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I still have my OCD and I'm still not too happy with it. I like that it's dynamic with my picking, but using it as a lower gain drive I feel like it's missing some bass. But when I crank it too much it gets too muddy for my tastes. I don't really need something super off the wall and high gain. I have a civil war big muff clone for that.

I'm looking for something that's easily buildable, dynamic, and has plenty of midrange bite to it without sacrificing too much bass.

I've been thinking about the Bearfoot Honey Bee OD or maybe the Crowther Hotcake, but I need more suggestions to sort through. The honey bee seems like it had more mid bite than the hotcake so that's a plus.

What do you guys think? Oh and if it means anything, I play noise rock/shoegaze stuff with a jazzmaster. peavey vulcan into a 4x12 w/ v30s.

I use a Hotcake clone and like it a lot. Would be good for rock/shoegaze. Never tried the Honey Bee but the demos sound pretty good.

Since you are building yourself then maybe have a go at both of them. Fuzzdogs Pedal Parts in the Uk has kits for both Hotcake and Honey Bee od's. Good prices, fast delivery and well designed kits.

KaosCill8r wrote:Since you are building yourself then maybe have a go at both of them. Fuzzdogs Pedal Parts in the Uk has kits for both Hotcake and Honey Bee od's. Good prices, fast delivery and well designed kits.

Hmmmm I'll have to look into this. I'm in the US though. Will shipping kill me you think?

The postage pricing is really good. I'm in Australia and our dollar is fucked at the moment. I think you will be fine.

Ok I'm guessing the Chilly Biscuit distortion is the Hotcake clone? Bee Juice has to be the Honey Bee.

Build yourself a Zendrive. I've built a few of them and they're great. Super versatile. They're a fairly easy build, as well.

Rat.

ramonovski wrote:Rat.

Seconded. It may not be bewteak, but a Rat will get the job done.

A rat has plenty of mid bite, but you can hardly afgue that it doesn't sacrifse any low end

I've got a hotcake. Love it at low and medium gain settings, but at higher gain settings you'll want a vox-esque amp with lots of treble, or it'll get whooly and dark as fuck.

Don't know anything about the honey bee, except that Lee Ranaldo swears by it

The rat's a little too high gain for what I'm after. Not to mention my bandmate is already using one. Sounds good through his twin though. It's not a very touch-responsive pedal from what I can tell. That's mostly why I'm interested in the honey bee and stuff.

I don't know anything about the Zendrive but is that one of those "transparent" overdrives? I'm totally not into that sort of thing. My amp needs a little bit of flavor added to it.

ancientbones wrote:The rat's a little too high gain for what I'm after. Not to mention my bandmate is already using one. Sounds good through his twin though. It's not a very touch-responsive pedal from what I can tell. That's mostly why I'm interested in the honey bee and stuff.

As a recent convert, I think I cn be excused for the hype of "If you can't get a good rock sound out of a Rat, you can't play rock".

More Seriously, Rat is touch responsive Enough. I pick lightly so I have to get more dynamics by picking harder or by rolling back on my volume. To me its kinda like a distorted amp. It won't get FULL CLEAN from dimed dirt knob, but it isn't like the Metal Zone in having one response to everything.

Also. You can run the dirt on the Rat low. I prefer it in low gain settings half the time (I might need another Rat...)

Bandmate using one can be problematic. But it is a fairly flexible pedal. I wish I had Rat earlier. it took ILF to show me the light. So I evangelize any chance I see that may be appropriate.

ancientbones wrote:The rat's a little too high gain for what I'm after. Not to mention my bandmate is already using one. Sounds good through his twin though. It's not a very touch-responsive pedal from what I can tell. That's mostly why I'm interested in the honey bee and stuff.

I don't know anything about the Zendrive but is that one of those "transparent" overdrives? I'm totally not into that sort of thing. My amp needs a little bit of flavor added to it.

The Zendrive is not generally considered to be transparent. It's based on the Dumble amp sound, which itself is based on the sound of old overdriven Fender amps. Youtube Zendrive.

There isn't any way to DIY a fix on the OCD? I preferred it to the Rat, although I think they're pretty similar in some aspects. What got me is the difference in the clipping section to ground in the Rat, which kind of "brickwalled" the response to me, compared to the OCD which kind of loops it back into the opamp. I didn't really want the Rat for low gain stuff though (I found it very midrangey, which I prefer for guitar). Our bassist has the VFE Rat with the bass/ruetz mod, and that makes it much rounder/thicker sounding, although lower gain which doesn't sound like it would bother you terribly.

I don't know if I really have any suggestions beyond that, I just figured you might want to start with what you already have.

If we're talking rat, I say check out the fuzzrocious rat tail. It's super versatile and just a real fun pedal. I just ordered another after selling my old one a few months ago