This is a library of perfboard and single-sided PCB effect layouts for guitar and bass. I'm not an electrical engineer by any stretch of the imagination, just a DIY'er who likes drawing layouts. It is meant for the hobbyist (so commercial use of any of these layout is not allowed without permission) and as a way to give back to the online DIY community.

Monday, August 28, 2017

Friedman BE-OD

By popular demand, here's the BE-OD from Friedman, one of the best Plexi in a box pedals around. Well, not Plexi really. It's designed to emulate the Friedman Brown Eye tube amp head. Laid this one out for board mounted pots, and it will fit easily in a 1590BB. More info can be found on the FSB thread for this one.


90 comments:

  1. Hi, first i want to say that i love your layouts, they are great.

    any chance you could do this layout with a tl074?

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    1. Probably not. Not single layer and with board mounted pots anyway. There's a vero layout that uses the TL074 tho.

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  2. How's the off board wiring work with the status LED powered from the board?

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  3. This man, he is not fried, he's on fire

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  4. Wow! I was waiting for this pedal for a long time. Only one question. It's imposible to make a little tiny to fit in a 152B? However I appreciate your work. Thanks!

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    1. It'll require at least 2-layered board with a ton of vias.

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  5. Hello, the trimmer is trim-gain in the original pedal??

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  6. As soon as I get my bigger perf boards im on this one.... should be any day now. Great work on the layout man!!! Looks like it was a tough one.

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  7. I build the stripboard version over the weekend and is working fine, the only thing is i feel does not have enough headroom, i have to put the VOL over the 3/4 position to have the same vol than my bypass tone. I read on the FSB thread that has to be with the 4 clipping diodes, i used 4148 instead of the BAVs, so i will check if there is a way to increase current over it. Anyway this has nothing to do with the layout so i you can marked as verified.

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  8. I finished mine over the weekend but the volume was very low, after checking everything I discovered two bridges, "I'm getting worried, I start losing qualities"
    The circuit works perfect, all pots respond well, as it had no anti-log potentiometers, applied linear, the leds also did not have 3mm, and soldered leds of 5mm, all without problems.
    The pedal produces some self oscillation, which can be attenuated reducing the gain through the internal trimmer, the last comments of the FSB thread, doubts if the mica capacitor will be 120pf or 1,2nF, because increasing the value reduces the noise and self oscillation, I have not tested yet but I will try as soon as I have a free time "tomorrow." I am waiting for the BAV99, but everyone who has already tested these diodes say they do not notice the difference between 1N4148, maybe I will not even bother to change them.

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    1. Hi! have the same problem. Excellent sound but only half the volume of my clean sound. Can you specify where you found the bridges? thanks!

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    2. Next to the logo and the name of the circuit, there is a thin line of earth between two tracks, it had a soldering point slightly touching, the other bridge was coarser, two points even joined, because I usually exajer in the amount of solder. I always print the inverted and enlarged circuit on a sheet of plain paper just to check, and it's a big help.
      Because of this situation, which caused me to lose a lot of time, because I could not find the problem, I proceeded to do the following if I did not have time to edit the circuit and erase all those lines of land that could give problems, after "decalcar" the layout on the copper plate, with an x-act and carefully, under a lamp with magnifying glass, scratch it.

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    3. Thank you! I had a bridge exact on the same position as you. But did not find anything else wrong until now. The pedal is still not as loud as the bypassed signal. I have to continue my search.
      It is hard to search for the error because always i take the guitar to check i spend half an hour in noodeling around :-) such a great Sound!

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    4. Does anyone figured out the volume drop problem?

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    5. I have make this layout two times (TT)but always fail
      Huhuhu iam tired but i will no give up for make this layout work

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  9. Can I replace the C10K and C100K with linear or log potentiometers? Wich values?

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    1. You can try linear tapers for those

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    2. I used the linear for the presence, it's okay! Unwritten rule is - LIN pots instead of REV LOG will do, not as "smooth" travel, but still usable... And having the lin pot for presence here I wonder if the rev log is actually mandatory, can't find anything wrong with the lin pot's sweep, guess some circuits are more picky than the others...

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    3. Of course, same value as rev log, just linear taper.

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  10. I applied sockets in the diodes, and in the capacitor of 120pf, the diodes tried several and some combinations, the differences in the sound are not many, nor are they better, so I continue with the 4148, the condenser makes a lot of difference, I started by changing it by one of 560pf, and soon notice an attenuation of the background hiss, I increased to one of 1nf, and the pedal almost became silent, I played guitar alternating the values and I did not notice any cut of frequencies or change in the sound, unless removal of noise; I wanted to test with a 1.2nf, but since I only had 1.8nf, that's what I applied,and the noise disappeared, I think it's going to stay that way.
    There are still some problems to solve, the self oscillation is a bit exaggerated, the FSB thread reporter commented that applying an input buffer solved the problem, I got the Cornish Buffer, it improved a bit but not enough.
    (My texts are translated in google, because my English is very bad)

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  11. One question! should there be DC voltage 4,5v at the two LEDs on the right side? One of them is always on and i can not find the source. i am almost freaking out!

