MI AUDIO PTY. LTD. P.O. Box 6426, North Ryde, NSW 2113 Australia http://www.mieffects.com
INTRODUCTION
G’Day! Congratulations on purchasing the MI Effects Super
Crunch Box v.1 pedal. This pedal is an extension of one of
our favourite and most popular pedals in the MI family, the
Crunch Box, and is now more flexible to provide every level
of crunch possible!
I have always wanted to fully trick-out a Crunch Box to see
how many mods and features we could fit into its small
enclosure. So one rainy afternoon I did just that, and
decided to give three away for our Facebook and Twitter
followers.
I was pleasantly surprised with how the Crunch Box sound
had evolved with these added features. This, plus the
constant feedback from customers wanting this new Crunch
Box, led us to prototype the Super Crunch Box.
The Crunch Box has been around for quite a few years now,
and has even inspired several clones and knock-offs. So I
threw some ideas around the workshop, and came up with a
design that expands the flexibility of the original, without a
large rise in price.
FEATURES
HEADROOM!!
All previous MI drive pedals could be run up to 24V for more
headroom, giving more clarity and a tighter bottom end. We
know that a lot of our users run our pedals at higher voltage,
but are aware of the troubles of running extra adaptors for
these pedals. So a feature implemented in this redesign
(also found in the Super Blues Pro, new Boost ‘n’ Buff and
Megalith Delta) is the addition of circuitry to double the input
voltage of your 9V adaptor/battery to supply 18V to the
pedal. NOTE: THIS IS A 9V ONLY INPUT!*
This is a great feature that your pedal board will happy with.
The pedal sounds bigger, tighter and more responsive at
18V.
* refer to
POWERING THE PEDAL
section.
CONTROLS
PRESENCE and TONE
–
The internal presence control was
implemented to integrate easier with every user’s amp setup.
Some amps are brighter or darker than the ones we use to
test, so by dialling in the PRESENCE control you can shape
your sound through your setup. By placing it as an external
control, you can really pull some great sounds that sit well in
a mix, or to have more control with a range of guitars/amps
you might use. The interaction with the TONE control is
important as dialling in more Presence can cut really well,
but also the lows won’t feel as powerful, so use it with that in
mind. This greatly increases the versatility of the Crunch
Box, but for those who want to rock it old school, just leave
the presence at 50% and proceed as normal!
LO/HI GAIN MODE SWITCH
–
This switch adds a great
amount of tones that will suit many different playing styles.
In
“LO” MODE, the Crunch Box really cleans up well with the
guitar volume knob and has a glassier tone. It still has a lot of
gain (it is a Crunch Box after all!) but there is more string
definition and top end than
“HI” MODE. This mode is the
stock Crunch Box amount of gain, so you can still get that
“hot-rod” sound as with previous versions.
COMP
–
Like the LO/HI GAIN SWITCH, the three-way
COMP switch aims to tap in to the lower end of the gain
spectrum. The switch selects between three different clipping
structures:
1. Stock red LEDs as in the original.
2. Silicon diode pair for lower output, different
harmonic content than the LEDs
0. A softer clip mode, again to provide some flexibility
to the overall distorted signal. The softer clipping
provides more clean signal in the mix and has the
highest output.
VOLUME AND GAIN CONTROL
The GAIN and TRIM controls the amount of gain and
overdrive of the pedal. The sweep and maximum gain is
determined by both the level of COMP and what GAIN
MODE (LO/HI) the Super Crunch Box is set to.
The final output section has been designed to provide you
with maximum output volume. With VOLUME turned all the
way up, the output signal can reach 14Vpp, which can
seriously overdrive a good tube amp. The volume control is a
logarithmic or ‘volume’ taper, which means that when the
control is set to 12 noon, the volume is only 15% of the way
up, so there’s plenty of volume up your sleeve should you
need it.
