Wah Inductors

It seems a little unusual to have an article on just one part that goes into a wah-wah pedal. In fact, there are circuit designs for wah-wah pedals that don't use an inductor. The reason so many wah-wah pedals have an inductor is because of the design and success of the first wah-wah pedal manufacturer: Thomas Organ Company. Thomas Organ employed the inventor of the Wah-wah, when he invented it: Brad Plunkett.

History

Brad took his design for the wah-wah pedal from a tone control that was part of another piece of equipment. It's believed this unmentioned piece was a keyboard amp. The wah-wah pedal, like most great inventions, came about completely as the result of an accident. In 1966, the owner of Thomas Organ, Joe Benaron, wanted to lower the cost of the Vox Super Beatle amp(and probably others).

On certain Vox amplifiers, including the Super Beatle, was a switch called the "MRB". This "MRB" switch stood for "Mid Range Boost". As you can imagine, it boosted the midrange frequencies. However, the cost of this switch was about $4.00 in 1966-1967.

Plunkett's task was to make the amps more profitable for Thomas Organ by lowering the cost on the amps. By redesigning the amp circuit to use a $0.20 potentiometer instead of a $4.00 switch (presuming the buying public would accept such a change), the amp would become more profitable...

One morning, in the span of about 4 hours, Plunkett had built a new variation of the previously-mentioned tone control into a sweepable tone control. After some experimentation in the office with this new control, it took on a life of its own. An unused treadle housing for a foot-swept volume control organ pedal was repurposed, and the first ever wah-wah pedal was born. Needless to say, this innovation captured the imagination of the people at Thomas Organ / Vox and it was released as a standalone product.

Impact

Most musical electronics professionals who've looked into the wah-wah pedal agree that the inductor, in and of itself, is not the most important piece of circuitry. It's clear from outside experimentation that adjusting other, more mundane pieces of the circuit can also have a large effect on a wah wah pedal's tone. However, since the inductor continues to capture the imagination of people around the music world as the "silver bullet" in a wah-wah pedal, we've decided to offer the "wah inductor" its own page.

Inductors

Dunlop

• Red Fasel Toroidal Core
• Yellow Fasel Cup Core
• Dunlop Halo
• Dunlop EVH
• Dunlop "Standard" Black

Joe Gagan

• Joe Gagan's Tone Tank
• Joe Gagan's 60s purple tone tank
• Joe Gagan's red tone tank

Arteffect.co

• Arteffect Halo
• Arteffect stack-of-dimes
• Arteffect stack-of-halos

MammothElectronics.com

• Mammoth Electronics ME-6

Dandyjob.com

• Dandyjob.com "Whipple" Halo

Fulltone.com

• Fulltone Silver Can Inductor

stuff to organize

• TDK 5103 "cube"
• Castledine Halo
• ArielFX Halo
• Chasetone.com "Stack of Dimes"

Stuff to note and update

1. Dunlop "Standard" black cylinder - not seen a price, comes installed in base model dunlop wahwahs, can be gotten on eBay
2. Dunlop "Yellow" cup-core - Price varies, seen low of $12.00 on tubesandmore.com, high of $20.00 from Dunlop
3. Dunlop "Red" toroidal core - Price varies, seen low of $12.00 on tubesandmore.com, high of $20.00 from Dunlop
4. Dunlop EVH "black signature" inductor - Price varies, seen low of $19.00 on Dunlop, high of $35.00 from eBay
5. Whipple Halo Inductor - $27.00 dandyjob.com / eBay
6. Arteffect.co Stack-of-Dimes inductor - $29.00, must await shipping from Israel
7. Arteffect.co Halo Inductor - $31.00, must await shipping from Israel
8. Arteffect.co Stack-of-halos - $25.00, must await shipping from Israel
9. Joe Gagan's "Original El-Rad Tone Tank" - $22.77 on eBay. Joe Gagan has FB page, but no business website
10. Joe Gagan's "Red Tone Tank" - $22.95 on eBay. Joe Gagan has FB page, but no business website
11. Joe Gagan's "Purple 60s Vox Tone Tank" - $27.77 on eBay. Joe Gagan has FB page, but no business website
12. TDK - 5103 inductor - Doesn't seem like it's available anymore except to be cannibalized from old electronic equipment - doesn't have a good reputation for musicality, but per Joe Gagan, the TDK 5103 came in two flavors - low impedance and high impedance with the low impedance inductor reported by Joe as sounding fantastic.
13. Mammoth Electronics "ME-6" Inductor - $8.00 / Mammoth Electronics
14. Fulltone "Silver Can" inductor - $49.00 / Fulltone.com
15. Chasetone.com stack-of-dimes $17.99 / eBay

Sites that Offer Wah Stuff

• arteffect.co: home-spun inductors. Also sells pots.
• JimDunlop.com: Saved the Crybaby Wah-Wah from oblivion.
• eBay.com: Search for "Joe Gagan", "Chasetone", "Dandyjob", or "Whipple" for more specialized stuff.
• area51tubeaudiodesigns.com: No idea why the site is "Tube Audio" when it's all wah-wah. Sells switches, pots, custom wah wahs
• realmccoycustom.com: Geoffrey Teese "RMC" boutique wah wah. Other models as well.
• chasetone.com: Wahs and other pedals, but no inductors. Chasetone has only sold self-wound inductors on eBay (we have one).
• www.wah-wah.co.uk: Castledine Electronics. We think we'd like a "Wizard" pedal by Castledine too...
• chicagoiron.com: Sells clones of the no-longer-available Parachute Wah Wah by TycoBrahe. Tony Iommi loves them.

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Additional Sources

• Crybaby Doc: The Pedal That Rocks the World - Dead Link
• Copy of the "Crybaby Doc", same above (dead) YouTube video
• Crybaby Doc - Part 1
• Crybaby Doc - Part 2
• Crybaby Doc - Part 3
• Crybaby Doc - Part 4
• Del Casher and the Story of the Wah Wah
• Vintage Guitar.com
• LA Weekly Wah Wah born in Hollywood