llllllllllllllllllll wrote: Fri Jan 16, 2026 9:42 am

Dr Tony Balls wrote: Fri Jan 16, 2026 9:18 am Its possible that you just never turned your actual Freedom amp up enough to get it to distort because the volume level was more than you wanted. I'm also playing into a whole other amp/speakers that's gonna color the signal in some way.

Haha. Yeah, I can tell you 100% I don’t plug into solid state practice amps when conditions allow me to turn up in the house. I’m going to have to give it a go now

Do you have one of the wooden Freedom amps with the wall-wart or the older 1x12 that takes all the D-cell batteries?

Nate Dort wrote: Fri Jan 16, 2026 1:06 pm

llllllllllllllllllll wrote: Fri Jan 16, 2026 9:42 am

Dr Tony Balls wrote: Fri Jan 16, 2026 9:18 am Its possible that you just never turned your actual Freedom amp up enough to get it to distort because the volume level was more than you wanted. I'm also playing into a whole other amp/speakers that's gonna color the signal in some way.

Haha. Yeah, I can tell you 100% I don’t plug into solid state practice amps when conditions allow me to turn up in the house. I’m going to have to give it a go now

Do you have one of the wooden Freedom amps with the wall-wart or the older 1x12 that takes all the D-cell batteries?

Ahh true it could be the wood one. Also FYI not all of the original circuit ones were battery powered. The one I have here right now is AC mains powered.

Here’s mine, don’t really know what version it is.

Ok I plugged it in, that thing distorts when you turn it up. With a EGC Standard with humbuckers it sounded like proto-metal. The speaker in mine probably sucks but I think that’s part of the charm a lot of the time.

That's the OG one that Dr. Balls pedal is based on.

The newer wood one looks like this. I think the only commonality they share is the name.

Nate Dort wrote: Fri Jan 16, 2026 2:40 pm That's the OG one that Dr. Balls pedal is based on.

The newer wood one looks like this. I think the only commonality they share is the name.

Good to know. I have to admit, every time somebody would bump this thread asking about the Freedom preamp I would wonder why the fuck anybody would want that stupid amp vs literally anything else he could build. Now I get it, but to get the Freedom amp to where it sounds good is at least as loud as a 15 watt tube amp, so a pedal would be way better.

To that point, I had all the knobs at 10 and it sounded pretty crazy, but I had to keep a variac on 110 so that I wasn’t getting this weird modulating sound. It would be a great sound to use for a lead guitar sound on a whole record though.

I couldn’t really get a Hot Snakes sound out of it but I was either using a Strat with heavy strings and too weak pickups or an EGC with heavy strings and too hot pickups.

Nate Dort wrote: Fri Jan 16, 2026 2:40 pm That's the OG one that Dr. Balls pedal is based on.

The newer wood one looks like this. I think the only commonality they share is the name.

WO(O)ULD

Yeah, I'd be in!

MAMMAL. Fuzz King / Supa Tonebender kinda thing with a clean blend so it'll rock even better with bass. Kind of a meld between two units I did for charity runs, the PRF Sustainer an the Zaytone.

This one is mine. It's Full of Freedom!