QUICK HIT: Using our pedalboard planner, I'm building a hypothetical pedalboard

to illustrate some simple best practices as it relates to using overdrive pedals and

arranging a pedal signal chain according to available conventional wisdom. Other

effects used include delay, reverb, chorus and several others.

• 6-minute read

• Article URL: https://www.guitarchalk.com/pedal-chain-order-overdrive/

In this hypothetical pedalboard build, I'm going to use our pedalboard

planner app to properly design and sequence a collection of guitar pedals

with a focus on placing an overdrive pedal, specifically.

This is meant to show how a pedal chain order should look, assuming

you want to feature and position an overdrive pedal in its most effective

spot.

If you want to follow along, you can access the pedalboard planner

app here.

Keep in mind, the gear I'm using in the app is fairly close to scale,

meaning the dimensions are available for each pedalboard and pedal and

are set in relation to one another. In other words, three five-inch pedals

would fill up the depth of a 15-inch deep board.

Here's a quick look at the board and pedals I'll start with:

• Pedaltrain Nano Plus

• Boss SD-1 Super Overdrive

• EarthQuaker Devices Sea Machine Chorus

• Boss PH-3 Phase Shifter

• Strymon Blue Sky Reverb

• Boss Waza Craft Analog Delay

To start, I'll setup my pedalboard in the app and make note of its

dimensions. For this build I'm using the Pedaltrain Nano+ which is a

narrow board that allows us to setup a linear pedal chain. Per the

Pedaltrain website, this board is roughly 18 inches wide and five inches

deep.

Pedaltrain Nano+ dimensions and weight. Image via Pedaltrain (View

Larger Image)

In the pedalboard planner app the board looks pretty basic.

Starting with the Pedaltrain Nano+ (View Larger Image)

Typically, compression and volume pedals are the first effects to come

after your guitar in a signal chain. From there we would go to filter or

pitch effects and then distortion.

1. Volume

2. Compression

3. Filter/Pitch (wah usually)

4. Distortion

Starting with Distortion

This means the Boss SD-1, our token overdrive pedal, will go first in the

signal chain and be our tone's first stop coming out of the guitar.

From our list, the overdrive pedal goes first. (View Larger Image)

From there we should be looking for anything in our list that would fall

under the category of modulation, which in our case would be the phaser

and chorus pedal. This means the gain increase from the SD-1 will run

through the modulation which will then layer over top of the increased

gain. In other words, we want to be modulating gain instead of increasing

the gain of our modulation.

Any modulation effects should be placed after your overdrive pedal. (View

Larger Image)

“We want to be modulating gain instead of increasing the gain of our modulation.”

Following conventional signal chain wisdom, we would end the path by

adding any pedals that would be considered ambient. Ambient effects

include anything that manipulates time, namely delay, echo and reverb.

If you recall our list we had two such pedals picked out, the Strymon

reverb and Boss Waza Craft analog delay.

Ambient effects at the end of our signal chain. (View Larger Image)

My personal preference is to have delay before reverb, so that if you're

using both you get the echoing mix figured out before you send it into

what is a subtler manipulation. However, the difference in how you place

effects within a single category is far less impactful.

The same goes for modulation effects, where I've placed my phaser pedal

in front of the chorus. Switching them up would be of little consequence.

Let's look at a couple more hypothetical scenarios with this board.

Adding a Second Distortion Pedal, Filter Effect and an Effects Loop

I'll add a second distortion pedal with a more robust EQ system, as well

as an envelope filter, both replacing an ambient and modulation effect.

I'll also assume (just to make it more interesting) that we're now

working with an effects loop.

Per Strymon's recommendation, let's take a look at a typical signal chain

order when throwing your pedalboard into an effects loop:

Effects order in a signal chain with an effects loop. (View Larger Image)

The pedalboard will look the same, with the caveat that we make sure all

ambient effects are placed inside the effects loop, while the rest of our

effects will stay directly between the guitar and amp.

Let's start by adding the two new pedals.

Replacing the phaser and delay. (View Larger Image)

I've taken out the Boss phaser and delay and want to swap them out with

a heavier distortion and the Keeley envelope filter. However, I don't want

to directly swap them, given the recommended order. Instead, we'll

bump the filter to the front of the signal and put the SD-1 behind the

heavier distortion since this particular pedal can function more as a

preamp for my pedal line.

Shifting the order to get the filter effect in front. (View Larger Image)

That distortion pedal is the AmpTweaker Tight Metal Jr, which is a

robust enough distortion effect to be viable as a standalone preamp.

Putting it in front of your overdrive gives you more power on the front

end of your EQ, while the Keeley Neutrino functions as a kind of hi or lo

pass filter on a mixer channel.

The following graphic is the same, but with some labeling that further

explains the signal path and reasoning behind it.

Labeling the effects order by category. (View Larger Image)

Pedal Chain Order Takeaways with an Overdrive Pedal

Understanding what happens to an electric guitar signal is - at times -

difficult and lacking any kind of straightforward explanation. You really

have to place your effects in a particular context before figuring out what

the best practices are going to be and even then you're relying on broad

conventional wisdom.

However, there are a few things we can takeaway, even from

hypothetical pedalboard build,s that involve an overdrive pedal.

1 . OVERDRIVE EFFECTS SHOULD COME AFTER FILTERS BUT BEFORE MODULATION

Not only overdrive, but any pedal that impacts the gain of your signal

should be placed after your filter effects. Following gain would be effects

in the modulation category which would include phaser, chorus, flanger

and tremolo. This way gain amplifies a pre-EQ'd tone and modulation

layers the entirety of the signal (all the gain).

2. YOU CAN USE MORE THAN ONE OVERDRIVE IN YOUR SIGNAL CHAIN

Most guitarists who use multiple gain sources get at least one of those

sources directly from their amplifier, though in our example we use a

distortion pedal to serve as a preamp that is placed before our overdrive.

The overdrive then serves as a booster for the first pedal.

3. EFFECTS WITHIN A CATEGORY ARE GENERALLY INTERCHANGEABLE WITHIN THAT CATEGORY

It doesn't drastically impact your tone if you mix up effects within a

single category. For example, the ambient effects - reverb, echo and delay

- can be arranged among themselves without significant audible

consequence.

Conclusion

Again, pedal chain order advice has a lot of subjectivity attached to it.

Because it's really hard to give good answers without knowing the

context of a particular guitar rig. That's why it can be helpful to use

something like a pedalboard planner to actually plan out a board, even if

it's just a hypothetical setup.

The Guitar Chalk Pedalboard Planner is free and easy to use, so feel free

to check it out and build up some of your own board ideas.

If you have questions about this setup or about using overdrive in a

signal chain, leave them in the comments section below and I'll do my

best to answer.