The Line 6 M-Series Stompbox Modelers are the next incarnation of multi-effects from the makers of the DL4 Delay and other XX-4 modelers. The Line 6 DL4 Delay Modeler has become a modern stompbox classic, with it being featured on many musicians pedalboards, like solo performers such as Reggie Watts to the multiple DL4 setup of Minus The Bear guitarist Dave Knudson.

The Line 6 M-Series takes the 100+ models from the DL4 delays, MM4 modulations, FM4 synths/filters, DM4 distortions and reverbs from the ToneCore Verbzilla to provide every effect any musician would want, and need. The range features three models, the monolithic M13, the DL4-sized M9 and the small M5. For those familiar with the original XX-4 series, you will jump straight into the M-Series, but new users will find the pedal easy to navigate. I have found a way to add my popular DL4 modifications into the M-Series and have done so first with the M5.

Two of the most popular mods I offer on the Line XX-4 series are an Expression Mod and Feedback Mod. I was able to put both of these mods into a breakout box for a mod I call the Feedback Box Mod.

The Expression Mod utilises the Expression Pedal functionality that many users don’t capitalise on. The mod allows you to save a heel-down and toe-down setting for each preset. If you have a Tube Echo, for example, you can increase the drive, and repeats at toe-down to shoot the echoes into self-oscillation. Or if you have the Rotary Drum model, you can control the speed of the horn for a subtle sound to a fast Leslie tone.

The Feedback Mod involves re-routing the output of the Modeler back into the input, and the new output selected by a switch on the breakout box. This is a feedback loop, and causes spontaneous bursts of noise, squeals, oscillations, drones – all unique depending on the modeler selected. This modification is definitely for the more adventurous musician, but with every effect, the feedback can be used subtly by adjusting the BLEND and INTENSITY knobs on the breakout box. Also, the feedback can be controlled via the pickup selector and volume controls of your guitar.

Having the two mods in the one box enables a wealth of experimental sounds from long, feedbacking reverbs, to resonant ring modulators, to static-like short decaying fuzzes. The experimenting is up to you with over 100 models to try!

Below is a demo of the Feedback Box mod for the Line 6 M5.

Clip Details: Hamer Flying V> cubisteffects modded Line 6 M5 Feedback Box Mod > MI Amplification Megalith Beta
Recording: SM57 in front of MI Amplification 4×12 (Custom MI Eminence Wizards) > Mbox2 > Logic Pro 9

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The Malekko Spring Chicken is now a discontinued pedal and becoming a collector as one of the great spring reverb emulators. At its core is a reverb module, commonly called the “Belton” brick after the manufacturer. It seemed as soon as the brick was made available, a whole gamut of builders started making the same reverb pedal such as the Neunaber WET, Wampler Faux Spring Reverb, Mr Springgy, Hermida Reverb as well as two DIY kits (1), (2) for those so inclined.

Compact in size, the Spring Chicken has just one knob – CLUCK – and controls the mix of dry signal to reverb signal. It can be used sparingly, to emulate the reverb of a classic Fender amp, or at maximum provide a real slappy spring emulation. The Spring Chicken also comes with an Expression Pedal jack to control the cluck by foot. However, a second version of the Spring Chicken soon appeared, the LE, that had another, unique control to the others on the market – DWELL. This mod pushed the spring sound to a far bigger reverb, allowing the control of the decay of the repeat from short spring slapback into huge soundscape cave reverbs. The LE was limited edition, but the Dwell mod is well sought after to expand the functionality of the pedal. It was offered directly from Malekko for a time, but they then moved on to the Omicron sized Chicklet reverb pedal – a unique design in a tiny box.

I have performed the DWELL mod to this Spring Chicken, fine-tuning the mod to create self-oscillation at maximum CLUCK and DWELL. By using the expression pedal, the amount of feedback/oscillation can be tamed and swelled in for a really unique effect. The pedal now behaves exactly like the rare LE pedals, as seen in the demo below.

