DOD FX17 Wah Volume

The travel on this beast feels completely different to that of a Cry Baby, having both a shorter base and a larger travel. This means that things you have to apply more movement in order to achieve some effects.

Why can't people accept that some things are just different. Compared to a Cry Baby there is far less distortion in the FX17 and I've found it great for VAI type sounds. Where the Cry Baby scores for me is in the honk and boost that occurs as the pedal is depressed - this is what makes an overdriven amp really talk. In comparison the FX17 is very polite and more uniform. Also the FX17 is active, even when off, which is great for driving cables and other effects but not so good if you expect your stomp box to round off the sound a little.

This little bugger has been a heap of junk - proving that so called noiseless wahs are not necessarily better. I've lived with annoying friction and squeaks from the metal plates which slide against the felt pad, as well as the PVC liner wearing out, and intermittent failure of sound altogether. Now it's completely dead after very little use.

Arbiter in England wants #45 just to look at it so bye bye FX17.

Although this thing has caused me grief I'm still attracted to the alternative voice of a clean/active wah but I'll try a Morley next time.

easy easy easy...it's not rocket science.

This is a good wah, and if set up properly, it is a GREAT wah pedal, and IMO, it can sound considerably better than a Dunlop. However, like most other wahs, it has to be set up in the right position, before the distortion, but after the compressor. This pedal is less forgiving than a Dunlop when it comes to positioning. The DOD wah, with a decent overdrive sound, sounds fantastic. Very crisp and clean and better than my experiences with Dunlops.

The volume part of this pedal is the big disappointment for me. It seems that with the volume switch enabled and the volume cranked, it is slightly quieter than the normal signal. It also seems to steal away my "edge" or some of the dynamics of my tone. While the volume feature might someday be used in the studio, there is no way I'll use it otherwise. It is a tone killer. Then again, I may be overly anal about my tone. It definately does, however, affect it.

I accidentally spilt some bong water on the floor when I was 19, and a TINY bit of water splashed on the pedal. The thing stopped working! I got it fixed right away, and it was okay. Other than that, this pedal is solidly built but, not a solid performer. I found the switch rather difficult to activate for the first 2 years and I had to jimmy a small piece of plastic to make up for dead space. Now, strangely enough, the pedal works fine without it. It also used to squeak, but it doesn't anymore. Grease fixed that.

Despite all these things, it has a very nice metal chasis and seems very solid. It is much better than Dunlops, which always seem to be in rough shape.

It's a very good wah, and a so so volume. I can't really compare it to any of other volume pedals in terms of what they do to your tone. I think one gets a better sound by learning to use your guitar volume knob with your pinky, than you do with this pedal. The wah, however, is killer when dialed. It also looks a hell of a lot better than those generic Dunlops. This pedal, however, is finicky, and may have limited capabilities with some setups. For examply, I can't get it to work well with heavier distortions, or with my Big Muff. But with a fuzz face, and a compressor, it is pure silk.

Very easy to use in all modes.

Ibanez RG570G, various distortion pedals, and various amps. The FX 17 wah sounds nasal thin. As a volume pedal it was great. Noise was an issue as well when in wah mode however I haven't found a quiet wah pedal yet. It was ok but nothing special. It didn't send shivers down my spine like some other wahs out there.

This pedal quit working about 5 months after I bought it. I fixed it, but it kept breaking so eventually I gave up on it. I will think long and hard about buying DOD sweep type pedals from now on.

I didn't deal with them. Even though I bought it new the shipping cost wasn't worth the trouble as I was overseas.

At the time of purchase I was a metal head but also enjoyed playing classic rock. I didn't really feel that this pedal suited either category. My playing style is vastly different now, but this pedal still would not meet my tone requirements. It mostly got in the way of tone. Not the worst pedal I have heard, but certainly not in the top 25.

Rediculously easy. Side switch to toggle between volume or wah function. Rock the pedal back hard all the way to turn the wah off or on.

Good volume pedal. Mediocre Wah Wah. Just wasn't to my liking. Just squeaks a little.

This thing is built to last. It's a metal brick. How the hell do you break that?

Never had to deal with them.

I give it a 8 for volume, 5 for wah wah. I mainly bought it for the Wah function. It's ok, but I liked the sound of a Dunlop Crybaby better.

