The following is a non-technical, non-scientific observation by nothing more than a wanna-be guitar player - take it for what it is worth...

My Swamp Thang tremolo arrived Monday (thanks GuitArtMan!). I have held really high hopes for this pedal. I really love the sine wave trem of my old Diaz Tremodillo. You can really hear the difference between sine and triangle wave trems if you listen. Triangle wave trems (like the Demeter, Fulltone, and any others that typically claim to be 'Blackface style' trems) don't hang around long at the top of the wave. They hit their max volume and then immediately start a constantly linear ramp back down. In contrast, sinewaves are nice and round so the volume "hangs" at the top for a lovely instant before plunging non-linearly back down the other side. Like a roller coaster, seeming to pick up speed as it goes. To my ears, no matter how slow and deep you set triangles, the waveform always sounds smaller in comparison to the sine style, and far more uniform. Add to the sinewave an apparent slight assymetric wobble (the tops are wider than the bottoms) and you get the Diaz style trem. If you prefer the melodic loping idle of a Harley over that of a Honda, then you know what I am talking about. Lovely.

The Diaz is the best sine trem I have ever heard. However, it has some drawbacks from my point of view. One, my Diaz is very old, and has no DC jack. Battery only is a drag. On a tightly packed pedalboard, having to unplug the input to any pedal when you are done playing in order to save the battery is a pain, and sometimes not possible without lifting the pedal completely off the board. Changing a dead battery is an even bigger pain. Ok, I admit to cronic laziness.

Also the Tremodillo isn't true bypass. I don't think a DPDT (let alone a 3PDT) switch would even fit. That isn't a deal breaker for me, but it is a smudge on the glass. Honestly not all partially bypassed circuits suck tone and as such don't warrant true bypass to be perfectly useable. The Tremodillo, however, is not one of these pedals. However, I believe the tone sucking to be very slight at least to my ears. I don't really hear it without A-Bing directly, which I rarely take the time to do. Still there is loss, I know there is loss, and let's face it, we are all here because we obsess over such things. The cool things about the Tremodillo are the very hip small little box (some off brand almost-MXR-sized box), and very, very cool trem. The Swamp Thang addresses the true bypass and the DC jack situation, but it does so at the expense of that ludicrously large box (mine is the "small" version even).

Both pedals are painted and chip if you look at them wrong. The Swamp Thang is so bad that one whole layer of paint peeled off the back when I put velcro on it. The velcro stuck to the paint, the paint stuck to the velcro, the paint did not stick to the box. Bummer. Fortunately the second layer of paint is the same color as the first and seems to be stuck to the pedal better. Both pedals are very attractive when the paint is attached. The Diaz is light blue with yellow lettering and black chicken head knobs. The Swamp Thang is a '60's Fender approved brown with white lettering and creme bottle cap knobs. Both very tasty looking, I just wish they were tougher. It should be noted that the new Diaz boxes are powder coated and that usually proves to be tough as nails. They also now have DC jacks and LEDs. Welcome improvements, though I have no first hand experience with the newer Diaz products.

