if needed. The updates along with a new switch and jack should help the pedal feel at home on any modern pedalboard.