It's relatively simple to use, just rock back and forth on the pedal and you get a great sound out if it. I gave it an 8 because I don't like the activation switch, it doesn't CLICK like the Dunlap so sometimes it's hard to tell if you turned it on. Plus it's located near the rear of the pedal instead of the front which takes a while to get used to. Also, to switch from wah to volume, you have to push a little button on the side of the unit, kind of a pain in the ass. I don't remember anything about a manual, I bought it 10 years ago.

I play a Gibson Les Paul Custom and a Fender Jag through a 70's Fender twin reverb and a whole slew of effects. This thing sounds awesome. It's not noisy and I LOVE the tone range it has, it kicks Morley and Dunlap's ass. I run it after my BOSS DS-1 and I get a really cool Swervedrivery wash-wah sound.

All I can say is this, I have had the damn thing 10 years, its been through 5 bands, 100's of gigs and I haven't had a problem with it. The only bad thing I can say about it is that when it gets really hot in your practice space, the glue that holds the little rubber grippy thing on the pedal melts and it slides off. DUCT TAPE!

This is the main reason I wanted to post this, DIGITECH is extremely helpful and friendly. I took the pedal apart a couple months ago to clean it out the sticky beer ooze in it, I somehow managed to lose the rod that the pedal rocks on. After feebly attempting to replace it with a bolt, I ended up calling the company expecting no help at all. The guy said they don't even make the pedal anymore but he went back to the warehouse, found the damn thing, and sent it to me at \ no cost. I read a lot of these entries about people bitching about Digitech products, call them! They are super helpful.

The sounds I get out of this pedal are so versatile. When I first got it I was really into playing funk and I got really great wah's out of it. My style has gradually changed to a dream-pop, shoegazing style and I still get really cool wah sounds from it, plus the volume pedal lets you do cool volume swell effects. I have compared it to the Morley Wah (i thought the tone range sucked) and the Dunlap Wah which I thought was way too noisy. Plus, our other guitar player went through 2 Dunlaps in 2 years. If it were stolen, I would be devastated because I don't think they make them anymore and I haven't seen too many used.

The DOD FX-17 Wah/volume pedal.
Using it as a wah or volume is a no-brainer except that the wah/vol switch is positioned so that you really have to know which you are going to use beforehand. It's a shame that there's no LED to let you know whether the wah is "on" or in "bypass" *before* you tear into that lead break. I bought this unit primarily as a continuous controller pedal. (Basically, for those who don't know, a CC pedal sweeps zero to 5 volts as you press the pedal and allows an analogue to Midi-digital converter to control a midi effect unit's parameters). I use a Rolls MidiWiz. One of the side effects of this being a multi use pedal is that to use this unit as a CC with a battery, you still need to plug a lead into the 1/4" input socket even though you are not going to attach a guitar to the pedal. Without it, nothing works. Pretty dumb! A switch&LED would be better. I used a dummy plug without a lead while testing the pedal on battery. The manual is dreadful, out of date , often incorrect and contradictory.

As a volume, it does the job. As a wah, it's a matter of taste so try it out in the shop. As a CC pedal, the unit should not affect sound quality, however.... When using a battery, I noticed that I was not getting the full range of parameter change I'd expect. Using a DOD FX125 Power supply (bought with the unit) I did get the full range. Using a voltmeter showed the the pedal was only going zero to 4.3 volts when on battery but zero to 5 when on the supply. Consequently, it's use as a CC pedal is not feasible while on battery unless you can live with not reaching the high end of the parameters. I tried all battery types, zinc, alkaline and Ni-Cad(fresh charged). Testing DOD's FX125 supply (labelled 10Volts) and found that it supplies 14Volts (huh??!) to the unit while under load (plugged in to the pedal and in-use). More about this later....

Don't drop it, you'll break whatever it lands on. The unit looks and feels bombproof! 1 millimetre folded steel. Weighs a ton! You could probably drive a 4x4 truck over this unit with no damage. However... The unit's 1/4" input jack nut came loose and fell off. I had to tighten all of the jacks up (they were all loose). Opening the unit up is simple. It's just one circlip, then slide out the pin plus 4 philips screws at the corners and bingo! it's open. The unit is made up of 2 PCBs, one flat the other vertical. The nut holding the vertical PCBs in place was 90% of the way off the screw. (If it had come off, It'd have dropped right onto the flat PCB and could have shorted the unit). I tightened it up, pleased that I'd opened the unit. The is no potentiometer to wear out. The vertical PCB is covered by a plastic (mica?) film that seems to act as a variable capacitor as the "wing" of the pedal sweeps across it. I can't see any moving parts that won't last years. Now that I've tightened it up, I think I can trust it 100% however, the rating reflects the tightening up I had to do (and the potential consequences of not doing so).

