When "boutique" becomes a paperwieght

[carfish7]

I have had a really cool pedal for several years now - got it here from a fellow HFC'er in fact. This is the Gaspedals Carb in a custom enclosure.

Ever since I got it there was some intermittent stuff going on with pots crackling and such, but I was told this was "normal" and just found that sweet spot and left it there. Finally, it totally crapped out and I decided to send it to our local pedal "guru" Casey Goobey.

When it returned, it had not been repaired and in fact had been slightly damaged cosmetically. There are components inside a glop of goo, I suppose to cloak whatever mojo was residing inside the box. Attempts to contact the builder met with zero result. Attempts to find anyone who was willing to take on the repair of this box have also borne no fruit. Basically, I am left with a cool-ass paperweight and fond memories of awesome tones gone by.

Can ANYONE recommend a mad genius repair guy or should I just bow my head in perpetual sorrow and chalk it up to a love lost for all eternity?

The cool thing is that the graphic kinda looks like my wife. Not like I relished stomping upon her visage or anything........

Or maybe it's closer to this.........

[cynic]

User ID gaspedals.net shows very recent activity on TGP. Try shooting him a PM over there.

[carfish7]

Unable to do so as the inbox is full.........

But that's a start I guess. Thanks.

I did put a posting there so maybe I will get some assistance.

[oldskoolrulz]

i know jhs pedals does all types of mods on a regular basis, may want to contact them to see if this is something they would take on...

[velorush]

What did it do before it died? I know certain fuzz configurations crackle when the gain knob is moved because of the DC across the pot. My Lovepedal BBB is that way. Some of the ZVEX pedals even have "Crackle Okay" on the knob:

Hopefully you'll be able to reach the builder and he'll be able to remember what was under the goop!

[Caddie]

Was it local pedal "guru" Casey Goobey who dropped the glop of goo?

Is Guru Goobey possibly the offender who returned it unrepaired and inflicted slight cosmetic damage??

Did you pay Guru Goobey for his gloppy n slightly damaging work???

Have you called him and said "Hey Guru, with all due respect due a guru such as you, WTF????

Inquiring minds want to know.

Pick up the phone son or pay a visit to Guru Goobey's local la bor' a tory.

Lets go down to the lab and see what's on the slab.

Cheers

caddie the impaler

[carfish7]

Well, it was just cutting in and out and finally gave up completely. I just popped it open a few minutes ago, plugged it in, and it was passing no signal. Percussive maintenance had no effect so I did the next best thing - jammed my sausage fingers in there and started poking shit around. Lots of buzzing and protest, then I got signal for a second. Slightly more deliberate poking and I got it to "work" for a few seconds. I'm thinking we have a loose or cold solder joint, so I'm gonna put on my lab coat, fire up the finger-burner, and see what I can see........

What's the worst that can happen?

[carfish7]

Was it local pedal "guru" Casey Goobey who dropped the glop of goo?

Is Guru Goobey possibly the offender who returned it unrepaired and inflicted slight cosmetic damage??

Did you pay Guru Goobey for his gloppy n slightly damaging work???

Have you called him and said "Hey Guru, with all due respect due a guru such as you, WTF????

Inquiring minds want to know.

Pick up the phone son or pay a visit to Guru Goobey's local la bor' a tory.

Lets go down to the lab and see what's on the slab.

Cheers

caddie the impaler

Been all up and down that road - let's just say it wasn't going anywhere. I wasn't impressed by his Bag of Dicks either, but some folks swear they sound great.......

[unfun75]

Since it is a "boutique" pedal, I'm guessing it's just a Tube Screamer with a fancy enclosure. Should be an easy replacement.

[crunchee]

+1! If all else fails, you can just keep the box and put new innards into it.

[triodecr]

Got any pics of the guts? If poking around will get it to work we might be able to spot the culprit visually. Might be a long shot but I'm curious to see what's in there.

[tomteriffic]

In the early 70's I had one of those "built like a tank and sounds like God" Standels. It was a hybrid job, with a solid-state front end and tube output. Unfortunately it was on of the early ones where the solid state bits were covered in block goop. One channel croaked, followed shortly by the other and nobody in town would even attempt to work on it.

The cabinet was a very innovative reflex 2 x 12. I hung on to it for decades.

[carfish7]

Well, an update is in order I guess.

Today was "solder-mania". I installed some pickups, rewired a vintage Ibanez Artist, and finally fully disassembled the "Carb". I just pulled the chassis out of my Mesa and am going to replace a busted mini-switch in a few minutes. Big fun and quite satisfying I might add.

Back to the "Carb" in question.

2 observations here. First, the soldering work on this pedal is terrible - just really low-rent and sloppy. It was obvious what the problem was as soon as I got the jacks out and got a good look inside. The ground wire that was supposed to be secured to the rear of "Level" pot was not, because the assembler didn't rough-up the pot before soldering it up. There was a wire passing above with a TINY blop of solder on the spot where it MIGHT have been attached at one point, but the back of the pot was all gooey and discolored from flux. A good degrease, a quick pass with some emery cloth, and I got the ground wire to stick just fine. Bingo - full function!

Secondly, I don't know what the aforementioned "tech" was doing when he was in here. If a total dork like me can spot and fix this, then why can't a respected and highly-regarded pedal builder do the same?

Fuck it - I'm doing ALL my own repairs from now on. Component-level stuff used to intimidate me, but I'm gonna try HARD to fix my own stuff before paying anyone a bench fee to MAYBE fix my shit.

The pedal sounds great, btw. At least the design has some merit. And it still looks pretty cool, even though "Bag of Dicks" (head) effed up the graphic when he did whatever he did.

[veatch]

Good on you! Glad you got to work!!

[carfish7]

Now the L.E.D. crapped out..........

Do these ever burn out or should I look for more dodgy wiring?

[tbonesullivan]

LEDs can burn out, but I would look for more wiring issues. Maybe check for continuity and see if the led comes back on if you move a bunch of wires.

I'm not sure which is amazing me more, that the pedal was constructed in such a haphazard way in the first place, or that a "pedal guru" couldn't spot that from a mile away.