Product Overview
WE ARE EXTREMELY EXCITED TO ANNOUNCE THE 'NEW FOR 2025' COLLABORATION WITH MADBEAN PEDALS! Fantastic DIY pedal projects, now available as full or partial Small Bear kits!
Our Partial Kits include the PCB/PCB Set and all parts needed for the project, except you supply your own enclosure and knobs.
Our Full Kit includes the PCB/PCB Set, all the parts, a drilled enclosure and knobs.
You can always check out the MadBean Forum for more info-- a great resource! MadBean Pedals Forum
Overview
I worked on this project for most of 2022. It ended up being a total bear for me to get right. I had multiple issues with my prototypes (small and big errors), and even some bad luck with PCB manufacturing. So, I spent a lot of time getting it ready as an mbp DIY project. I finally got it perfect on rev.5, haha. And, boy, is it worth it! The Prognosticator is based on the EHX Stereo Memory Man™. Not the more recent, DSP-based one, but the old school analog one. While there is some overlap, circuit-wise, with the traditional Deluxe Memory Man™, the Prognosticator is it’s own thing. It utilizes a single MN3005 BBD, and the maximum usable delay is around 300ms. So, it’s more in line with the DM-2 as far as delay time. Where this design shines is in its stereo implementation and how the delay and modulation behaves in a two amp setup. Note that this is not a true stereo pedal. It does not have two independent pairs of inputs and outputs, each with their own BBD audio path. The Prognosticator is a mono input, single BBD output delay. It essentially “fakes” stereo by copying the delay output, inverting the signal then sending that inverted signal to a separate output. The outcome is two mono signals that, when combined, create a wider audio bed than mono. This was a popular method used in analog pedals back in the 80’s with Boss, DOD and others. Don’t let this shortcut fool you into thinking it’s a gimmick. Here the “stereo” part acts a spatial enhancer across two amps. Not independent or as lush as true stereo, but still much wider and musical than a mono output. And, with the extended modulation control you can get some nice fast chorus effect at low delay settings. And, because of this implementation, you can still use it as a mono output if you are using a single amp. You can take the effect output from either output jack. They will sound exactly the same on their own. I made a few changes to the Stereo Memory Man design. First, I set it up with a charge pump so it can be operated off a 9v supply. I also converted the bypass from a passive split to an active buffered output. I prefer this method of bypass for stereo. And, being that the delay is likely at the end of the signal chain, that’s the right place to have a buffer in case you are using a lot of pedals before it. The last change was to swap the single, preset modulation to a fully featured modulation with rate and depth controls.
