Making a Pedalboard

October 24th, 2024
contra, footdrums, jammer, music, tech
A few weeks ago I posted about how I was thinking about a pedalboard. I've now made one!

Before:

After:

It folds up slightly and fits in a standard rolly suitcase:

Not pictured: I later added padding on all six sides.

Here's the pedalboard by itself:

You can see the bundle of wires to the left that go to the keyboard and bass whistle box, and the wires to the right that go to the electronic drumkit's brain.

I really like how much faster I can set this up and strike. I now need less than five minutes instead of maybe half an hour.

What I wasn't expecting before I started this project, though, is how nice it is when playing. My feet can easily reach the buttons, without even stopping playing kick with my left heel. This is way better than when the pedals sprawled all over the floor and didn't stay put.

I started by cutting a piece of 3/4" plywood to the largest size I could fit in the suitcase I usually travel with. Then I played around with pedal layouts:

I realized I could fit the talkbox in the middle, and expand my effective space with a folding panel:

I put down velcro:

And cut away unused parts to save weight:

Here it is all together:

Comment via: facebook, lesswrong, r/pedalboards, mastodon

Recent posts on blogs I like:

Where I Donated In 2024

All Grants Fund, Rethink, EA Funds Animal Welfare Fund

via Thing of Things January 17, 2025

2024-25 New Year review

This is an annual post reviewing the last year and setting intentions for next year. I look over different life areas (work, health, parenting, effectiveness, travel, etc) and analyze my life tracking data. Overall this was a pretty good year. Highlights …

via Victoria Krakovna January 15, 2025

The ugly sides of two approaches to charity

What's neglected by "magnificent" philanthropy, and by Singerian global poverty focus The post The ugly sides of two approaches to charity appeared first on Otherwise.

via Otherwise January 13, 2025

more     (via openring)