I rarely use a pedalboard. The only effects I use are reverb and delay. Sometimes I use a Boss RE-20, which has both. For strictly Surf, I’m as likely as not to use my Topanga, occasionally my RI tsnk. The main thing is that I don’t use more than one effect at a time and usually whatever pedal I’m using simply sits on top of my amp.

I do have a pedalboard with a Boss Super Chorus, a Boss Phase Shifter, a Boss Super Overdrive and a Boss DD-5 digital delay. These are low cost, reliable pedals I keep around just in case, but they’re are rarely ever used.

On recordings I record clean, directly to the recording interface and use zero effects. If I need some effect, I insert it in the recording interface. I usually don’t use an amp model either.

The artist formerly known as: Synchro

When Surf Guitar is outlawed only outlaws will play Surf Guitar.

stratdancer wrote:

Samurai wrote:

I see all the surf guitar players use delay or echo)

I'm finding more places to use my Belle Epoch these days. The way I have it set up is to give certain parts of songs like a chorus a boost and little more "sonic occupation". The El Cap is currently only used for one song in our set at this point but makes use of the infinite hold switch which is such a cool function. It will be on the next record to a much greater extent now that I am more comfortable manipulating all that it can do.

I like using Carbong Copy for some additional space under reverb. Experementing with pretty long decays

Waikiki Makaki surf-rock band from Ukraine

https://linktr.ee/waikikimakaki

Lost Diver

https://lostdiver.bandcamp.com
https://soundcloud.com/vitaly-yakushin

Since my last post to this thread, I have assembled a new pedalboard which contains a relatively narrow range of pedals, but works well for Surf and the other early ‘60s music I perform.

From R to L:

• An EarthQuaker Devices Dispatch Master, hall reverb/delay.
• A Stanley Blue Nebula, which has presets for all of the Hank Marvin classics, plus an exceptional plate reverb and a number of other effects (including delays and tremolo), which can be edited and saved as presets. It’s quite versatile and having editable presets allows set lists to be preprogrammed into the device.
• A Catalinbread Topanga spring reverb pedal. Drips like all getout.
• A Boss Tremolo, which has a variable waveform.
  (I am considering consolidating these last two pedals by replacing them with a Strymon Flint.)
• A Kartakou latching footswitch which controls the tremolo built into my Winfield Tremor.

SilverFlash wrote:

I just built my first pedalboard. My goal was to setup a simple surf oriented pedalboard, with the pedals that I had on hand, that I could use with my battery powered Boss Katana mini and that would be just as portable. My solution came in the discovery of a $10 USD USB cable that can step up the 5 volts of a phone charger powerbank to 9 volts. I had a powerbank on hand so I only needed to buy the pedalboard and USB to 9v converter cable.

Today I put it together and tested the results, and I have to say that I'm very happy. I was able to run the board continually for 5 hours, at which point I still had more than 25% power remaining. My powerbank is only rated at 8000mAh. There are many rated between 10,000 and 20,000 mAh in the $20-$30 range. In the event that I were to run out of power, the USB step up cable can be run directly from a standard wall phone charger.

Here's the flip side of the board where the powerbank is mounted.

A close up of the 5v to 9v usb converter.

The Oceans 11 Reverb is the star of the show. What a great sounding spring reverb drip. (My allegiance is still to my Surfy Bear, but the Oceans 11 is a great pedal for surf in a small, portable unit, plus it has other cool reverb effects. The plate is wonderful.) I plan to replace the DOD Gunslinger with a Soul Food, EP Booster, or another pedal that can provide a clean boost, but maybe with the option for a little grit. I used a Truetone 1 spot daisy chain cable to wire the 5 pedals, I'm sure that 5 is about the sweet spot for the number of effects that that the USB converter can handle. Time will tell regarding the durability of the converter. I bought the cheap Amazon version for this prototype, but I plan to get the gold standard Birdcord brand: https://www.songbirdfx.com/products/birdcord/

All in all, it is a neat little portable effects package.

Nicely packaged.

The artist formerly known as: Synchro

When Surf Guitar is outlawed only outlaws will play Surf Guitar.

Sold my pedalboard with most of the pedals. Now pretty happy with this.

Waikiki Makaki surf-rock band from Ukraine

https://linktr.ee/waikikimakaki

Lost Diver

https://lostdiver.bandcamp.com
https://soundcloud.com/vitaly-yakushin

Last edited: Feb 18, 2019 08:45:05

SilverFlash wrote:

synchro wrote:

Nicely packaged.

Thank you, Synchro. Your board is several orders of magnitude beyond mine. I like the way you have kept it focused using minimal pedals. Any board that has a Stanley-FX Blue Nebula and a Topanga is off to a great start right out of the gate.