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  12. i just finished building this one today and found a major error in the layout causing very low output and all of the clipping LEDS not working correctly. it's the two LEDs (D7 & D8 that connect to pin 3 of the treble pot. their other side the are NOT supposed to connect to ground. they go to +VB (the orange trace). after fixing that, it works perfect and it sounds great.

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  13. Anybody Tried this using 4148 ? Is that working properly ?

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  14. Is there a "Layout wishlist"? I would also like to make and compare this pedal with the Diezel VH4. Schem can be found here:
    http://www.freestompboxes.org/download/file.php?id=28802&mode=view

    Thanks!!!

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  15. Hi, I just built this one yesterday - it works fine except that I get a lot of AM station frequencies and it's as loud as the guitar signal. How do I get rid of that annoying AM niose?

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  16. is there a orientation for d1 2 and d7 8 which way does the cathode and anode face ?

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    1. With LEDs, the flat side indicates the cathode. So here, the cathode of D1 and D7 are on the right, and the cathode of D2 and D8 are on the left.

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  17. Built this last night. Sounds great, no issues! Thanks for sharing your work and making these amazing layouts available to everyone!

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  18. Hi, May I know where to get the transfer image, please? Thank you!

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  19. Try to break the ground loop on the pcb to reduce noise...

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  20. build it today. got some serious oscilation problem. changed the pf caps to higher values , oscilation did decreased but not stopped. because my own stupidity I have managed to change the power source to a more reliable one (strymon blue sky wall supply). And the oscilation stopped... I will change the original pF values back now. The layout is working as it should and I thank to author for sacrificing his time to make this available. Everything is working as it should without any problems and I tried the circuit at 18V.. The sound was better louder and tighter.

    Ps: for high gain circuits always use a reliable and silent, quality power supply. I had learned the hard way :)

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  21. Although I had trouble, I read the 10 Ohm as a 10K my fault, I have to say this was a fantastic circuit. I changed values on a few things because I know the tone I like and the red LED's carry a higher frequency so I went down to d1 and d2 green and yellow so I got a little lower frequency on the 2nd stage gain. Then went with the switching diodes you had suggested since I didn't have any of the BAV99 and then I went red and yellow on the presence/hard clipping/treble and then finally I went with bass and volume control of the two 220n caps down to 120n (those were done because it was all I had really.).

    After everything it was still a great sounding circuit. I know it isn't exact to the actual pedal but I built it with the idea if for some ungodly reason I needed more crunch I could simply let my amps gain channel do that. I have noticed no AM frequency and no adverse effects. I did not get any oscillation and all is well and for my build to be a modified BE-OD it is what I was looking for.

    Thanks for your hard work and the ease of use of your site to get the transfers. Oh and the power diode I used was a 1n4001 since a lot of pedals out there use those on the power supply part of the circuit and it works just fine so I can confirm that the 1N4001 works in this circuit.

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  22. So D1, 2, 7, & 8 are basic red LEDs? And these are being used for audio purposes and not optically, is that right?

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    1. Correct. They’re just being used a clipping diodes.

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  23. One more question, I ended up ordering 5mm super bright red LEDs, will these work? or would you recommend that I get 3mm regulars? And is there a difference between the 2 types for this kind of effect?

    Thanks again,

    John

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  24. I just built this today but it has a serious volume drop. Can anybody enlighten me on this matter? TIA

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  26. I built this circuit exactly as laid out above and it works, definitely an overdriven distortion. There aren problems, no volume drops, but it is a noisy circuit as most distortions are. The only complaint I have is that the distortion is simply too much, even after tweaking the internal trim pot to reduce it when the gain is on 9 O'Clock it is already the equivalent of many other distortions at 3-4 O'Clock! I compared mine with an actual BE-OD at Guitar Center and although close, the original does sound better. The latter has a more compressed cleaner sort of echo-like metallic character that I kind of like. May try to alter some components to see if I can tame thus monster haha.

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  27. I had about 50 times and this scheme is put instead of 120 PF capacitor VISU FKP 470 PF, altered an original size. In this PCB, the implementation of the output is not very successful, you need to cut off the track near the volume pot and signal it with a shielded wire.
    https://vk.com/albums370361647?z=photo370361647_456239385%2Fphotos370361647
    https://vk.com/albums370361647?z=photo370361647_456239386%2Fphotos370361647

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    1. Hi can you list your changes of the components?

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  28. You can still use a less noisy chip in the first gain stage. But shielded connection of the output gives an even better effect. Here's a shot of the result just on the phone https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iPQYBGmdrQ

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  29. Buenas noches! primero que nada quiero felicitarte por el trabajo que haces. Sos un genio!!. Segundo, quisiera saber que articulo es el que aparece en la parte superior media que indica 100k.

