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Welcome to DIY fever – site dedicated to building your own guitars, amplifiers and effect pedals. Use the site map below or the navigation menu above to find your way around and enjoy your stay.
- Home
- Blog – quick tech tips, news, announcements and concert reports
- Guitars
- Bancika JPM – modern shred guitar inspired by Petrucci’s Ibanez JPM
- Bancika MK1 – shredding guitar with Floyd Rose and hot DiMarzio humbuckers
- Bancika MK2 – hand painted guitar with more of a traditional feel
- GS Mini Upgrade – trying to make this little gem even better
- Headless Telecaster – Richie Kotzen inspired full scale headless mini telecaster
- Ibanez RG Upgrade – upgraded with new DiMarzio pickups, Tremol-no and pots
- Mini Les Paul – travel sized guitar based on Les Paul Studio
- Shredneck – warm up and practice tool
- Squier Strat Upgrade – how to turn a cheap guitar into a decent instrument
- Staining Guitar Tops – how to get the best out of figured maple tops
- Amps
- 1×6″ Astoria Cabinet – Mini speaker cabinet with a 6″ speaker and open or closed back
- 1×10″ Guitar Cabinet – my new cab that hosts a Celestion Vintage G10 speaker
- 12K5 Flea-Power Amp – tiny hybrid amp with JFET preamp and 12K5 tube output
- 2W Trainwreck Express – 2W version of the famous Traniwreck Express amp
- 2x6W Stereo Amp – Hi-Fi spec’d stereo power amplifier based around TDA1521A
- 3W Tube Power Amp – 6AK6 power amp with 6021 submini tube and LND150 stage
- 5W Soldano SLO – 5 watt version of the famous Soldano amp, with EL91 output tubes
- AX84 Firefly – self split 12AU7 amp with cascode boost
- Blackstar Fly 3 Mods – cool sounding miniature battery powered amp
- Deacy-Style Amps – salvaging vintage audio devices into cool little guitar amps
- Deacyfunken – built from scratch using Telefunken parts
- Ei RR 220-T – 50s transistor radio made in my town
- Minerva Funkberater – radio with silicon preamp and AC187/AC188 Ge output pair
- Neywa 402 – compact Russian push-pull germanium radio
- Panasonic R-12 – cool speedometer-style Japanese radio
- Tele-Merc 70 – single-ended class A germanium phone amplifier
- Telefunken 302TS – German-made reel-to-reel tape recorder
- Toshiba 8TL-463S – push-pull germanium radio with splitter transformer
- Fender 5F2-A Princeton – classic small combo with a few mods
- Kalamazoo 1 – head version of Kalamazoo Model 1 with EL95 output
- Little Gem MK2 – Smokey inspired tiny amp based around 386 opamp
- Mesa Mark IIc+ Pre PCB – PCB based two channel IIc+ with relay switching
- Mesa Mark IIc+ Pre PtP – famous preamp with a couple of mods
- Matchless Hotbox – all-tube preamp based on Matchless Hotbox
- Soldano Preamp – Soldano inspired all tube preamp
- Soldano Preamp MK2 – legendary 3 channel preamp with simplified switching
- Effects
- ’69 Fuzz Face – FF derivative based on Fulltone ’69 fuzz
- Dallas Rangemaster – legendary germanium treble booster
- Dr Boogey – Mesa/Boogie Dual Rectifier JFET emulator
- Friedman BE-OD – DIY clone of the cool BE-OD distortion
- Fuzz Face Revisited – Bonamassa inspired fuzz with massive changes
- King of the Brits (KOTB) – J201 based marshall-in-the-box
- Lehle Buffer/Splitter/Re-amp – flexible utility box for recording
- Marshall Cab Sim – Marshall 4×12 cabinet simulator for direct recording
- Mr EQ – simple discrete equalizer with 12 different EQ curves
- MXR ZW/GT/Classic OD – mod that takes you from GT-OD to ZW and back
- Rebote Delay 2.5 – DIY digital delay from TonePad
- The Ultimate Overdrive – transparent overdrive with configurable clipping
- Tube Screamer 808 – Tubescreamer clone with a couple of mods
- Misc
- Air Brake Attenuator – scaled-down version of the well known attenuator
- Audio Probe – very simple contraption that helps with debugging audio circuits
- Circuit Layout Tips – making a quiet and reliable amp and effect layouts
- Component Selection – some suggestions for parts and supplies
- DIY Sustainer – how to make your own sustainer from scratch
- Crappy Desktop Speaker Mods – trying to make cheap speakers act as semi-decent monitors
- DIY Vespel Picks – home made Blue Chip/Gravity pick cross
- Dummy Load – simple device that lets you run a tube amp without an actual speaker
- Fake Capacitors – how to spot fake electrolytic capacitors and avoid them
- Flexi Clip – adds many different clipping options to any circuit that uses clipping diodes