Did the Swamp Thang sound better than the Tremodillo? Well, here is what I heard in my basement. Both have the sine waveform and can be setup to sound similarly gorgeous. The Tremodillo, however, has MUCH more depth (labeled 'Dwell' on the Diaz) available and can get down right choppy when cranked. The max depth on the Swamp Thang is about 60-70% of the dwell available on the Diaz. Also the Swamp Thang advertizes a smoother control sweep. The Diaz always takes a hit in reviews because much of the Dwell knob travel doesn't create any audible change, then comes on rather suddenly when it finally does. This doesn't bother me much so long as I can find a good sound on there somewhere. Still for quick live tweeks, a smoother sweep would be a real plus. The all-the-sudden dwell point on the Diaz is at about the 11 o'clock position. The point can shift somewhat based on the Speed setting because the two controls are very interactive. Much more so than you might be used to on a non-sine trem pedal. But, suprisingly there is a similar point on the Swamp Thang and it is even later! Around 12 - 1 o'clock, again varying with the speed. Even more apparent dead space than the Diaz! But since the depth on the Swamp Thang doesn't go as deep as the Tremodillo, it doesn't seem to come on all at once like on the Diaz. Still you will find your most playable trems somewhere between 1 o'clock and full-on with the Swamp Thang. In all fairness to both pedals this dead area in the depth/dwell is probably an artifact produced by standard pot values and the type of circuit used to generate a useable sinewave. But the point is, there is not much improvement here in the Swamp Thang. On the other control though, labeled 'Speed' on both pedals, the Swamp Thang wins out. Both get ludicrously slow ( I don't remember which one got slower - it's like a race between the continental drift of two land masses) but the Swamp Thang gets considerably faster than the Diaz. I wish I had the best of both controls in one pedal, but I am not one for the extreme settings anyway, so I didn't find a tie breaker here. The "useable" trems I found were VERY similar on both pedals, even if they were found at very different locations on the dials. The other most immediate difference in the Swamp Thang, compared to the Diaz, is that there is a big bump in volume when activated, at least at the basement level at which I was testing. The Tremodillo seemed to have no change or at most a very slight drop in volume. But it was VERY slight if any. Both pedals have been accused of tone sucking when engaged, but I didn't hear too much of it in mine. That may well change when I play the Swamp Thang at volume. I have played the Diaz at volume a fair amount and it has never bothered me. Neither pedal is anywhere near as bright when engaged as the Demeter. Still if the volume jump or extra presence bothers you, you might favor the Tremodillo over either the Demeter or the Swamp Thang.

One thing I see in the construction of the Swamp Thang concerns me. Every single cap in the box is an electrolytic - no exception. Some of those caps must certainly be in the signal path. I have always heard that electrolytics in the signal path make for harsh high end (they are perfectly acceptable outside the signal path, like knocking down AC ripple, etc). Half of Keeleys magic is that he removes all the cheap nappy sounding electrolytics (and ceramics) from mass produced pedals and replaces them with more expensive, better sounding caps. Cap quality and type make a world of difference in the tone of a pedal (or any audio appliance). Electrolytics also don't tend to last as long as other types (electrolytics dry out - I had one fail in an old KMD analog delay just last month). When I do play out with the Swamp Thang in the next week or so, I will listen very carefully for any hint of harshness. At any rate, from what I know now, I don't consider electrolytics to be boutique quality when they are in the signal path of such an expensive pedal. I wanted to compare the Diaz in this regard, but it is hard to open up and look at its circuit board without tearing things up (it is covered with a glued down piece of foam), so I have no immediate knowledge of Cesars componant choices. The Diaz is so small though, I doubt if electrolytics would fit. There are nine of the relatively bulky critters that I can see in the Swamp Thang. One item that could be a plus for the Swamp Thang, it has the better full sized pots. Swamp Thang also uses carbon comp resistors throughout. I have heard how good sounding these resistors are, but I have also heard that carbon film sound identical and are more stable over time. I hope the pedal doesn't sound different ten years from now because of componant drift.

