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Wah Pedal Headroom

Posted: Sat Jun 11, 2016 4:21 pm
by sixpakldp
I have a Dunlop Bonamassa wah which I really like. Unfortunately the one thing I do not like is when I have my amps on a cleaner setting on the edge of breakup or say in the cash of a Plexi when my guitar volume is rolled back, the wah adds gain to the signal. I like my wah tone to be as the as the signal of my clean tone. I read that running the pedal at 18 v instead of 9 may help. Does anyone have any experience with this?

Re: Wah Pedal Headroom

Posted: Sun Jun 12, 2016 4:02 am
by Haze13
Nope. Increase the voltage and you will increase the gain of the transistor. What you possibly had heard is that the headroom will be bigger. It means that this gain stage won't saturate, because there will be enough voltage and an output signal will not clip.
The gain of the Wah is high, that's the reason why your amp saturates.

Re: Wah Pedal Headroom

Posted: Sun Jun 12, 2016 9:50 am
by sixpakldp
Any suggestions on a wah that won't do this?

Re: Wah Pedal Headroom

Posted: Sun Jun 12, 2016 11:47 pm
by Haze13
Vox V847...
You do not need to change a Wah for that thing... Change a Resistor and that's it or a transistor with lower betta (BC547, BC548, BC549 "B" grade for examle)
Wah Pedal is so "personal" pedal, that you need to adjust/replace most of the things for your self, to make it work best for you. There are so few components in this pedal that changing one component can improve/worsen the whole thing.
Joe's Wah is a high quality pedal, if you want it to sound just like you want it, just mod it.

Re: Wah Pedal Headroom

Posted: Mon Jun 13, 2016 4:53 pm
by sixpakldp
Thanks Haze, I'm thinking about doing that. I love the pedal and the way it looks. I was doing a little reading, and it looks like on at least the original Crybaby you need to adjust the value of the resistor next to the transistor.

Need to find out which one to mod in my pedal. Since I built an amp or two, can't imagine this will be difficult.