Updated Finish

In an attempt to make the Butter Booster more butter-like, I've been working on a pigment mixture that achieves a more consistent shade. Previously I'd done this by cooking it in a toaster oven until it turns golden brown, like a batch of chocolate chip cookies. This was a bit imprecise. I found a nice yellow water-based pigment that works well with water-based polycrylic, resulting in the following:

About This Pedal:

The Butter Booster is my version of the classic Dallas Rangemaster. It features a custom hand brushed finish, durable hand-wired Switchcraft jacks, and a PCB layout for the audio and power circuits to minimize noise. This design accepts a standard polarity (center negative) DC 9V power adapter, and includes an internal voltage regulator that ensures consistent tone and bias regardless of the input voltage (9-14VDC nominal). All switching has been carefully designed to be pop-free, and this pedal is true bypass.

There are three tone presets - Traditional, Modern, and Baritone, plus the Ge and Si modes making for six different tonal combinations:

• Traditional (aka "Treble") is the same 2.6kHz corner frequency of the original Rangemaster

• Modern (aka "Midrange") drops this an octave to about 1.3kHz. I find it gives it a bit more grit, mellows out the brightness, and works well with newer amplifier designs that may already be shaping the overdrive tone with bright caps or high shelves.

• Baritone (aka "Bass") is around 700Hz, coincidentally the same as the Tube Screamer. It has some of the TS character, but clips asymmetrically and has its own distinct flair. Useful for overdriven bass, drop tuning or baritone instruments.

Full disclosure: there is a single silicon transistor at the heart of this pedal! In my testing I found that selecting the right transistor with non-linear gain characteristics matters much more than whether it is Ge, Si, NPN, or PNP. With the proper components any silicon transistor can be made to sound virtually identical to germanium, although the opposite is not necessarily true.

The benefits of silicon are numerous - well-defined gain, low leakage, low noise, low dependence of gain on temperature, and good consistency across batches. The mystique of germanium is undeniable, that's just not what this pedal is about. The Butter Booster is designed to deliver optimal performance and consistent tone in a compact package.