RE: "Low Controller voltage". Called the number, got the "Harmon group" help line. Was asked whether DOD or Digitech. Got hold of a DOD guy who was somewhat familiar with the pedal. Talked through the problem. He suggested either "try alkaline batteries", "Use the power supply" or "send it back to us for recalibration". Pretty happy with the response. If I hadn't found another way to power the pedal, would definitely have sent it back.

I've got over the power problem by powering the FX17 from my Midi pedal board which is itself phantom powered over it's Midi-Out cable by my home-built supply. (I *hate* AC voltage and a box load of wires under my feet). This does invalidate the warranty but I'm going to risk it. The CC voltage really gives this pedal plenty of potential. So much more that just a wah/vol pedal. I don't like the .35 phono (mini headphone) jacks that DOD use as power supply and "CC voltage out" jacks. They spark as you plug them in which the DOD tech says is nothing to worry about. If you're a whisky/vodka drinker, keep your poison away from this pedal unless you want to risk instant, unplanned pyrotechnics. Will probably replace these with regular coaxial 2.5ID/5.5OD power jacks.
Submitted by : Smegz (Sorry, no email address I can use for this type of stuff yet)

It's very easy to use, but rather inconvenient. If you want a volume pedal, the switch needs to be pointing on the in position, but the switch is in a very inconvenient place on the side & if you want to switch to wah it needs to be pointing out & in order to do any of this you have to stop in the middle of the song & pick up the damn thing & press the switch. not very convenient, but my friend is going to wire it into a different place for better convenience. The bypass is a little to sensitive too. If I rock back on the wah/volume, it can click off. That's my reason for the 5

I think it sounds great. I think the people who say it sucks are elitist Crybabys (no pun intended). The crybaby is not the only wah -- get over it! This one is just as good if not better. Very interesting wah sound & great volume pedal (I assume all volume pedals are pretty much the same. I can't imagine any other one doing something different). Sounds really good through the effects send & return, not with my guitar!

It is very solid (tank even.) Very heavy. Very solid. Very trustworthy. The battery cover is a bitch to get on & off. i still don't really understand how to do it, but who uses batteries?

Seems like a great wah. It'd be better if the bypass was better & the convenience of the switching between wah & volume was better, but that'll be fixed soon.

No manual. It's a wah pedal. Its easy to use. It doesn't have a whole lot of sweep range, though, so it is easy to accidentally shut it off

Not too noisy. Sound horrible with distortion after it. Treble is a little weak. It doesn't work for lead stuff at all. This is no crybaby. Its more like a squealing hog. It does OK on Marleyesque rhythym stuff, though. Also, it has a noticable volume drop through the wah. Works ok as a volume pedal, but too touchy for me.

It broke. I fixed it. I don't really care much about whether my stuff breaks, I just fix it. I wouldn't use it at a gig except to scare the audience into running away.

I would buy it again for $50 dollars because I plan on converting it into a crybaby. Hopefully. I hate PCB boards, though, but it shouldn't have too much stuff in it.

You would have to be a moron not to understand how to use it. However, I think a moron designed the instruction manual. Boring!

Good Volume pedal awful wah pedal! DOD should exclude the word WAH from the title of this pedal!

I submitted mine for nuclear testing and it came back without a scratch.

No contact, but I would not want to talk to the moron that designed the instruction manual!

Not for a wah pedal. I would buy a Dunlop Crybaby instead. In fact I have with a Beckman Pot and it jams. Two years without any scratchy noises. Now that is a true Wah pedal and for only $70.!

Very simple to use, who needs a manual?

For use as a volume pedal, it's great. Smooth and predictable. But as a wah pedal, it stinks. It "washes" out real early, and not as wide a range as other wah's.

This thing weighs about as much as a whale. No backup needed for this unit, short of nuclear fallout, you're safe.

Don't know, never had a problem.

I'd buy it if you can't use your little finger to control the volume on your guitar, or if you like a foot controlled volume. I wouldn't even think about using it as a wah. Buy a real one.