After circuit-bending the Livingstone Super Overdrive, I thought I would track down one of the pedals that inspired the line, the Ibanez 5 Series. I managed to get an AW5 Auto Wah for cheap and thought it would make a good candidate for bending. I was right…

An auto wah is also known as an envelope filter or envelope follower. The sound of the wah is dependent on the attack of the strings of the guitar and is much faster than moving your foot on a conventional wah, therefore producing unique sounds. This effect was THE funk sound of P-Funk and Sly & the Family Stone in the 70′s. The Ibanez 5 Series wasn’t a very popular line but it does have a number of standout effects. The AW5 Auto Wah is one of them and is a great pedal for a filtered lead guitar sound. This is straight from the Ibanez catalogue:

“Our version of automatic wah is a little different than other touch or auto wahs: it has just a hint of distortion which adds some warmth to this great effect. The sensitivity control can be adjusted to increase response to your playing. Not just for wah effects, the AW5 can also be a more subtle manipulator of attack and tone. Great for guitarists or bassists, especially for bass players who want to create their own “synth-bass” sounds.”

The AW5 Auto Wah has three controls; Depth, Range and Sensitivity. The range of this auto wah is not as wide as many auto wahs but it does have a unique sound. This pedal shines with distortion or fuzz before it, making a great fixed wah tone that brings out the harmonics in your playing. A clean guitar tone through the AW5 is reminiscent of an AM radio sound. However, the circuit bends described below have taken this pedal further than initially imagined…

Pictured is the Ibanez AW5 Auto Wah before I worked on it. I have made a couple of hardware changes to the pedal. Firstly, I replaced the PCB actuator switch with an SPDT “soft-click” momentary switch. This improves one of the design flaws of the AW5. Secondly, I replaced the standard LED with a waterclear bright green LED.

I got this pedal from a friend Dave. He picked this up from the cheap supermarket chain Aldi for a handful of dollars and uses it maxed for a noisy, feedback pedal. He threw it to me and asked what I could do with it and the Frankenstein above is what eventuated…

This range of pedals are under the Livingstone brand (with motto “Music For Life”) but similar pedals can be found on eBay under the Daphon name. These are pedals that have been constructed with the cheapest of parts, and no doubt the cheapest of labour. They are aimed at the beginner guitarist looking for new sounds at a very affordable price. Pictured to the right is what the original pedal looked like. They look very similar to the Ibanez Soundtank series – or 5 series. They featured a number of pedals in the same shaped plastic case, and whilst having a couple of good pedals in the range like the Echo Machine and Auto-Wah, their durability limited their life span.

Since this Livingstone is used for sheer aural abuse, I didn’t go for a Boss SD-1 kind of mod (which this pedal shares extreme similarities to). I decided to push it further and circuit bend the pedal. For the unfamiliar, circuit bending is the non-scientific approach of purposefully creating short circuits to yield a new spontaneous and random noise generator. Bending is very popular in electronic and noise music as it provides something outside-of-the-box. However a number of rock artists including Tom Waits, Peter Gabriel, King Crimson and The Rolling Stones have been known to experiment with these sound generators. Circuit bending does require some basic electronic knowledge or else blown capacitors and ICs will occur, but the craft itself can be very creative and boundless with many of the obsessed benders referring to it as ‘sound art’. For more circuit bending info, check out this link, this link, or the Godfather of Bending Reed Ghazala‘s page here.

So after replacing the fragile plastic on/off actuator with a heavy-duty switch, I began probing around certain areas of the circuit that I thought would truly make this a “feedback pedal”. I managed to find three unique sounds, each of which are controlled by a small on/off toggle switch. Two of the bends provide an octave down and octave up oscillation. The pitch of each oscillation could be controlled by the volume and tone knobs of the guitar for interesting siren-like effects. The third bend provided a big boost in volume and gain, almost like the tone bypass modification of the T-34 Big Muff Bass Mod. This bend gave instant feedback and a raw punk distortion sound. This was a winner. So with that, Dave now has a one-of-a-kind cubisteffects Circuit Bent Livingstone, ready to terrorise his audience at every gig.

If you are interested and have a cheap pedal laying around collecting dust, I can circuit bend your pedal too and create your next inspiring sound.

Here’s a quick loop I did of the Circuit Bent Livingstone.

