Neon distortion

Some time ago i’ve stumbled upon this video https://youtu.be/BmYvxnKo2pA?si=-QWfVxrDH-txgYTA, basically he builds a distortion pedal with a neon discharge lamp
I was wondering, would it make sense to convert it into an synth module? it would be cheaper than valve distortion but cooler than diode distortion

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Since when did we let “making sense” stop us from turning shit into modules?

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It is a known fact that this is exactly the scenario the JFDI accreditation was created to celebrate.

JFDI!

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You’re right! I just wanted to hear other opinions, i was a bit concerned about the power demand and the EMI generated by the transformer so i wanted to hear more professional ones
Right now i’m a bit busy with other stuff (i’m rebuilding my synth psu) so I can’t get experimenting, i will start asap

I’ve seen this video long time ago (probably soon after it was posted). I had to grin as I remembered an even older thread at some guitar pedal forum when a member (rather naively) asked if one could use a neon lamp for distortion, and a well-known DIY pedal guru responded quite dismissively that it won’t work, so the question was left at that. It reminded me how, sometimes (safety and common sense taken into account) we just need to try out things ourselves despite the, often, dismissive opinion of whatever experts.

I do recall that I’ve looked around and saw that I had all the parts (or reasonable substitutions anyhow) to try this, but never actually got around doing it. It should work, but I don’t think it would be very practical for guitar or anything else, apart from the novelty factor of course.

So …. perfect for this lot

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I just saw this. You are right. There is a place for anything.

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