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    1. Es un Trimmer o preset. Es un potenciometro chiquito para ajustes internos

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  30. what kind of led should i use? 3mm or 5mm reds?

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  31. Can i use 4558 instead of tl072?

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    1. you cant get enough gain with it. NE 5532 should working if you have

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  33. IS there a way I can see an actual digital circuit/schematic of this layout?

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  34. buenas contrui el circuito al pie de la letra y no tengo respuesta de audio y los led no encienden, alquien sabe que puede pasar?

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    1. 1° Revisa la alimentación, sobretodo en la linea roja y naranja.
      2° conecta y huele tu circuito a ver si no hay nada quemado.
      3° revisa las pistas y ve que no haya continuidad en las zonas donde no debe de haber sobretodo con la conexión a tierra.
      Ahora estuve haciendo el Baja Reactor y no funcionó, revisé y había un pequeño puente q conectaba una pista y tenía 9V donde no debía de haber.

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  37. Exelente pedal, lo acabo de construir pero hay un pitido muy molesto. revisé conexiones, pistas, valores de componentes, rehice la placa, probé con otras fuentes y hasta le hice un gabinete para aislar en circuito pero el pitido se mantiene. Probé como dicen en post más arriba con cambiar el condensador de 120pF hasta llegar a 10nF, se soluciona pero altera bastante el tono. Alguna idea?

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  38. Puede ser usado como un preámp? Bajando la ganancia?

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  39. I built the pedal and it works fine for me.

    But there are two things that I don't understand.

    Thight control behaves like a tone control in reverse, correct ??

    and diodes d1 and d2 do not light up at any time (I don't know if they have to or not) d7 and d8 yes, they light according to the input signal.

    Thank you.

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  40. It was a very good distortion pedal but it also very noisy...is there any solution than shielding the ouput?

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  41. Hi
    Which pot substitute for c100k and c10k?
    I put b100k and b10k, but it only works at the end
    Is there another potentiometer that can work? Thank you

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  42. I built this pedal but as I play the 6 and 5 strings on the guitar the sound decreases a lot creaks and the sound goes off. Did someone happen to you?

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    1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  43. Funciona muy bajo la salida de volumen, que puede ser?

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  44. good afternoon, I put together my friedman obde and it sounds bad ... it has a crunchy sound like something is burning ... when I give it volume or gain it sounds even worse ... a lot of noise and the 6 and 5 string of the guitar sound saturated ... letting a note or chord play while the sound decreases cuts it off at the end. The board was designed by pcb mania, and the solders are excellent and all components are new. excuse my English

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    1. Have you tried to adjust the internal trimmer? It's there to trim the gain of the last opamp stage. There is no preferred setting for it, just adjust it until you're happy with the sound.

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  45. Its verified! Sounds great and power ! Tnx n regards fr Philippines.Jun

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  46. Very good pedal, build it in a 1950B case it's a tight fit but if you cut the sides of the PCB and remove some metal in the botom plate it works...

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  47. hi sir, i have built this pedal, and it works fine, one question whether all four LEDs should light up when there is a signal? mine only LED 7&8 is lit, while LED 1&2 is not lit.
    thank you

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  48. Hi again, I have a question about the pots.. I ordered a load online and what i believed to be the correct ones what i was sent seems to be confusing me... Right..here goes..

    I got 2x C100k pots but they are labelled 100k 'Reverse' log pots.. these the same thing or is it going to work backwards or something.. I also ordered 1 x C10k also has 'Reverse' on the label..
    this and the 50k Linear is B50k Not a A50.. Not reverse tho this one just B50k linear..

    Are these ok to use..??
    or am i gonna end up unsoldering these puppies and wrecking my super uber neat job ive done on it.. ive been researching the issue but im getting such mixed information and its really confusing me. so rather then spend another day wondering and breaking my build i thought id just ask...

    Great site btw.. I've been coming back for a few years now and glad to see you still going.. Ive learnt a damn lot from this place!

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    1. The "reverse" just is in reference to the taper. Same thing as saying C-taper. It's the reverse taper of an A or log taper pot. They should be fine.

      You can definitely get away with a B50k for the volume pot. B is linear taper, so it will act a little differently than the A/log but will still work.

      Here's a good write up on tapers of potentiometers that's worth reading:

      https://www.thomannmusic.com/onlineexpert_page_potentiometers_tapers_and_sense_of_rotation.html

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  49. Abolute legend!!! Thanks for the instant reply bro.. I can get on and build this today then. THats really made me happy thanks dude.

    I will check that out.. I read everything i come across im a bit of nerd but im learning still haha.. Honestly, thanks again man!

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  50. Verified! Works.. It does have a lot of floor no0ise, the hiss is crazy when up full but use that trim pot to turn that down.. it still pretty noisy But as i owned an original one of these before i can 100% confirm that is normal!! this sounds and feels just like it BE-OD.. The B50 Pot works fine and I also Used TL072's fore the 3 x IC's.

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