Clip Details: Fender Jazzmaster> Circuit Bent Livingstone>Line 6 DL4> Marshall JCM 600
Settings: Metronome-like beat made with the Livingstone and looped with the DL4, overdubbed rhythm guitar is neck pickup/rhythm circuit on Jazzmaster also with the Livingstone and looped with the DL4, and feedback through Sweep Echo setting on DL4.
Recording: SM57 > Mbox2 > Reaper

Circuit Bent Livingstone Super Overdrive
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The Line 6 DL4 Delay Modeler has become a staple on many guitarist’s pedalboards – from professionals to bedroom rockers. It packs 15 different delays into a four stomp box – enabling you to have anything from Floydish tape echos one second to reverse Hendrix solos the next. Expression Pedal control allows you to morph between two different saved settings in the one preset. For example, heel down of the expression pedal can be saved for 50% Repeats and 50% Mix and toe down can be saved for 100% Repeats and 100% Mix. This lets you ride the pedal into oscillation and back it off when it starts to run away.  The three presets give you your favourite sounds one-click away while the fourth switch is a tap tempo control. But perhaps the hidden gem in this versatile pedal is the excellent 14-second looper which lets you record a phrase and manipulate it via a one-shot, reverse, half-time or double-time speeds.

Line 6 also offers more Modelers in this four-button stompbox format: The MM4 is a Modulation Modeler that contains classic emulations of phasers, flangers, tremolos etc. The FM4 is a Filter Modeler and changes the guitar into a vintage synth with a step of a switch. A Distortion Modeler, the DM4, recreates many of the hard-to attain fuzzes, overdrives and distortions. The discontinued AM4, Amplifier Modeler, can also be found on eBay from time to time.

As much loved as the pedal is, it has gained a bad reputation as unreliable due to some design limitations. Firstly, the switches used are not on/off switches, but spring actuators that “click” a surface mount switch on and off. These switches feel unsturdy and are normally the first things to break. Secondly, many users noticed a volume drop when activating the pedal. The output level was affected by component values in the buffer circuit with varied levels of “drop” in different pedals.

The DIY community was pleased when pedal designer Jeorge Tripps (Way Huge, Line 6, Dunlop) released information in tackling these initial limitations, it led to a number of pedal makers and modders to offering their services to improve the Line 6 Modelers. Robert Keeley offers a hi-fi mod involving the replacement of IC chips for Burr Brown’s and some part-time modders (DRASP at Harmony Central Effects Forum) improving on the flexibility of the pedal. After intensive experimenting successes (and failures), cubisteffects now offers a number of modifications to the Line 6 Modelers.

cubisteffects offers not only a modification to rectify the initial design flaws but also has a number of modifications that can improve the flexibility of the unit, and some that push the pedal to become a new experimental tool.

STANDARD MOD

The Standard Modification involves three changes;

1. SWITCHES - The spring actuators are removed and momentary SPST “soft-touch” switches are installed. These switches are screwed to the pedal chassis and are wired to the place of the switch providing thousands of clicks without touching the PCB.
2. VOLUME DROP – Selected capacitors and resistors are removed and, if required, replaced with metal film components.
3. LEDs – The four red LEDs are replaced with superbright, waterclear LEDs of your choice.

EXPRESSION MOD

A rugged 24mm Alpha pot is placed on the bottom right of the pedal, adjacent to the tap tempo switch. This allows you to use the Expression Pedal controls without having an expression pedal take up pedalboard real estate. The modification enables you to save and morph between two settings per preset by rolling your foot over the knob. Settings are saved as per the Line 6 instruction manual. The knob can be put on either side of the pedal.

FEEDBACK MOD

This modification involves re-routing the output of the Modeler back into the input, and the new output selected by a switch on the top of the chassis. This is a feedback loop, and causes spontaneous bursts of noise, squeals, oscillations, drones – all depending on the setting selected. This modification is definitely for the more adventurous musician, but with every effect, the feedback can be used subtly. Most times the feedback can be deafeningly loud, so I have installed a separate BLEND knob to dial in the volume you wish.st be used with caution. The second knob controls the INTENSITY of the feedback allowing control of the amount, pitch, speed of the feedback depending on the delay setting.. A superbright, waterclear LED indicates whether the feedback loop is on or off.

Below is a demo:

Other modifications offered are:

TWIN PRESET MODIFICATION

This preset lets you save two different settings per preset as per the Expression Mod. However unlike the Expression Mod, the two settings are selected via a stomp switch. This allows you to instantly switch between two settings without the need for an expression pedal. The selected preset is indicated by a superbright, waterclear LED.

DISTORTION CIRCUIT BENDS – NO LONGER OFFERED

WARNING: Volatile and extreme modification. Not for the faint-hearted.
This mod involves two circuit bends that work around the same principle as the Feedback Mod but are much more pronounced and distorted. Crackling, white noise, fuzzed loops can all be activated via two independent toggle switches with a knob controlling the output volume for both. Superbright, waterclear LEDs indicate whether bend is on or off (but you can clearly hear them if they are on!)

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