Tone Bone Hot British
Radial Engineering is one the finest audio equipment engineering companies around today with a wide product line in both the professional and consumer industries. Their Tone Bone line of equipment for working musicians is top of the line and very applicable in today’s high-tech world of musician rigs. What’s nice about the Tone Bone series is that they have mastered both solid-state and tube electronics offering a full range of distortion pedals, switchers, and preamps.
My personal favorite is the Hot British tube distortion pedal. In my rig, this pedal serves as my “high-gain” drive sound. The Hot British uses one 12AX7 vacuum tube to create this over-the-top compressed distortion. It includes a variety of boost and cut switches to narrow in on just the right sound for your preference.
My only real complaint with these pedals is with the mechanical switch. After about a year of use, the switch on my pedal started to give out and not “engage” the distortion sound. Sometimes it created this “half distortion” sound that was very odd. I’m not alone either. I have friends with Tone Bone pedals and they complained about the same thing. I also read about similar problems on a few of the guitar gear forums.
What Happened
Well, the switch on my Hot British pedal finally broke off. Instead of sending it in for repair, I decided to see if I could tackle this repair myself. Disassembling the case is not difficult but it’s not easy either. You just need to keep track of the screws and parts. Radial did design this pedal so that it could be serviced properly. As you can see, the top of the switch is sheered off. The whole switch needed to be replaced.
What Next
End Result
After carefully reassembling the Tone Bone box, I plugged in and the unit worked perfectly. It was an easy DIY repair!
In the future, I plan to stomp a little less aggressively to help preserve the life of the switch. After all, it is just a mechanical switch!
Tone Bone Hot British
Foot Switch Replacement
by Chris Conte, Dec-08
