Catalinbread Carbide Distortion Pedal with Dry Volume and Wet Volume Controls, Low and High Knobs

There's a good chance you've heard of this trendy new sound, which is typically connected with powerful riffs and power tools if you've been a music listener in the past 30 years that uses guitars tuned lower than usual. A pulverizing distortion with hefty boosts to specific frequency bands—three of them, to be exact—and a ton of volume is what the Catalinbread Carbide Distortion 1.96 x 4.33- Inch Pedal with Dry Volume and Wet Volume Controls sounds like. Officially, getting this "chainsaw sound," as it became known, requires connecting to a Boss HM-2 Heavy Metal and turning all four knobs to their maximum settings. To maximize crunch and thud, Carbide starts with this as the foundation and then modifies the majority of the distortion circuit. The Carbide divides your signal into two channels instead of offering you a meager mix control; one path goes to a strong clean boost specially designed for down-tuned instruments, and the other goes into the gears of the distortion. You may control the precise amount of dirt by giving each path its own volume knob before mixing them in parallel. The extreme bass end is compressed while the treble is reduced by an emphasis control, allowing the boosted frequency bands to stand out in the mix.

Volume Knobs

The volumes of the dry, enhanced path and the wet, chainsaw path are controlled by these two knobs. It vanishes from the mix if either one is out. Because these two circuits are parallel, you can rig or combine the two sides as you choose. 

Emphasis Control Knob

You have two color mixes, or EQ knobs, on the original HM-2 circuit: L (low) and H (high). The H knob controls two separate bands concurrently, at 958 Hz and 1279 Hz, while the L knob controls a frequency increase at 87 Hz. These three boosts are maintained by the Carbide, but the Emphasis control reduces frequencies near these bands, giving the boosts a little more pop. Like the original H knob, the Emphasis control simultaneously changes a treble shelving filter and a filter operating at 63 Hz. The integrated bass boost can be butted up against the low filter's Q, which is just broad enough while eliminating bothersome sub-bass.

DC Power Source

The Carbide can be powered by a center-negative DC power source that ranges in voltage from 9 to 15 volts and can deliver at least xxmA of current (more is acceptable). The Carbide could be bricked if you plug in anything else (center-positive, AC, higher voltage, etc.). Verify your supply to ensure it contains all the necessary information. Your pedal will be instantly sent to the shadow world if you plug in the incorrect power source.