Speaking of minimal, Samurai, it looks like you have nailed it with just three pedals. I've watched your posts as you have gone through quite a number of super nice pedals to come down to your final (for now) setup. I suspect any pedal that made the final cut is exceptional. That said, I know exactly what the Surfy Bear and the EP Booster provide, but how do you use the Sonic Blue Twanger? Do you alternate using it with the EP as a booster, or is it always on? Should I consider getting one instead of a Soul Food or EP Booster for my board? And if it came down to having to choose just one pedal to pair with your Surfy Bear, which would it be? Thanks in advance for any answers to my barrage of questions.

I looked up the description:

The Sonic Blue Twanger is another in the line of 'Amp in a Box' designs by Bjorn Juhl, meant to model the sounds of that other company's 'blackface' era. It can be used as a preamp, booster and distortion pedal and will give your rhythm guitars an edge, and your lead guitars that limiting distortion effect of those 'blackface' amps run flat out. So whether you use backline for your live shows or just want that classic 'blackface' tone available; regardless of which amp you use, the Sonic Blue Twanger is the only fx pedal on the market to satisfy your need. As with many of the BJF designed pedals from One Control, the Sonic Blue Twanger is compact with 4 simple controls. The Treble control is really a tone balance (like on the original amplifiers) which increases and decreases a 'shelved' EQ setting. Volume and Master controls work as pre and post volumes allowing you to vary the amount of clean headroom and distortion in the signal. Finally, on the side of the pedal is a Rhythm/Lead switch. In Rhythm mode, the pedal provides about 18dB of gain (-80dB noise level), and in Lead, about 40dB of gain (-74 dB noise level). Whether you are using the Sonic Blue Twanger as a preamp with any of the other BJF overdrive or distortion pedals, or as a stand-alone effect to achieve a more American sound, the Sonic Blue Twanger will take you back to the 'blackface' days at almost any volume!

Nice question, man! I’ve really came through a row of pedalboards and loved them all))
This set up is great but highly depends on an amp. I mostly play the amps that are offered by clubs and festivals and it may be anything from Fender Twin Reverb to Mesa Boogie Rectifier! I am too lazy to take my amp with me (and currently do not have any besides my bedroom Yamaha THR), so I’ve bought a pair of EHX pedals: Soul food and Oceans 11 that I enjoy a lot and that give some nice surfy sound mostly with any amp.
The Surfy Bear with two boosters is currently the best sound I’ve ever had, counting that you use some amp with good clean sound, no matter if it’s tweed, blackface, silverface, some vox, peavey or whatever.
I used EP booster as “always on”, but after getting Sonic Blue twanger I’ve experimented for some month and it turned out that now Sonic Blue is the “always on” pedal that forms the sound and EP is an additional boost for solos and heavy parts. I was surprised, but it gives much more than EP booster, generally sounding the same in coloring your sound. Sonic Blue Twanger in some way is the EP booster “on steroids” and with some additional controls that give it more flexibility. Highly recommended! I would leave it if I need to use only one pedal with Surfy Bear.

Waikiki Makaki surf-rock band from Ukraine

https://linktr.ee/waikikimakaki

Lost Diver

https://lostdiver.bandcamp.com
https://soundcloud.com/vitaly-yakushin

Last edited: Feb 18, 2019 12:57:08

SilverFlash wrote:

Samurai wrote:

The Surfy Bear with two boosters is currently the best sound I’ve ever had, counting that you use some amp with good clean sound, no matter if it’s tweed, blackface, silverface, some vox, peavey or whatever.
I used EP booster as “always on”, but after getting Sonic Blue twanger I’ve experimented for some month and it turned out that now Sonic Blue is the “always on” pedal that forms the sound and EP is an additional boost for solos and heavy parts. I was surprised, but it gives much more than EP booster, generally sounding the same in coloring your sound. Sonic Blue Twanger in some way is the EP booster “on steroids” and with some additional controls that give it more flexibility. Highly recommended! I would leave it if I need to use only one pedal with Surfy Bear.

Great answer! The Sonic Blue Twanger now goes on my short list. My budget may limit me to the Soul Food, so it was good to hear you have some positive words about it, too.

Soul food is a great pedal! I love it for some heavier surf and it pairs great with both Surfy Bear and Oceans 11. But this Sonic Blue twanger plus my Sonic blue strat, mmmm)))

Waikiki Makaki surf-rock band from Ukraine

https://linktr.ee/waikikimakaki

Lost Diver

https://lostdiver.bandcamp.com
https://soundcloud.com/vitaly-yakushin

Last edited: Feb 18, 2019 13:24:56

This is my current setup. I just reworked the whole thing to make the SurfyBear Metal & Fulltone Tube Tape Echo major parts of my setup. After a year of using digital emulations, I figured I would try the real thing. Between my pedalboard and amp onboard effects, I now have 2 types of spring reverb (6G15-type from the SurfyBear + subtler shimmery reverb from my amp) and 3 types of tremolo (tube-bias, standard & harmonic). I don't play strictly surf, but surf influence looms large in my sound. The Deluxe Memory Man for modulated delays & self-oscillation tricks (which differ from the TTE), and the Nemesis for Oil Can delays and other specialty delays.

Last edited: Feb 19, 2019 14:29:09