The making of... Mango Man Pedal Board #001

[cajone5]

Well this has been a long time coming and a repeat will make its way to TGP sometime tomorrow but here, for your viewing pleasure - Mango Man Board #001. This is a unique and beautiful pedalboard built by our very own Donnel (hawaii121). He was kind enough to put this together for me over the past few weeks and I wanted to put together a thread to document the build process and give the man a little much needed publicity for his work. So here goes...

The board started as a slab of mango wood that Donnel hand picked and shaped into a ~12"x~21" rectangle as you can see below. It was routed along the top and bottom to hide some of the power and patch cables and keep everything looking neat and tidy.


Here's a photo that gives a bit of perspective on the board size.


Then the board was coated entirely in black....


...and sanded to bring out the grain...


Next, the entire board was stained yellow (the first of a few colors added to give it the burst appearance)


Then the board was stained green to complete the burst appearance on the top side


Another photo with a pedal to give size perspective...


The underside was stained blue at one point... although it appears to be green now? ... but here's a picture of that anyway


Finally the board was polyurethaned and waxed...


...and the legs were attached and the bottom was routed to accomodate a power supply or two and/or a stealth/hidden pedal...


Then, after some discussion with Donnel, I decided to get a PP2+ to mount on the underside. I had it shipped directly to him and after some mixups with PGS (Twin PP2+'s) Donnel kindly mounted the PP2+ snuggly and securely to the bottom of the board as shown here...



Finally, he signed it, added serial # 001 and sent it off across the US to Washington D.C. And here are some photos of it after it arrived..


I've been really meaning to get it all wired up and ready to go but my life is in utter chaos currently (in the process of interviewing and trying to move out of the area all without alerting the current employer... joy...) but this weekend I at least had some time to get everything laid out and get the majority of the pedals velcroed into their respective places. The only ones without velcro currently are the BJFe drives which I have some fear of velcroing (although that video by Donnel w/ the diaper method will probably end up being put to good use ). So for now, here it is...




I'll update this thread once I get it all wired up (which may be a couple+ more weeks) but wanted to share all this with the forumites out there. Oh, and he's got a couple other projects in the works but I'll let him share those photos with you . I have to say, I think the current board he's working on looks just as great if not better than this one.

Thanks again for everything Donnel!!!

[strings2wood]

3 cheers for the artist and the artiste.
Thanks for this cajone5.
What a fine post and tribute to the work and vision.
Incredible process to produce a labour of love that is
obviously loved and appreciated.
Man that's just got to put a smile on your face every time you look at your board.
Hats off for the photo story and Donnel's craftsmanship.
Great collaborative project.
Nice board too!!!!
#001 just has a nice ring to it!!!!
Bet it won't be the last!!!!

[melodichaotic]

+1 on that for sure--Great job and thanks for posting
Nice grain never gets tiring to look at A platter well worth
serving those mostly BJF/MP pedals on.

[ptbarnum]

Yes!
Beautiful board, and documentation..

[cajone5]

So I've done some re-thinking on the board layout and I'm still trying to figure out what 3 BJFe drive pedals I want to have on the board but here are some updates on the board. The first couple show the "permanent" (Ha... righhht....) ones and the open spots are for 3 drive pedals (which is overkill... I know ). The end is what I'm playing around with now. I've got 4 drive pedals to choose from...

1. SYODv1
2. SYODv2
3. MHv2
4. HBOD

And here she is By the way the JMI MKII is going to work with this one as well off to the side since it takes up too darn much room!

Top:



Bottom:


Filled Board:



Any recommendations for best combination of the 3 drives listed above?

[Bobby D]

i love how beautiful that wood is with the sunburst finish!!!

[strings2wood]

Filled Board:

Looks Fantastic!!!
How is the KLON working for you? I value it as much as the HB to my surprise,
but find it works better with some BJF's than others.
Also can your swap the favourite switch from the El cap
to use with your other Strymon pedal (just wondering).?
I actually just bought an El cap from the maker of your board!!!!
2 good deeds both courtesy of Donnel in Hawaii!!!!!!

[hawaii121]

Thanks for all the props on the board! Donner should have his soon. I did not do the velcro rout on the bottom of his board, but his is HUGE "USS Donner" and should be able to hold 12 pedals or so. Hopefully Don will be just as pleased. This is such a great site loaded with good people and good gear thoughts.

[Donner]

Yupper! # 003 USS Donner landed today ..... Ill take some before pics of my board now and try and document the transfer, uh arming of the aircraft carrier

[cajone5]

Yupper! # 003 USS Donner landed today ..... Ill take some before pics of my board now and try and document the transfer, uh arming of the aircraft carrier

Can't wait to see more photos of this one... the sneak peak I got during the build process made it look INCREDIBLE. It's really got some attitude