Shotgun SMD

About The Pedal Creators

Everyone can build excellent boutique guitar pedals. Everything we do is to make that experience more accessible and user-friendlier. The Pedal Creators series are the best and easiest to build PCBs ever. Including most resistors and capacitors already soldered on board as SMD components, leaving the key values for you to experiment and craft your own tone. Now you can build a pedal you are proud of in less than an hour without any previous experience. What are you waiting for to become a Pedal Creator?

The Pedal creators – key features:

• Easy to build, no previous experience required. It’s like Lego for musicians.
• Fast assembly, finish a pedal in less than an hour. Play your favorite record and enjoy the ride along.
• 100% mistake-proof. Even my grandma can build one while she cooks.
• Build your own boutique pedal. Experiment with different values and make the pedal you always dreamed of.
• Easy to scale. Turn your passion into a money-making machine.

Project overview

Inspired by JHS Double Barrel, two overdrive circuits from JHS’ range integrated into one board – one transparent, sparkly drive and one mid-heavy, Tube Screamer type drive. Is time to double the fun! Tone stacking for low-to-medium gain settings doesn’t get any better.

Introduction

The Shotgun is two awesome overdrives packed into one clever box that allows you to choose which one goes first and which one is second in the signal chain with a nifty little switch. The two overdrives mentioned are JHS’s most popular drive circuits: the Morning Glory V4 and Moonshine V2.

Let’s have a look at the Glory Drive (Morning Glory V4) side first. This is the transparent side. The side that you’ll turn on when you want to add just a touch of overdrive and nothing more. It comes equipped with 3 potentiometers – LEVEL, TONE, DRIVE – and a HI-CUT switch. LEVEL allows you to control the volume of the overdrive. With TONE you can shape the frequency response of your signal. DRIVE lets you dial in the desired amount of harmonics. The HI-CUT switch is a perfect tool if you’re using bright pickups that make the high end overwhelming.

On the other side of the board we have the Homebrew (MoonshineV2) unit, which provides some serious overdrive that cuts right through the mix. It offers 4 potentiometers – the same trio of DRIVE, TONE and LEVEL, but with an extra BLEND knob, which lets you add some clean tone to the overdriven one in order to maintain some clarity. As if that wasn’t enough, on this side of the Shotgun you’ll find a clipping diode switch to change the character of the drive. To make things even more interesting, we’ve added a charge pump to the circuit to give this overdrive some extra headroom.

Each part of this board is excellent on its own, but the real magic starts to happen when you combine them. Tones that are unique and new will come with ease: Looking for a more colorful crunch tone? Run the Homebrew into the Glory Drive for added gain. Want a gritty solo boost? Toggle the Glory Drive into the Homebrew, then dial in to taste. Since both pedals are grouped inside the same board, there are no cables to swap and no footwork to master, and you will have extra flexibility thanks to the “order switching” toggle.

It’s always tone season in the world of guitars, so don’t waste a minute – build your own Shotgun and hunt that sound you’ve been after all this time. After a hunt you might be in need of some refreshment, so stay tuned for some Sweet Tea – a delicious blend of Homebrew and Angry Carlos that we’re preparing in our kitchen.

Controls

Glory drive section

• Drive
• Level
• Tone
• Mode toggle

Homebrew Section

• Drive
• Level
• Tone
• Blend
• Diode toggle
• Order switch

For further analysis on the circuits take a look at these threads on DIY Stomp Boxes Forum: MorningGlory and JHS Moonshine.

For any technical questions regarding this build don’t forget to check out our Facebook Group and our forum at Free Stomp Boxes.

Shotgun SMD – Building Docs

Shotgun SMD – Drilling template