The Electra Forums

Gorgeous guitar and with all those modules - excellent find guys!!!!!

I'd love to do modules but as stated before, I don't think it would be cost effective for the limited market. It will take someone that is strictly an enthusiast that has lots of time (and possibly money) to come up with anything.

The original system is really quite innovative for its time I must say. It didn't fly then, they eventually pulled it from the market. I would argue though it was the most successful incorporation of FX built into guitars, and even making it modular to boot. It was truly impressive.

If it were done today? Man, I don't know. Some FX work better than others for sure. Today things are smaller so one would likely want smaller and more FX to be able to be used at once. But with multi-FX Boss, Line 6, Digitech, Korg and all those many brands - I don't know if it would be a desireable result. Doing too much for the sake of flexibility, but too little in the sake of quality would be a bad thing. No one wants a multi-FX boss pedal in their guitar (I don't think so). Nothing against Boss either, some of their pedals are really excellent. Just multi-FX pedals seem to usually be a big compromise in quality.

One way to make it work would be to have boutique designs in the modules. But that is the only way to get modules to be profitable enough in my opinion (if redone today). Who would do it? They'd have to be a partnership of some sort. But boutique could really set the idea apart. Someone well respected like Wampler - but I doubt they'd ever want to do it. He does too well on his own.

As far as the enthusiast route again with the old MPCs - the best idea would probably to put together a run of boards that could be done as prototype plug in modules and let people "roll their own" so to speak. But to do a good job, you'd need a plastic box to slide it into and a cap (not unlike the originals). That would take a bit of work, and still probably would not be cost effective in limited quantities. Who would want to volunteer a LARGE amount of time and take the financial risk to appropriate the molded plastic cases and the limited number of boards with the hope that enough people would want to buy them? There is a boutique pedal craze right now despite the shoddy economy. It is ironic that people will pay as much for a single pedal than they will for a whole tube amp. Also, there is some risk as electronics are truly getting to the point where modeling stuff is getting acceptable in some circumstances (being a tube amp guy, I can't stand saying that). I am NOT talking your typical line 6, I am talking Fractal Audio's Axe FX II - really a pretty amazing piece of gear. It is truly professional and it isn't cheap. But I am still a tube amp junkie.

I *will share* some info I don't think I ever shared before here regarding modules and prototyping boards. There ARE boards ready made out there that would work for prototyping that plug directly into the socket. I have a couple. It is labeled: "Sunhayato UK-10P-67" from what I can read and was made in Japan a long time ago. This probably was used for some computer or plug in cards for some manufacturing piece of equipment - who knows? If we found a stash of those very cheap, we might be in business. A buddy of mine found them on a trip to Japan and he brought me a few back. There were a few dollars in what he described as an electronics "flea market" sort of environment. I don't know where to buy a whole bunch cheap enough to make it worth anyone's time. I am not going to spend several hundreds bucks in hopes I can sell a bunch of boards for $5-15 each in hopes that if I sell a hundred or so I'll break even. I have 2 right now, and I'll probably do something with them. If I did anything it might be a gain/fuzz because I really am out of my comfort zone doing anything more elaborate. I just don't know enough about manufacturing to do anything more elaborate or custom.

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Thorny

I think gain and fuzz are the best choices for on board effects since the circuits for those have not changed much and there are so many better alternatives for modulation and time based effects. Also its really cool how having a fuzz/gain between the pickup and the master guitar volume works so differently from an out board effect setup.

What a find indeed!!!

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Free Your Mind and Your A$$ Will Follow......

I've seen those cards listed online.