NucleusVintage Boost

From the vendor

A reproduction of a boost pedal from the early 1970s that featured a two-band tone stack.

The Nucleus Vintage Boost is a clone of the Colorsound Power Booster, a transistor-based boost/drive pedal with 2-band tonestack that was first sold in 1970 by the Macaris music store in London.

The Power Booster ran at 18V using two batteries in series. There were two versions, an “early version” and a “later version”, with some minor part differences between them. (See build notes for details.)

The Colorsound Overdriver was an updated version of this circuit, a third revision from 1972, that dropped the power requirement down to a single battery. The Overdriver is available as another project, called the Plasma.

The Nucleus is a direct clone of the Power Booster that allows you to build either the early version or late version, with the addition of an output volume control which the original unit was sorely lacking. This way you can set the gain according to the tone you want without being tied to the volume that is produced along with it.

It also includes an on-board charge pump for 18V operation from a normal 9V supply so you don’t need to hunt down an 18V adapter for correct operation.