Caroline - Wave Cannon

mrdobolina · Post by **mrdobolina** » 20 Nov 2010, 05:11

GMD has something called the Wave cannon on the board.

I like the look of it. Very retro 50's style graphics. My total non-expert look at it, feels like a Fuzz factory style arrangement. 4 knobs with much oscillation. Check it out and report back....I"m curious.

Dobo

fakeplasticmeat · Post by **fakeplasticmeat** » 14 Dec 2010, 20:02

This pedal looks pretty awesome. The designer (or 'designer') stated that its an op-amp fuzz.

Indoor Storm (http://www.indoorstorm.com/Caroline_Gui ... -6145.html) has a demo up and it sounds great (if you're into that kind of thing). Perhaps its based on the op-amp muff? In many ways, its tamer, but it also has that crazy self-oscillation thing going on. The knobs are 'shape', gain, tone, and volume. He's calling unity tone around 2:00.

The first sample of the pedal is pretty laid back in terms of gain compared to an op-amp BMP (though to be honest, I don't think I've ever set mine that low). I might have to play around and see if I can approximate the WC with a lower gain setting.

EDIT: He has a picture of the PCB on his site. (carolineguitar.com)

Philippe_CGC · Post by **Philippe_CGC** » 28 Dec 2010, 19:45

Hey, thanks for digging our pedal and your interest!

We're a new company here in Columbia, just trying to start what I'd call a "small-batch distortery". I actually don't mind being called the 'designer' as what I'm doing could charitably be called standing on the shoulders of giants. We just took my favorite old op-amp distorters and fuzzes I used to use as a touring player and figured out what we liked, what we wished they did better and how we wanted get there. Among my faves: a '78 op-amp BMP, a funky '82 big box Rat with 4 clipping diodes (?!?), a grey DOD 250, an old Ibanez SD-9, a Japanese DS-1, a 91' Sansamp Original, and a bunch of other stuff. In the end, we figured that this is like a chili recipe – you decide on a general direction and flavor to taste – and what we've released as the Wave Cannon comes from our personal tastes getting refined by a lot of players and their suggestions.

As far as the "havoc mode switch" goes, it's pretty simple - I accidentally created a parallel feedback loop, kept it, and offered it as an inexpensive upgrade/mod for people who would be into that kind of thing. When we first showed it to people, nobody seemed that interested, but then when we released the pedal, everyone on the pre-order list kept asking for it. Now we sell the "Customs" with the havoc mode far more often than the standard pedal.

I'm not going to ever pretend that we re-invented the wheel here. I'm mainly proud that we made the pedal that I always wanted for myself, realized it could be better, let go of our preconceived notions and unlearned a lot of pseudo-technical marketing hype, and made it sound pretty darned good. Each is handmade and hand-soldered by me or two other people here, and our goal is just to keep learning, making better and better stuff, and come through for our customers who've paid us hard earned money for our work. Feel free to ask me any questions, and have a great year!

fakeplasticmeat · Post by **fakeplasticmeat** » 05 Jan 2011, 14:54

Thanks for sharing. It is a great looking and sounding pedal. I do love those old op-amp muffs; mine is a '78. Ordered it from ebay when I was about 17, had no idea about any of the differences between models, I just wanted an old big muff like my idol, Billy Corgan. Those things are awesome.

culturejam · Post by **culturejam** » 11 Jul 2011, 04:23

Listened to the Burgerman demo of this just now:

Sounds pretty awesome to me.

polarbearfx · Post by **polarbearfx** » 11 Jul 2011, 15:21

I must admit this is one of the only newer pedals in years that I have any interest in. I do not desire the feedback loop, but the overall tone is quite nice I dig it. I could formulate my own chili I guess but these guys seem cool and the pedal does look pretty hip I would not mind giving one a spin.

coldcraft · Post by **coldcraft** » 11 Jul 2011, 16:48

Philippe is a stand up guy. We recently became pen pals.

roseblood11 · Post by **roseblood11** » 16 Jan 2013, 22:41

I'd really like to see a schematic of this one!

V1nce69 · Post by **V1nce69** » 22 Oct 2022, 18:31

Sorry to resurrect an old threat, but I got one Wave Cannon MKI and decided to trace it as it hadn't been done until now.

I unsoldered all resistors and measured them to be sure of their values. Diode has also been unsoldered to be checked.

IC is unknown, but the schematic is very similar to that of a RAT. So an LM308 can be a good guess.

What differs from a RAT:
- it has the RUETZ modification applied in a special way as it blends R5/C6 and R6/C7, values also differ from a RAT
- added 2k2 resistor before gain pot
- tone pot is B50K
- low pass filter values are 1K/10nF, instead of 1K5/3.3nF
- two leds arranged in symmetrical hard clipping
- HAVOC switch feeds back the output to input through a 100K resistor

I also drawn a pcbs in KiCad to be sure my schematic matched the original pcb. The only difference is that I found a way to add the HAVOC switch on the pcb.

: front view

: pots' values

: pcbs component's side

: pcbs top cleaned

: pcbs top details

: pcbs bottom cleaned

: pcbs bottom detail

: Wave Cannon MKI - pcb tracing

: Wave Cannon MKI schematic

: pcb KiCad render, with HAVOC switch on pcb

jimilee · Post by **jimilee** » 22 Oct 2022, 19:18

PedalPCB has a board for MkI and MKII

https://www.pedalpcb.com/product/pcb475/

Jarno · Post by **Jarno** » 24 Oct 2022, 09:17

Still though, nice work! Nice and small PCB, might help in fitting this in alternative enclosures.

Nocentelli · Post by **Nocentelli** » 24 Oct 2022, 13:58

jimilee wrote: ↑22 Oct 2022, 19:18 PedalPCB has a board for MkI and MKII

https://www.pedalpcb.com/product/pcb475/

but no schematic up for either

storyboardist · Post by **storyboardist** » 25 Oct 2022, 22:07

My guess is the IC is a TL071 or something similar. There's no compensator cap like there'd need to be with a 308.

ppluis0 · Post by **ppluis0** » 26 Oct 2022, 12:18

storyboardist wrote: ↑25 Oct 2022, 22:07 My guess is the IC is a TL071 or something similar. There's no compensator cap like there'd need to be with a 308.

Hi there,

This schematic is similar (correct me if I'm wrong...) to a RAT pedal.

The disctintive sound of that classic model is mainly due the poor slew rate of a LM308 that was an op amp intended to use in precision or industrial equipment.
The ability to amplify audio signals of this op amp isn't mentioned in their datasheet and their slew rate numbers does not appear published either.
As the LM308 was discontinued from some years ago, current replacement IC with similar speeds can be employed to reproduce the behaviour in the RAT clones:
OP07 (0.17 V/usec); OP05 (0.3V/usec) and OP77 (also with 0.3V/usec). This three models can work with or without compensation capacitors.
Comparatively, the TL07xx family manage audio signals easily as accept waveforms that changing up to 20V/usec.

Cheers,
Jose

bugg · Post by **bugg** » 04 Nov 2022, 01:07

Although a completely different circuit otherwise, the MKII adds an additional series 1K resistor between the input and the node where the feedback is introduced.

This helps to prevent pedals in front from swamping out the feedback effect.

I'll get that schematic up for yall shortly.

Caroline - Wave Cannon [traced]