My New Built-From-Scratch Pedal Board
Created 08/20/09
By Paul J. Marossy
After lugging my my original DIY pedal board around for seven years, I have decided that I generally don't need such a big variety of pedals to choose from for "everyday" use. I had considered buying an off-the-shelf pedalboard because I didn't really want to mess with building one, but as usual, none of what is out there is exactly what I want. So I thought that I would build a new pedalboard from scratch with some features I would like to have tailored to my personal tastes. With the help of my good friend, AutoCAD, I designed something that I thought would work well for me.
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Here is the upper and lower halves of the case. It is constructed out of 1/4" plywood glued with wood glue and also stapled with 3/8" staples. The inside corners have cleats to add some strength. It's pretty sturdy as constructed. While at 24"x15"x4", it's not a whole lot smaller than my original pedalboard, but it will be more manageable and less heavy to carry around. |
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The lower half also has a 1/2"x1/2" lip around it. This gives some extra rigidity and something to put screws into for hardware, etc. |
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Along the back of the lower half, I installed a 1"x1" aluminum angle which will hold the mini patchbay and DC jacks. |
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This is the outside of the lower half. All of the edges have a piece of 1/2"x1/2" aluminum angle screwed to the case. I will remove all of them when I find the perfect covering for the case and then reinstall them after the covering has been glued to the case. |
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This is just showing the method I devised to attach the 1"x1" angle to the back of lower half of the case. |
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Here is a size comparison between the old pedalboard and the new one I am building. |
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This is the removable piece that sits in the lower half, which will gently slope upwards via some wedges glued to the underside of it. It's amazing how just a little slope like that makes it easier to use a volume and/or wah pedal. It's another piece of 1/4" plywood with a 1/4"x1/2" alunimum U-shaped edging on all four sides. |
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This is a closer view of the mini patchbay. You can also see the screw that attaches it to the mounting block to the left of the patchbay. |
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This is showing the removable bottom piece now covered with black felt. |
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This is the felt-lined lower half of the case, with the removable piece removed. I put handles on each side of the lower half to make it easy to move around, if needed. |
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Here is looking at it from the other direction. |
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The pedal board is basically done now. Instead of the usual sort of covering that you would see on something like this, I used a kind of cool looking upholstery fabric on it. The metal corners were ordered from www.partsexpress.com |
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Here is my adjustable power supply using an LM317 adjustable voltage regulator. This is mounted on the underside of the patch bay, to the left of the input & output jack. |
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Here is what it looks like all closed up. |
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This is a little closer view of the carrying handle and draw latches. |
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Here is how it looks with some pedals on it. |
The project ended up costing a lot more than I thought it would (about $150 or so counting all of the new patch cords, etc.), but I am very happy with the end result. I just wouldn't have been happy any other way. I have been using this pedal board for about five months now and it it has been working out very well.