Are any of you guys guitar pedal savvy? I'm in a bit of a pickle. I have a black Russian Big Muff Pi that I wanted to install a true bypass switch into, so I googled around and found that I had to buy and install a 3PDT switch (9 lugs). I curiously opened the Big Muff up and found that it already had a 3PDT switch installed :\. After discovering this I tested the pedal out several times and to me it sounds like the pedal muffles/compresses the tone of my guitar when it's turned off. Is this a faulty switch installation? Or am I just an idiot that is mistaken about the meaning of true bypass, which I believe means the pedal is transparent when it's turned off.

LOL, well it's safe to say that you were mistaken about the true bypass, because when you turn off the pedal, you're still going to have that muffled noise and I mean you can chain your pedal set up and put a noise suppressor with it, and that would get rid of all of the feedback and your tone should be fine. Go to guitar center or somewhere and try out different pedals, orrrr go here, to get an idea of what you can do:

http://forums.gearwire.com/electric-gui ... ight=pedal

Actually, true bypass should muffle your tone in a really slight way, as when the pedal is turned off, the signal still has to travel through the pedal, and well, everybody knows longer cables = less pure tone. It applies in the same way. But the difference is so small it doesn't really make a difference, I'd say mostly no one can hear it.

The other thing is, because of that whole thing going on, a lot of pedal have a signal booster installed for when they're turned off, in order to compensate for the loss of signal. I forgot what brand was the one that did that, think it was Boss.

Thanks for the info guys. It's good to know that my Muff has true bypass I guess, but I'll probably end up selling it sometime soon. I recently got a vintage 80's Tokai TDS-1, which is similar to the old Japanese made Boss DS-1, and I don't really see myself needing two solely distortion pedals. I prefer the Tokai over the Muff as of now. I admittedly bought the Muff for $80 just because Manabe had one and I [i]deeply[/i] regret it now. I had not researched it at all, and basically, I just bought it because I saw it in a guitar shop and I had the money at the time. Though, for the TDS-1, I played through a MIJ Boss DS-1 and really liked it, so I bought the Tokai for s&g's when I saw that Hisako uses/d one.

[quote="Aplaca"]I admittedly [b]bought the Muff for $80 [i]just because Manabe had one[/i][/b] and I [i]deeply[/i] regret it now. I had not researched it at all, and basically, I just bought it because I saw it in a guitar shop and I had the money at the time. Though, for the TDS-1, I played through a MIJ Boss DS-1 and really liked it, so [b]I bought the Tokai for s&g's [i]when I saw that Hisako uses/d one.[/i][/b][/quote]

Just when you thought he'd learned his lesson...


Also, isn't it generally accepted that Russian Big Muffs sound like shit, compared to their American counterparts?

[quote="GoldenShower"]Just when you thought he'd learned his lesson...[/quote]
Aww come on, it's an MIJ DS-1 clone in terms in sound and quality. Also, I couldn't exactly pass up a vintage Japanese pedal (ya'll know how weeaboo it gets up in hurr)

[quote="GoldenRhino"][I]sn't it generally accepted that Russian [products are] shit, compared to their American counterparts?[/quote]

That's kind of the rule about everything, though, isn't it?