I was lucky enough to get asked again to submit a piece for an annual show here in Brisbane called I Used To Skate Once which I have been part of once before. Last time I made a skateboard guitar which turned out great and played and sounded MUCH better than the sum of it's parts. I didn't want to repeat myself, and I'm not really an "artist" so it had to be something I could make using what's around my workshop ?
I initially thought of building an amp into the board but time restraints meant I wouldn't have time to build an amp and fit it so I went for something a little more ........... achievable along the same lines.
I thought I could make a fully working Big Mud pedal into the board and someone could hang it on the wall of a studio or practice room and still use it if they wanted ? Or it could just be a piece of art that had an interesting story ?
I got my local printer to print the artwork from my Ram Head Big Mud pedal onto vinyl the width of the board. This would give me the layout for the rest of the idea.
I populated the PCB while i thought about layout and hardware options. The knobs would be set according to the artwork and I needed a way to get the in and out jacks looking neat and being functional. The idea of the Tele jack cups came as I was trying to fit Strat style jack plates and realized it didn't have to be that difficult.
The switch was a bit clunky as a stomp switch and I figured it would need to be well secured to the wall if you were going to push it hard to turn it on and off. The power switch from one of my amps would do the trick.
It all fell into place nicely and seemed to work well aesthetically ?
I fitted the PCB into a small enclosure with the battery clip and a small toggle to turn the battery off and wired the pedal pretty much as normal ....... except on a skateboard.
The concave and kicks on the board were deeper than the enclosure so even with the board flat against the wall the electronics don't get bumped. I had to recess the board from the back to get the thread for the switch and pots through the timber. I ended up fitting two LED's to the truck mounting holes already drilled in the board. Everything was wired up and ............. bang. There's that lovely Ram Head tone that I love so much.
The knobs were obvious, as used on my guitar and finished the whole thing off nicely.
The board sold on the night which was nice but I figured if it didn't I'd love to have it hanging in my shop for customers to use ? Maybe I'll need to make another guitar and pedal for the shop ? It'd be kinda cool to have the set ..........