Way Huge Pork Loin

This pedal has five external knobs (volume, overdrive, tone, curve, and clean) as well as three internal trim pots (presence, filter, and drive mix). Considering the quantity of settings, it is clear that this pedal is more difficult to coax great sounds from than your average Tubescreamer. When using it one must keep in mind that the pedal incorporates a pair of distinct tones, clean and dirty; they key to using this, I've found, is to deal with the mix first. Once you've decided whether or not to use it as a more clean-type boost or an overdrive box, adjustments are relatively straightforward. Random knob turning, I'm sorry to say, just won't cut it here. Spending a few hours with it is necessary to really get the full potential of the pedal.

I use this pedal with Fender and Gretsch guitars through an assortment of 6L6 and EL84 valve amps. The only other pedals I use are a Boss tuner and a Boss SuperOverdrive.

The WHPL, like all dirt boxes, does generate some noise when it's on -- although it is far quieter than many similar pedals. It's dead quiet when switched off.

As mentioned above, the effect does take some tweaking to sound great, although it's definitely passable right out of the box. About once a month I'll crack it open and change it around. I really like this pedal because it can achieve a great number of sounds: it can be a wicked clean boost, a mid-humped Tubescreamer sound-alike, a very open sounding overdrive, and anything in between. The key is manipulation of the clean mix (more or less clean in the output signal) and the curve control (changes the EQ curve from flatter to a mid-hump).

My only complaint regarding this pedal is that overdrive, at times, can sound very bass heavy. I found that keeping the drive set at a lower level remedied this. Boosting the cleans should do the trick as well.

As for the sound quality itself, the pedals is fairly transparent, in that it doesn't colour your base tone. The drive is pretty natural sounding, and the cleans are sparkly without being overly harsh or spiky. It's a good sounding pedal if you're willing to devote some time to fiddle with it.

I gig this all the time without a backup. I've owned it for a year and it's traveled a lot. No problems, whatsoever.

I've never had to deal with Dunlop (which owns Way Huge)

For rock'n'roll this is a good, versatile pedal to have. It can do many things well. About the only thing it's not good for are modern, high-gain tones. It is only an overdrive, after all. I can't fault it for that. And if you like blues and rock, you'll like this box.

In addition to the great name and wicked blue LED, it is incredibly tweak-able. I love this. It's also great for tightening up the sound of Humbuckers or Filtertrons while adding a hint of gain.

For a boutique-style pedal it's great value and sounds very good. I think it's better than it's closest competitor, the Voodoo Lab Sparkle Drive.

Theres a lot of control, so it could be a little difficult to use. I found my sound quite easily. Everybody is looking for something a little different. Not a whole lot of info comes in the box. Plenty of Dunlop/MXR crap in there though.

I was looking for something to push a few different single channel tube amps. Egnater Rebel, Fender Deluxe Rev, Boogie F-30 ( I just use clean channel ), old Carvin, Bassman, Blues jr,.. etc. All of the OD / distortion units I have seemed to either push to much and loose defintion or they would just sound wimpy. If you have never warmed up to a stock Tubescreamer you know my dilema. Like most I have been buying and trading distortion boxes since I learned what tone was all about, (25-30 years) so I have a bunch, some are better than others. I honestly have to say that this one is the best one so far. I have used a Sparkle Drive and I like this much more. It has plenty of drive but I'm still able to keep a lot of definition. It has more drive than I need or use. I am completly satisfied. I think it is well thought out product. For me the tone and curve controls really find the sweet spot. Since I don't use a lot of the gain it is very quiet.

Too new to tell.

Dont know. I have never had to have a Dunlop/MXR product serviced.

I have to say I really like it. I can probably find something I like better but it's not going to be a whole lot better. If do find something I like better I'm sure it is going to be Way Expensive.

Basic controls plus 2 external and 3 internal trim pots.

Too much BS for an overdrive, IMHO

After reading many glowing reviews, scoping out a bunch of YouToob demos (some good, some crap) and then being really enticed by the Gear Demo run on Comcast on Demand by Paul Rosario from Guitar World mag, I figured I'd give it a shot.

Didn't demo it at the Guitar Center (With all the wanking noise around, what's the point?).Told the nice sales girl (not d00d!) at the GC that it might be coming back, since I really needed to hear it with my guits, through my amps, on my pedalboard. The short review?

