Pimpin' The Fender Starcaster Flanger

A forum devoted to mod, tips and suggestions for upgrading and rehousing your VERY CHEAP commercial stompbox to near boutique excellence.
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Pedalman85
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Post by Pedalman85 »

Okay we all should have seen one of these by now. The little cheap pedals for $40 at Hastings and Best Buy, Fender Starcaster. i for some reason bought the ugly orange flanger. but when i plugged it up it sounded amazing to me, but i wanted more sounds. After letting it collect some dust (i'm not a big fan of flange) i decided to crack it open and see what makes it tick. it seems to be an almost complete copy of the boss BF-2, so most mods should work after you find the right parts on the board. I've added the vibrato mod as well as the quisi-ring mod from the instructions on this page.

http://archive.ampage.org/articles/5/fx ... _mods.html

i'll post more info and pics very soon.

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Pedalman85
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Post by Pedalman85 »

Okay here is another link/cross post to some more BF-2 mods:
viewtopic.php?f=11&t=307

As i have said i have performed the vibrato and the Rate speed mods then mounted them on two DPDT switches. so C27 and C28 on the boss are numbered C17 and C18 on the Starcaster the non polarized 6.5 uf
and the R28 is R55 for the dry signal lift, doesn't really matter since we don't have a schematic of the starcaster but the BF-2 we do:
http://www.hobby-hour.com/electronics/s ... langer.php

sorry for the blurry pics:
Here is the component side to start with:
component side FSF.png
component side FSF.png (536.79 KiB) Viewed 1993 times


The Copper side:
copper side FSF.png
copper side FSF.png (293.88 KiB) Viewed 1993 times
and The switches: Right the rate speed selector and the other vibrato:
them switches FSF.png
Btw ya gotta love the ugly, orange, goofy looking, sturdy enclosure.
FSF.png
FSF.png (482.3 KiB) Viewed 1993 times
I got room for more switches so I will post more when i mod more.

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Post by Tonetweaker »

Pedalman85 wrote:Btw ya gotta love the ugly, orange, goofy looking, sturdy enclosure.
:lol:

I just bought one of the ugly, goofy looking, sickly yellow Starcaster Chorus pedals from Best Buy ($15 shipped!)... My understanding is that it's a CE-5 internally, and sound-wise, I'd certainly have to agree.

Now I've gotta look to see if I can find one of these ugly orange buggers cheap. :wink:


Cheers...
Steve
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Post by Dirk_Hendrik »

oh my! This is ugliness beyond any experience I've ever had. Even makes a Vzex look good in comparison! :shock:
Sorry. Plain out of planes.

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Post by Tonetweaker »

Dirk_Hendrik wrote:oh my! This is ugliness beyond any experience I've ever had. Even makes a Vzex look good in comparison! :shock:
Yes... but Zvex are ugly AND expensive. At least these things are cheap... :lol:


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Post by Dirk_Hendrik »

:mrgreen:
Sorry. Plain out of planes.

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Post by greenskull »

Thanks for posting!! Any chance of uploading sound samples of your results with the mods? I'd really love to score one of those Flangers cheap ($20ish) to fool around with.
I just pulled the trigger on buying the chorus pedal online. Already built up a CE-2 and Small Clone to compare it to when it arrives.

Ugly? Man, I think it's a kinda cool retro seventies look actually and at least they're not plastic with flimsy pots/switches. Well, maybe that "yellow" color looks ugly in the pics, ha!
fuck smooth tone, fuck eric johnson - Seiche

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Post by Tonetweaker »

greenskull wrote:Thanks for posting!! Any chance of uploading sound samples of your results with the mods? I'd really love to score one of those Flangers cheap ($20ish) to fool around with.
Keep an eye out at SniperCentral (aka ~ eBay)... Earlier this evening, I picked up the Flanger and the Distortion brand-new for $25 each.

I'm addicted to cheap-ass pedals...

...and expensive ones too... :oops:

:lol:
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Post by greenskull »

Tonetweaker wrote:
greenskull wrote:Thanks for posting!! Any chance of uploading sound samples of your results with the mods? I'd really love to score one of those Flangers cheap ($20ish) to fool around with.
Keep an eye out at SniperCentral (aka ~ eBay)... Earlier this evening, I picked up the Flanger and the Distortion brand-new for $25 each.

I'm addicted to cheap-ass pedals...

...and expensive ones too... :oops:

:lol:
Thanks, Steve! I've already built up the ADA Flanger and Electric Mistress but it would be cool to mod up an already built pedal for cheap. Hats off to Pedalman85 for sharing his experience.
fuck smooth tone, fuck eric johnson - Seiche

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Post by Greenmachine »

How come I can't find the cheap flanger on Best Buy? I've checked USA and Canada.
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Post by greenskull »

Greenmachine wrote:How come I can't find the cheap flanger on Best Buy? I've checked USA and Canada.
Best Buy only has the Chorus pedal, I believe. I wish that Flanger was available there for $7.99!!!
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Post by Tonetweaker »

greenskull wrote:Thanks, Steve! I've already built up the ADA Flanger and Electric Mistress but it would be cool to mod up an already built pedal for cheap. Hats off to Pedalman85 for sharing his experience.
Absolutely. Mike mentioned that the distortion is actually a slight variation of the Boss MT-2, so all three have decent sound to start with... and I would imagine that all of them would be pretty mod-friendly, especially considering the size of the metal footlocker they come in. :lol:
greenskull wrote:
Greenmachine wrote:How come I can't find the cheap flanger on Best Buy? I've checked USA and Canada.
Best Buy only has the Chorus pedal, I believe. I wish that Flanger was available there for $7.99!!!
That would have been great! Hell, at that price, I'd buy just about any pedal. Even bad pedals have their uses sometimes, and the Starcaster chorus is actually very good. Pretty good quality for the price of a CD.

Even if it wasn't, though, lo-fi can be fun when you just feel like making some noise. I'm exceptionally good at noise. Just ask my wife. :P

I've got a few old noisemakers like that I pull out every once in awhile. One of my first pedals was a crappy old Rocktek Flanger I got at a yard sale for a $1 about 20 years ago. Noisy as hell, but it could be tortured into surrendering a way-over-the-top Nirvana vibe, a la "Come As You Are." It would have made Cobain himself cringe... :mrgreen:

And when I plugged my old Boss HM-2 into it, it would make him roll over in his grave. :lol:


PS ~ Sorry about the hijack. :oops:
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