Option Knob, huge fucking waste of money.

[Communarchy]

http://www.optionknob.com/

...for those who don't know what I'm talking about.

So I bought two of these, one for my looper level so I could fade my loops in and out while I played and another just to kick around with on my delays or tremolo. Well I put it on my EHX Pulsar Tremolo and gigged out last night and I broke the entire fucking pot shaft off mid set.

The greatest problem with the option knob is that the wings are so long that if you play on MOST enclosures that you can not set your knob value at anywhere from between 10:30 to 2:30 and then STEP ON THE FUCKING SWITCH without potentially bumping, nudging or straight up stepping on the knob wing (my DD20 is not effected because the knobs are far enough away from the switch, but good luck with any MXR, EHX or boutique enclosures). In my case, at a gig, while singing and playing and doing my little pedal tap dance, I can not set my tremolo or EHX delay in the aforementioned range without bumping it as I go to step on the switch. Further, IN THE CASE OF LAST NIGHT, I straight up tore the pot shaft off of the tremolo rate pot while going to turn the pedal off while playing.

The worst part is that Option Knob claims that their product won't damage your pedal WHEN USED PROPERLY.

Q. Will it break my pedal easily?
A. No. The Option Knob is engineered to not cause any additional stress or torque on the pot shaft of your pedal. When used properly there is no harm to your pedal whatsoever.

So, is it PROPER not to be able to set your delay, rate, level, gain, etc. etc., between the range of 10:30 to 2:30 without the KNOB being in the fucking way?

So, in the end of the day, morale of the story. Fuck Option Knob, and if you pedal can fit one, just buy a bigger knob. As for the tremolo, not only does the rate not work, but the whole pedal doesn't work either. Oh well. Looks like my money is going to the Iron Ether Cygnet.

[foomanfat]

Yeah, these things seem super weak. I can't believe people would pay money for something like this.
Someone posted these on TalkBass one time and they were like, "I just bought five of these! Amazing idea!".
And I was like,

[devnulljp]

That looks like some useless PoS from an infomercial starring Mr T or something.

[Communarchy]

I feel really dumb for getting two. I was kind of coaxed into it by my drummer who told me he wished I could control the level of my loops so he could hear it more/less depending on the song. So I though, "hey, maybe this will work." Well it does work on my DD20, but on any normal sized pedal, forget it. Just at the picture in devnull's post, you can clearly see that if you move the wings vertically you will step on them when switching the pedal. I'm dumb.

But fuck them, they broke my fucking pedal.

[Nychthemeron]

Easy solution:

Buy scotch tape and grab a twig from outside and tape it to the knob.

[gururyan]

...not to mention they look absolutely ridiculous.

[KickDisk]

You may want to try KickDisk. Solves the same problem (turning knobs with your feet) but is more flexible so you won't break your pedal - won't hurt your pedal if you step on the disk part when trying to switch your effect on and off. I guess if you really stomped on the knob itself you could do something, but you will break your pedal if you step on the knobs no matter what. Because it is flexible, the only pedals I've tried KickDisk on where the disk interfered with being able to turn on/off the effect is ZVex pedals - but those are designed kind of weird so the switch is basically right up against the knobs (at any rate I always used to turn the knobs on my Fuzz Factory by accident whenever I turned the effect on and off).

Anyway, my point is there are other possibilities out there. And it is so liberating to be able to adjust an effect on the fly.

One other thing - you probably already know this, but you should be able to (or find someone to) replace a broken pot relatively inexpensively. I found a guy on craigslist who fixed many, many broken pots when we were testing out KickDisk prototypes (but none with the final product!).

Sam

[bob the r0bot]

I think you could get the same, if not better, results with duct tape and popsicle sticks

[Sockgazer]

Those look hilarious.

You'd be better off getting that EHX volume knob pedal or something. You'll only have two levels but that might end up being enough.

[devnulljp]

You need a 3rd hand is all

it slices, it dices, and it's better than a shamwow

[theavondon]

You need a 3rd hand is all

it slices, it dices, and it's better than a shamwow

That ACTUALLY fucking rules.