It's going back.

Slapped it on my now minimal (TU2=> OCD => MI Blues Pro => loop to a Boss OC2 Octave <to keep it out of the chain> H2O => Verbzilla) pedalboard in place of the Blues Pro, after my OCD.

It's "big" feature is are the external trim pots to blend in a clean signal (ala the SparkleDrive), and a contour pot for the overdrive. It also has 3 internal trim pots to modify the amount of clean, amount of drive, and presence for the drive.

Now, the SparkleDrive is on my short list of "Pedals I Have Hated" (apologies if you like it, it just didn't do anything for me), but the hype on the Loin is that the "clean" is supposed to be based on "a British preamp"

BTW, I used an 08 Les Paul Standard into a KJL Dirty 30.

Started out with all knobs and Trim pots at 12 noon.

On it's own, it sounded rather promising UNTIL I started to dial in some more clean. On some notes the clean jumped out, on some others it wasn't there at all. Reminded me of a poorly tracking Octave box. The overdrive itself was less than thrilling. More like a fizzy preamp buzz until I dimed the overdrive and backed the clean pot way off. Even with a low gain setting it didn't clean up well the the guitar controls rolled down.

Kicked on the OCD along with it ... Sounded pretty good until the Loin's clean pot was bumped up a bit.
Sounded like total ass. Fizzy, spitting, glitchy UGLY distortion. OK, I tweek the OCD a bit and it gets better, but only when drive on both pedals are cranked pretty high. I won't even get into how hideous it made the Verbzilla sound. The Loin does NOT like other pedals, it seems.

Twisted knobs and and tweeked everything (except the internal trim pots) for around an hour, and I could not find one sound I was totally happy with.

Now, I don't know if the guys getting some good tones out of this thing spent a bunch of time messing with the the internal trim pots. In the real (gigging) world, with all of the variables that go into your live tone, it makes no sense to me to have a dirt pedal that needs that much dialing in.

For what I do, either my RAT, or the OCD/Blues Pro combo murders this thing, period.

I should just beat it with my RAT pedal

It's $170.00 (!!!) worth of hype, IMHO, YMMV, ETC.

(But it is a cool anodized purple!)

Looks and feels well built.

See Above.

I love a good overdrive / dirt pedal as much as the next guy. That's what a RAT is for.

The Loin needs to much tweeking in real-life gigging situations for it to be useful to me.

Save some coin and treat yourself to the OCD. You'll even have enough left over to pick up a used RAT and a couple of burgers.

The features are presented at the Way huge Site.

This stompbox is rather fiddly, 5 knobbies on the outside, 3 trimpots inside the chassis. Instructions printed inside the chassis as well. Very cool!

Manual was provided with the pedal. Very informative, yet compact.

Excellent! Huge range of sounds, once you get the hang of all the knobs and trimpots. You can go from tubescreamerish compressed midhumped tone to pretty much anywhere in terms of overdrive. And the ability mix in the clean signal is a big plus.

The amount and quality of the low end this pedal provides is especially impressive and separates this box from other similar stompboxes.

It also takes fuzzboxes well when placed before it in the signal chain. A big plus for that. And it cleans up nicely with the guitar volume knob. Lovely.

I'm using it with a Fender American Vintage '62 strat with Duncan Antiquities pups to a Fender Blues Jr amp and a host of carefully selected pedals. A Keeley Fuzz Head, a Fuzzface, a Carl Martin Hot Drive 'n boost, a Univibe, an MXR Carbon Copy delay, Hardwire & EHX chorusboxes & a zvex box of rock to name a few.

Too early to tell. Seems robust enough.

No idea.

I've been playing for 23 years and i've had quite a lot of gear. Currently I play mosty blues and "hendrixian" rock & occasionally some stoner/doom/trash-metal.
The Pork Loin is a perfect match with my gear and playing style. I've gone through around 20 to 30 overdriveboxes and this is the best so far. It definetly helps me express my self better through my guitars.

Pretty easy for me to use but my score is for the average user. Manual is to the point and easy to read. You get a lot of tweaking options on this little gem.

