Thread: Stomp Box

G'day Bradlee, welcome to the forum

I am going to move your query over to the Musical Instruments Section as you'll get some more knowledgeable people on the subject over there.

i'd suggest a hardwood as you are going to be beating it with yur foot -
locally available vic ash is as good as any exotic as far as resonance

i would say that somewhere around the 8mm thickness would be about right for solidity and resonance

what are you using for the electronics??
i have seen good stompers with nothing more than a cheap transducer siliconed onto the bottom - you can put a volume and even a tone control in there if you want

I would think any "tone wood" would be fine. Blackwood, Jarrah, Vic ash etc. Have a look around at the places that build them for ideas. I have often wondered whether a round box would produce better sounds than a a square one, never built one, so I don't know. The pickup selection and placement would be pretty important too, IMHO.

Probably made more questions than answers, but anyway...

welcome to the world of instrument building...

thanks for your response guys - can't wait to start experimenting.

i'm still hunting down places that recycle / sell old hardwood scraps and offcuts. i think i've found a few good ones, but still have to go and visit a lot of them. also i've been told that houses for demolition are a decent source for small offcuts as well but i'm yet to try this avenue.

as for the circuitry, i've got a few mates helping me out with the placement of the mike. for this particular project i'm using a pretty good PZM mike, so after we've found the sweet spot i'll just make a housing around it on the inside bottom so it doesn't move but can be instantly taken out.

i've thought about making a round one too (quite a few different shapes actually), but for the purpose of this 'maiden voyage' i'll just stick with a square box. somewhere round 300x300x50. i stomp quite heavily when i play guitar after years of drumming in different bands, so the top will need to be a HELL of a lot sturdier than the last one i borrowed off a mate. whoops.

thanks again for your input guys - hope to hear more

Dont forget to check out these
http://www.ellisguitars.com/stompbox_shops.html

you know, i reckon ANY wood would probably do. Tonewood Schmonewood. You want a "schtomp" sound and it'll be more in the pickup and mounting and what shoes you're wearing ... than the wood.

you can use a piezo buzzer element ($5 at tandy) as a supercheap pickup.

How much HiFi in the stomp do you want? A PZM sounds rather overkill for this app!

wot i reckon, anyway.

Go! the plywood and MDF!!
Could stick a transducer in a brick and it'd probably sound OK.
Well said Contrebasse!

We luthiers can get a bit carried away with our timber choices...

Actually MDF would probably have a nice flat slap...

i've definately taken your thoughts into account contrebasse & mongrel. thanks for your input i guess i want a certain aesthetic to it as well as being simple. also noted that the PZM is overkill... it's just that i already have it in my possession, so i just figured i'd use it here. cheap pickups will do fine though i think...

in short, i'm treading the fine line between practicality and timber sex appeal

take a cruise round the factrys in bayswater
you'll pick up enough wood for 1000 stompies in a couple hours
if you get to know where the cabinet makers / furniture makers are you'll find plenty machined offcuts in the dumpies

you sound like a bin-diver from way back, ray...

Hi Bradlee, check out this site to get an idea of stompboxes.
http://www.ellisguitars.com.au
Cheers Bob,

g,day im a guitarist as well and was thinking of doing the same and i found the plans you will need at:
http://www.tomdukich.com/stomp%20box.html

hope this helps

Chris

Originally Posted by mongrel

you sound like a bin-diver from way back, ray...

when i was a kid my old man went to the local tip not the local hardware before he built anything- i guess i learnt young to to reuse stuff -

i have raided dumpies and hard rubbsh piles for years and landed some truly remarkable stuff

Originally Posted by old_picker

when i was a kid my old man went to the local tip not the local hardware before he built anything- i guess i learnt young to to reuse stuff -

i have raided dumpies and hard rubbsh piles for years and landed some truly remarkable stuff

My brother ran a trailer skip service for 20 years, you can imagine the crap he accumulated over two decades. Amazing stuff! Probably lucky he doesn't live anywhere near me, or I would have a shed full of crap too (moreso than I do now)
I read a story once where the "wood guy" from maton was tooling around melbourne one time and came across a church that was being demolished. He, very helpfully, said he would haul away the roofing beams for them for nothing. He then tooled off again with several substantial lengths of brazillian rosewood, 150 years old.

You never, ever, know whats under a rock unless you turn it over...