Boss EQ pedal settings for Dobro

[John Gould]

Anyone know of someplace to start with the Boss EQ pedal as far as settings for dobro emulation? I know there will be some tweaks needed for each different setup. I guess I could RTA my dobro and try to match with my steel and eq but that's a big undertaking .

[Richard Sinkler]

First slider all the way down, next all the way up, next down, next up, down, up, down. That is how Bobbe Seymore set up the "Bo-Bro" (really just a Boss EQ pedal).

[Jerry Overstreet]

I defer to Richard about the settings. The unit Bobbe modded was the Boss GE-7 EQ pedal. However he set it up, it works well for me.

[Richard Sinkler]

I owned BoBro at one time. I opened it up and saw how he set the sliders. That's all he did. Then he broke off the sliders and put a piece of plastic over them. No evidence of any parts replaced. I now use a Danelectro Fish & Chips EQ with the same settings. Much cheaper than a Boss and sounds the same.

[Dennis Detweiler]

I did the same with the Fish&Chips. Use a piece of 1 inch pvc pipe for a plunky effect. Bluegrass in a box.

[Jack Hanson]

Be aware that all BOSS GE-7s are not created equal. Since they've been in production for decades, some components have changed over the years. The older ones are usually quiet as a church mouse, but many of the newer ones are often very noisy when set for the reso effect as described above. I used one for awhile, but all the white noise was a turn-off for me. Much happier with Tom's MXR unit.

[Jack Goodson]

i don,t know a lot about why these things work, but i remember bobbee telling me the setting he used, but the last one on the right is a volume slide and it goe,s half way which might cause the white noise....thanks jack

[ajm]

Jack Hanson is right, and that is from personal experience.
To add to this...........

Some of the (probably) older GE7s used different op amps than newer versions.
I bought a beat up GE7 off of Craigslist and sure enough, it was noisy.
I replaced three of the op amps inside and it's like night and day. Much more quiet.

There are a ton of threads on the internet for this fix.
Some places also offer kits to do this.
However, IMO, a lot of the kits just sell extra parts that are not required and can lead to more work.

I removed three op amps, installed sockets, and replaced them with quieter op amps.
I've probably posted what I did on this forum if you do a search.

This "dobro sim" thing also works well with an acoustic electric six string and a slide as well.

I also have a Danelectro Fish and Chips and as Richard said it also works well.

[Richard Sinkler]

The secret I found to using different brand EQ's is, it needs to be a 7 band EQ and have the same center frequencies as the Boss and Danelectro. I tried using both and MXR 6 and 10 Band Eq, and couldn't really get close. I also have a Source Audio programmable 7 band EQ that I have tried, and it doesn't come close either. It has different center frequencies.

On the Fish & Chips, I find that sometimes I need to pull the second slider (200 hz) down to about half to tame a honkiness in the sound.