I play through a Vox AC30CC2 with the Wharfedale speakers. (not bad speakers but I plan to upgrade to Weber Blues) Guitars are an SRV Signature and a 52 RI Telecaster. This pedal is great! I have been on a boutique pedal kick and have totally upgraded everything. My board consists of....Keeley Compressor, Analogman King of Tone, Zendrive, Keeley Java Boost and now the Way Huge Pork Loin. (I'm pretty much into dirt pedals as you can tell) I'm thinking about adding a delay. Can I borrow 700 bucks for an Aqua Puss? Probably will settle on the MXR Carbon Copy. It is also designed by Jeorge Tripps. (If you don't know who that is...look harder)


The design is similar to the Voodoo Lab Sparkle Drive which I also own. IMO, Way Huge did this better. You have a clean knob that blends in the tone of a clean British preamp. Very cool idea. On the SD I find no happy medium between dirt and clean. You can roll the clean knob all the way on or off. You also have a highly flexible curve knob which allows you to fine tune frequencies. If this pedal wasn't boutique quality it wouldn't be on my board. Best part is that the price makes it available to ALL consumers and not just a select group of tone snobs.

The overdrive on this pedal is very creamy and voiced just right. OH! Almost forgot that there are easy adjustments inside the box for even MORE fine tuning. I found that the pedal sounds great stock so I haven't even bothered with those yet.

At first I was a little put off that Dunlop is doing these pedals. NEVER FEAR. Dunlop has really become one with the market lately by releasing a slew of great "bargain boutique" pedals. The Hendrix series was revamped into solid great sounding pedals. There are more so check out their website and see whats been going on there lately.

I was worried about quality but when I opened up the box expecting cheap carbon film, I was greeted by a bunch of metal film resistors!! These are within 1% tolerance and have nothing but positive attributes to your tone. Oh and if you mess with the internal controls and forget how they were stock...there is a sticker with the factory settings in there! I would gig without backup and have complete faith in this pedal.

I did email a couple times and got friendly, subtle responses within a day.

I play blues. Would buy again if needed. There is nothing like this on the market that I am aware of. EVERYBODY has an 808 knock off these days so it's nice to see an original design now and again. GET THIS PEDAL!!!!

.....If you want metal tones look somewhere else unless you might need a boost for certain parts of a song..This pedal is for the Klon/Tubescreamer mild gain fan who wants more tweekability.The pedal is not really for the beginner.I gave it an 8 because its not totally brainless.You need to know what you are doing.The clean mix knob and the frequency sweep for the treble voicing are very unique in the way they operate and process the dry and overdrive effect.You will want 2 of these pedals after you spend time with it.I love where they put the battery compartment.Well done.

The Pork Loin Overdrive Guitar Pedal incorporates 2 distinct tonal pathways that are blended together a modern soft clipping overdrive and a modified classic British preamp for clean. At the heart of the Pork Loin's overdrive path is a soft clipped BiFET overdrive gain stage with a passive Tone control, rounded out by a Curve function that gives the user freedom to fine-tune corner frequencies. The Volume control regulates the masses of pork power that exude from its space age circuitry, leaving room for the Clean control to blend in its warm glistening clean tones. Additionally, the Pork Loin has three internal mini controls: Filter and Voice deliver extensive tonal shaping possibilities, while the overdrive Mix control allows the Pork Loin to be run as a clean preamp. With a wide range of dynamic tones from supple and clear to warm and punchy, the Pork Loin's outstanding features make it one extremely in-demand guitar effect pedal on the market today.

This pedal is from dunlop but they have cut no corners on sound quality.This pedal is all about sound quality.This pedal was mainly designed to preserve the natural sound of your guitar and then enhance it with overdrive.The overdrive can get aggressive but it is smoother and restrained when compaired to say an OCD.I have since put my tube screamer reissues that I was waiting to modify on ebay.They are junk compaired to this.

Too early to tell

havent needed it

I play classic rock and indi rock and roxy music type rock.Art rock.I have lots of gear and pedals from Boss to Pete Cornish.The way huge line is very well thought out in the design of there pedals.The dunlop collaboration is just fine with me.I love the colors...the jack placement.......where they put the battery compartment.Not outrageously priced.The bottom line is the sound.This pedal is a great asset.