- Guitar Wiring 101 – instructions and common wiring configuration dissected
- Isolation Cabinet – place to store my gear and record silently
- L-pad – probably the simplest and cheapest way to attenuate output of an amplifier
- Panasonic WM-61A Mic – great sounding but cheap and simple to build electret microphone
- Pickup Slant Test – testing how bridge pickup angle affects the sound
- Power Supply – pedal power supply with regulated 9VDC and 12VDC outputs
- Power Supply MK2 – simple variable voltage regulated power supply with sag control
- The Ultimate Power Supply – heavy duty isolated power supply for all my effects
- Tips & Tricks – collection of random stuff that I wish I knew earlier
- Tremolo Spring Noise – finding and solving the issue with noisy tremolo springs
- Value Statistics – charts with the most common component values for effect pedals
- Zog-zog – lightbulb attenuator with line out tap and dummy load
- Software
- Digital Modeling – series of articles on software digital modeling
- 1. Hardware – choosing and configuring hardware for modeling
- 2. Common Use-Cases – ways to integrate guitar, pedals, amps with an interface
- 3. Reaper – DAW – how to pick good a DAW software and make use of it
- 4. VST Amp Models – some of the good amp models that I came across
- 5. VST Effects – some very cool effect pedal models
- 6. Cab Impulses – what are IRs are where to find them
- 7. IR Loaders – some of my favorite convolution plugins compared
- 8. My Presets – a couple of my favorite presets
- DIY Layout Creator – DIY Layout Creator software and layout collection
- Digital Modeling – series of articles on software digital modeling
- Reviews
- Effects
- Boss BE-5 – ancient but very useful multi-effect pedal
- Boss DD-20 Giga Delay – twin pedal digital delay with some advanced features
- CMAT Mods Deeelay – “boutique” digital delay pedal based around PT2399
- Crybaby 95Q Wah – switchless wah pedal with built in booster and Q control
- Dean Markley Overlord – vintage tube powered overdrive/distortion pedal
- Dunlop DC Brick – glorified daisy chain inside a bullet-proof enclosure
- MXR 6 vs 10 Band EQ – affordable and yet great quality graphic EQ pedals
- Palmer PDI-09 Junction – versatile speaker simulator and DI-box
- TC Nova Repeater – stripped down yet potent version of TC Nova Delay
- Tech 21 Fly Rig 5 – super compact multi-effect pedal
- Guitars
- Cort AS-E4 Acoustic – top of the line dreadnought from a budget brand name
- Ibanez RG 2550 EGK – shredding guitar with Edge Pro tremolo and DiMarzio pickups
- Taylor GS Mini – travel-sized acoustic with great tone and feel
- Music
- The Winery Dogs – amazing old-school rock trio
- Parts
- Bourns Guitar Pots – premium sealed guitar pots with polymer element
- DiMarzio Pickups – reviews of various DiMarzio pickups I’ve owned
- Hipshot Headless System – high quality streamlined headless system
- Hipshot Tuners – high quality and great looking aftermarket tuners
- JJB Prestige 330 – soundboard mounted piezo acoustic pickup
- Tom Brantley Pickups – custom humbucker set inspired by EVH
- Tremol-no – tremolo blocking device
- Picks
- Chicken Picks – uniquely shaped picks made from very durable termoplastic
- Dragon’s Heart Picks – unusual 3-tip picks made from high quality materials
- Gravity Picks – boutique hand-made acrylic picks
- Graphtech Tusq Picks – guitar picks made out of synthetic ivory
- Jazz III Pick Family – Jazz III Regular vs Ultex vs 2.0mm Ultex vs Petrucci
- Jazz Pick Roundup – explore all jazz picks I’ve came across
- Pick Compare Tool – compare Jazz picks head to head
- TuskBuffer Picks – custom hand made mammoth ivory picks
- V-Picks – boutique hand-made acrylic picks
- Winspear Picks – British-made boutique Jazz picks
- Studio
- Beyerdynamic DT 770 Pro – 32ohm closed-back monitoring headphones
- Boss Micro BR – portable digital recorder and processor
- Focusrite Scarlett Solo (1st Gen) – bare-bone USB interface for home recording
- Panasonic RP-HTX7 – great sounding budget headphones with cool looks
- Tascam DP-008 – small but potent digial portable studio
- NI Komplete 6 – USB interface w/ 4 analog ins/outs, digital in/out, MIDI
- Sony MDR-7506 – famous studio monitor headphones
- Effects
- Clips – search through my DIY related video clips
- About – About me, my rig and my taste for guitar tone
- Links – DIY related sites that I like to hang around
