Bixonic and The Rat

[BetterOffShred]

Man I kind of want to build one of each of these, but the expandora seems crazy noisy. It also has two lm308's in it .. but I'll just drop OP07's.

[Jero]

Good one.
Rat+Vox AC30 symbioses produced another one of my fav 90s return-of-the-riff jams/tones
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ttzjq29EgwU[/youtube]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ttzjq29EgwU

IIRC, this song was recorded with one of those super mini Marshalls with the volume cranked. I got similar tones with a Fender one that ran on batteries. But the rest of the album was supposed to be Rat.

I have one of those little Marshalls, a Fender Mini Twin, and the Vox. The Fender has got to be the highest gain thing they ever made

[dubkitty]

it appears that the bad switch on my Expandora is easily fixable...it's free of the circuit board to which it's connected by wires. pictures later if need be.

[BetterOffShred]

Sweet man. I'll fix it for you if you need. I can PM references.

Let me know

[cutonio]

Thom Yorke was playing Bodysnatchers with his MXR Distortion+, then with the Bixonic, and now with the Crowther Hotcake.

I'm pretty close with the DOD Carcosa.

[Christophe]

Thom Yorke was playing Bodysnatchers with his MXR Distortion+, then with the Bixonic, and now with the Crowther Hotcake.

Ah ah! What goes around comes around: I do have a Hotcake!
Problem solved/no need to look for an Expandora.

[D.o.S.]

It's one of those riffs that when played correctly sounds 'right' regardless of the pedal

[BetterOffShred]

Dubs expandora showed up .. the problem is intermittent so I've gotten to use the device as it should operate .. damn It sounds great. Definitely on my clone list now. Yeah wow.

[BetterOffShred]

Dub has the 2000R, which has a toggle for the selectable input cap I believe. It sounds pretty huge on bass mode. Unfortunately it uses a compact DPDT stomp and a milenium bypass (not surprising for the era when they were made) so I have to order a compact stomp.

The later expandora apparently use TL072s and LM324 etc.. the 2000R sounds amazing. I'm impressed.. now to get it fixed up for Dub.

[Jero]

Nice! Gotta keep these old things running.
I'll open my red knob version up later and confirm the guts if anyone's interested

[taco satori]

It sounds pretty huge on bass mode.

The later expandora apparently use TL072s and LM324 etc.. the 2000R sounds amazing.

Yeah! I had the chance to play a reissue. They’re a bit smaller than I thought, def smaller than the Expandora II in videos. I kept it on “bass” mode even for guitar because, indeed, it sounds huge. And that’s cool about the opamps used - it sounds great and doesn’t seem super fizzy in the decay.

I have a clone that uses metal can LM308’s in a FuzzDog PCB, but the bass switch is pretty subtle. I honestly miss the bass freqs more than I like the idea of mojo components, ha.

Forbidden mode on the reissue is interesting. It doesn’t get into oscillating dolphins territory like some vids seem to show but is just super saturated and gated, which is cool, too. The clones I’ve played in Forbidden mode seem to kinda crap out and sag considerably after getting slammed with a few loud chords and the Gain around 11 o’clock to noon. Not necessarily a bad thing, just something I have to keep in mind.

[BetterOffShred]

Nice! Gotta keep these old things running.
I'll open my red knob version up later and confirm the guts if anyone's interested

Yes plz.

Yeah the 2000R definitely does whistling dolphins with everything up and forbidden mode. It's neat.

[digi2t]

Here are the schematics.

2000 (v.2)


2001 (v.4, with the VU LED's)


I prefer the final version myself, though the second version can be modified to use a pot instead of the switches. I find it handier for setting the gain to in between settings.

[BetterOffShred]

Thanks man I had found these on your stash from the DiYSB gallery.

I'm hoping the DPDT is the culprit. It's intermittent, the input jack was loose and rotated where it was touching the board, but I haven't been able to get it to act up since. The stomp should be in Thursday.

[Christophe]

As a -temporary- epilogue to this post: I just bought the Bixonic 2000R that had been on Reverb for a while.... I've just spent a few moments with it, and...
God it sounds fantastic!!!
A really mean, dirty, rattling-riffing dirt pedal.
Really worth trying guys, instant classic for me...
(I'll come back here when the honeymoon's over, promise)