Klone Army

stickyfiddle

Re Fuzz Faces: I got great results from the pedalparts kit, albeit using matche trannies from Small Bear (via Nocaster iirc). That and some tweaking of a bias pot let me get it sounding excellent, but took a while longer than your average Joyo factory build takes I guess.

Sporky

But the transistor matching and biasing can be automated if'n you've got the money to invest.

randomhandclaps

Sporky said:

But the transistor matching and biasing can be automated if'n you've got the money to invest.

I honestly believe all most companies see is the possible large-scale waste 'out of the desired range' components.  The lower price and predictability of op-amps and modern transistors makes them far more appealing for mass production.  Although putting it rather simplistically 1000 JRC4558s could make you 1000 Tubescreamer clones, whereas more 1000 expensive and harder to source in large number vintage transistors may only yield 100-200 fuzz faces.

Sporky

All good points.

ThePrettyDamned

Sporky, you're right - fuzz face was a terrible example.

The point stands that some pedals are horrendously overpriced. The klon was one, and I don't really like it much. The timmy wasn't nice either, but I did try a les lius which I loved, despite being a metal guitarist mostly (it made everything sound awesome).

But it's just a rip off, and that saddens me. It's a great pedal, but expensive and not original - as far as I know, it's just modded slightly?

frankus

Was the original Klon overpriced? I seem to recall the overpricing came from people reselling them.

the KSR comes with a comment on the enclosure "Kindly remember the ridiculous hype that offends so many is not of my making"

ICBM

frankus said:

the KSR comes with a comment on the enclosure "Kindly remember the ridiculous hype that offends so many is not of my making"

If you've ever wondered what something disappearing up its own arse sounds like, it's now available in a pedal.

frankus

I have regularly been accused of "disappearing up my own arse" so much so that I instinctively dislike the people who use it.

It's dismissive without addressing why something has been judged lacking - a common trick among the manipulative and their confederacy of dunces.

Not necessarily meaning to say you are either, merely that you risk being mistaken for such a person by using their tools.

Sporky

ThePrettyDamned said:

The point stands that some pedals are horrendously overpriced. The klon was one

I'm not sure about the Klon being overpriced - expensive, certainly, but it did have a custom made enclosure which (from having looked into it a few times) wouldn't have been at all cheap.

Again, the prevalence of people selling pedals they've made in their spare time while a day job pays for their food and shelter has massively distorted the market. If I was trying to make a living selling Valvesporkers I reckon I could make four a day. To pay the mortgage, other bills and food I'd then have to sell those for about £200 a pop...

ICBM

frankus said:

I have regularly been accused of "disappearing up my own arse" so much so that I instinctively dislike the people who use it.

It's dismissive without addressing why something has been judged lacking - a common trick among the manipulative and their confederacy of dunces.

Not necessarily meaning to say you are either, merely that you risk being mistaken for such a person by using their tools.

I used it mean something so inherently and pretentiously self-referential that it proves that what it purports to say was bullshit in the first place.

Isn't that roughly what it usually means?

randomhandclaps

Sporky said:

 If I was trying to make a living selling Valvesporkers I reckon I could make four a day. To pay the mortgage, other bills and food I'd then have to sell those for about £200 a pop...

And I'm sure in that you are solely incorporating production cost, let alone setting about promotion and PR to ensure you are managing to sell a steady amount.

I wouldn't say the Klon was majorly overpriced but I do feel it set a marker for new boutique price-points to follow.  If you include the extravagant enclosure which many say cost around £100 to produce, part for part the Klon is actually cheaper than some of it's contemporaries.

I look at the Sunface sometimes and think that maybe it's over-priced then think the if Analogman wasn't charging those prices then he probably wouldn't be able to survive making them.

 

ICBM

Sporky said:

I'm not sure about the Klon being overpriced - expensive, certainly, but it did have a custom made enclosure which (from having looked into it a few times) wouldn't have been at all cheap.

Again, the prevalence of people selling pedals they've made in their spare time while a day job pays for their food and shelter has massively distorted the market. If I was trying to make a living selling Valvesporkers I reckon I could make four a day. To pay the mortgage, other bills and food I'd then have to sell those for about £200 a pop...

There's easily £200 of work in a pedal like that, if you're building them by hand.

I don't think the Klon was that expensive originally for what it was either.

ThePrettyDamned said:

The point stands that some pedals are horrendously overpriced. The klon was one

You can't compare something like that to a mass-produced pedal which is designed to be machine-stuffed on a single circuit board and then dropped into a casing in one go with the hand work limited to tightening the jack nuts and putting the bottom plate on.

If anything the ones that really amaze me are Boss pedals, because they're almost unfeasibly cheap - the amount of hand work putting one together is substantially more than the single-PCB types, and yet they sell for only a little higher prices, and far less than most boutique pedals.

frankus

ICBM said:

I used it mean something so inherently and pretentiously self-referential that it proves that what it purports to say was bullshit in the first place.

Isn't that roughly what it usually means?

Yep, that's generally what people have intended it to mean when levelling the accusation at me.

There's usually no small level of self-satisfaction at being able to deploy such a pithy but convincingly working class sounding epithet as a rebuff against oh you know something or something they're not prepared to engage with.

So I imagine that smug grin... feel the same urge to bury my size 12 boot up their arse, "see disappearing up there is a painful process have a bit of empathy next time".

conditioned response, much like the use of such phrases ... anyway thre ya go KSRs some do some don't.

Dave_Mc

randomhandclaps said:

I wouldn't say the Klon was majorly overpriced but I do feel it set a marker for new boutique price-points to follow.

+1

Also you could possibly make the case that it was overpriced compared to what it cost in dollars in the USA to buy... I can't remember exactly but I seem to remember it cost more or less the same in pounds (~£300 IIRC) as it did in dollars, at least at the time I was aware of them. IIRC that was also around about the time that a pound bought you two dollars...

randomhandclaps

True.  A lot of US gear seems to be marked the same in dollars as pounds.

Dave_Mc

Yeah.

Now I mean obviously there are several reasons for it (some perfectly legitimate, I'm well aware of that), but it's still annoying )

randomhandclaps

I just remember being a kid and buying Guitar Player magazine then doing the virtual 2:1 conversion of the day and thinking - I could probably afford that.

Dave_Mc

I did the same with guitar world and guitar one )

Catthan

ICBM;34101" said:

If you've ever wondered what something disappearing up its own arse sounds like, it's now available in a pedal.

I think that's just a brilliant thing to say next time I want to tease a cork sniffer in MLP or TGP..
Thanks for a great laugh!!!
Brgrds,

Dave_Mc

^ Be careful on TGP, that kind of talk will get you an infraction right quick )