Close
Mobile phone
  • +49 7666 61 99 68 0

Zvex Machine (Hand Painted)

Distortion Pedal
  • Zvex Machine (Hand Painted)
  • Zvex Machine (Hand Painted)
  • Zvex Machine (Hand Painted)
  • Zvex Machine (Hand Painted)
EUR 369.00
Incl. VAT, free shipping in Germany
This pedal's primary purpose is to cut through.

In control, Limit control, Out control, 9V battery required, current draw approx. 3mA.

Description

Pedal users are very sophisticated. Take the old conventions: of in on the right, out on the left, battery connected when input plug is in place, use this pedal before that one for a certain sound, reverse for another, positive ground, negative ground, pedal switching systems... we're living in a 'been there, done that' pedal world. Most every guitarist is familiar with the limitations of putting one fuzz or distortion into another... losing the detail but perhaps gaining that fun "shutdown" effect as one overloads the other, and the "where's my fuzz?" experience of playing a fuzz into a really dirty amp. Limitations. They increase your creativity but hob-gobble your plan.

I designed this new distortion generator, Machine, with some different limitations. Like try playing chords through it. But put it in front of any string of fuzz pedals, and try to make it disappear. Machine is actually a dual frequency-tripler circuit that uses crossover distortion for the first time in any pedal, ever. It generates the distortion of the wave in the sloped part of the cycle, instead of the peaks and valleys like all other distorters and fuzzes. In other words, it distorts when your guitar string is in the middle of vibrating, while it's swinging, not as it's turning around. That's the same place where your speaker cone is sort of coasting, between all the way in and all the way out. Where nothing is happening, this pedal happens. With Machine you can leave your favorite distorting pedals on and still add a new element of energetic grind.

One thing to keep in mind, however, is that this pedal basically sounds horrible. It's primary purpose is to cut through. But like a wild man with a machete, it is not nice.

You'll notice the dynamic response is higher than most pedals. If you put a tremolo pedal set smooth in front of it you'll hear it sweep through it's wild frequency multiplying stages, or if the trem is set for square wave it will jump back and forth between crunchy harmonics. Conversely, you can get ringing harmonic effects using a dynamically freezing pedal in front of it like a compressor.

Knobs are In, which is drive; Limit, which clips the original waveform off at about the same size as the harmonics (if you want); and Out or Volume, which is output level. If the Limit knob is set to the right, the signal remains unclipped.

Keep in mind that this pedal needs to see a sloped wave in order to do it's thing, so an undistorted guitar signal going into it will allow it to generate the strongest harmonics.

Like my other pedals, this one is hand assembled, hand painted, with each box a little different from the others. Machine draws about 3 mA, giving it long battery life.

Attributes

Key attributes
Effect Types Distortion , Fuzz
Battery Operated No
True Bypass Yes
Distortion Pedal attributes
PSU Included No
Mini Form Yes
Input Configuration Mono
Output Configuration Mono
Voltage 9V
Analog/Digital Analog
Product Details
Product Number 139795
Brand Zvex
Series Hand Painted Pedals
Category Distortion Pedal
Brand Category Zvex - Distortion
Relevancy rank 556 of 583
Date March 2010
Dimension
Box Depth 324mm
Box Height 44mm
Gross Weight 0.4kg

Properties

- Effect Type: Overdrive
- Design: analogue
- Special Features: Hand painted
- Mono/Stereo: Mono In, Mono Out
- Controls: In, Limit, Out
- Bypass Mode: True Bypass
- Power supply: 9 VDC, center negative
- Current consumption: 3mA
- Battery operation: Battery operation possible
- Battery type: 9 V block
- Case Format: Standard
- Dimensions (WxHxD): 110 x 32 x 60 mm
- Boutique effect: yes
- Production country: USA
- hand-painted, each pedal is unique

Series Info

Your hand-painted Z.Vex pedal has a lifetime warranty!

Documents (1)

Brand

Z. Vex Effects is a boutique effects pedal company based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Their name derives from the name of founder Zachary Vex. The company's most famous product is the Fuzz Factory. All of their pedals (except the budget-line Vexter series) are hand painted at their factory in Minnesota. All Vexter subassemblies are made in Taiwan, but the final assembly is completed in the United States. Their products tend to be high end and hand made, thus are rather expensive. Z. Vex effects pedals are known for the extreme amount of control that they give to the user.
Report incorrect data about this product
Quantity:-+
Why MusiX?
  • Free delivery from 200 EUR (Germany)
  • 3 Year Warranty
  • 25,000 products in stock
  • Daily deliveries
Your Settings
Discount base: 1. Previous MusiX price, 2. Recommended list price