While I was at it, I did a quick compare of the Swamp Thang to my Demeter. It is really apples and oranges though. What I said about triangle versus sine, is really where it is at when comparing the two. The difference really stands out to my ears. I prefer the sine most of the time, but many others do not. The Demeter had way more character to my ear when I compared it to the Voodoo Labs (four knob), and barely edged out the Fulltone IMO (in large part because of its smaller footprint). The Demeter has pretty good sweep in its controls. The speed control covers the entire speed range of the pedal, from slowest to fastest, so no speed footswitch is required. The down side of this arrangement is that the speed control is a little tweaky live. Move it a little and get large changes in speed, particularly, as it turns out, around the speeds I use alot. The Demeter will get up to ridiculously fast speeds. Faster than any other pedal I have heard or tried. So fast you almost don't recognize it as trem. It gets respectably slow as well. I don't remember testing it for sure but I don't think it gets quite the "go out to lunch and make it back in time for the next pulse" type of slow that the Diaz and Swamp Thang can achieve. It certainly doesn't sound as round at slow speeds as the Diaz/Swamp Thang. The beautiful about the Demeters controls, is that no matter what you do to the Speed, you rarely need to re-tweek the Depth. The controls for the triangle circuit are much friendlier than the sine circuits. The Demeter has an awesome subtle trem, the kind that makes slide solos melt like butter. The Demeter won't get as choppy as the Diaz at full depth/dwell, but probably about as choppy as the Swamp Thang. The Demeter never gets as round or as assymetrical especially in the bigger, more dramatic, trem settings. Again, some will prefer this, others won't. None of the pedals tested here offer a square wave setting. Really IMO, there is ample justification to own one of each, sine and triangle, particularly if you are a bonified trem-geek like myself (and you must be or you would have quit reading this thread several paragraphs ago!). But the jury is still out as to whether the Swamp Thang is really an improvement over the venerable Tremodillo. This one will take some time and hair splitting.

Thanks for the shootout, mapleneck. Did you ever get that bottom plate from that other company I posted on a while back (whose name I forget now)? Otherwise, I would suggest trying the Dunlop AC Jump. It's designed for old wah pedals that don't have DC jacks, but it works with most battery powered FX. It basically adds a DC jack through the pedal input. Downside is that you have to use this somehwat big & ugly plug, but it works perfectly and would solve your DC power issue.

I'll keep your name on file as I may have a little something for you to try in the future.

Oh yeah: carbon comp resistors = noise, noise, noise. Subjectively they may have a different tone (though in a 9V powered effect, the difference is zero) but one thing that cannot be argued about is carbon comps are noisier than carbon film, which in turn are noisier than metal film.

WOW... you must be bored!! I dont' know where I would find time to write a post like that!!

Anyway, thanks for the very complete review. I was planning on checking out a Demeter, but now I may have to try the Diaz as well. I had a Diaz about 6 years ago, and the only thing I remember about it was the "all of the sudden dwell point" you mentioned. It was either a lot of trem, or none at all. It was a hazy time....I don't remember much from 6-8 years ago...but I do remember the EXTREME amount of gear buying I did.

Head

All I can say is that the bias on my Tremulator must be set so that the triangle wave is rounded off to nearly a sine wave, 'cause the Swamp-Thang and Demeter were so damn close in my tests. Anyway, glad you enjoy it. I am wondering about the internal trim pot somebody mentioned on the Frantone though...

Another useless shootout? Hardly. Maple, when it comes to reviewing trems, you are The Man. I'd like to see you get your hands on a Toneczar Powerglide, so we could hear your spin on that one...

Very interesting! Thanks for that thoughtful and thorough review!

Chris

Yo guy -did you crack open the oscilloscope? I want to know the amplitude of the L-R ratio of the Demeter... ok, bad jokes are my other hobby.

An awesome review, Mapleneck, and I think I can speak for everyone when I say that we appreciate the time you took to be so detailed and thorough in your evaluations. It even got me in the mood to buy a Trem now! Kudos!

Ditto Tone Dog- thanks for the reviews Mapleneck!

Thanks guys for the compliments. Sorry it turned out so long. I just sort of typed it out (and yes I was a little bored at the time) and what came out, came out. Believe it or not it was a little longer at first. Oddly, Nathan, there was a longer disclaimer in the original, that specifically mentioned that NO oscilloscopes were used. These were all impressions, not technical observations. I am an engineer by trade, and frankly a little burned out on it all (almost 15 years now). When I play guitar, I turn the nerd off, and the artist on. Getting technical takes all the fun and magic out of it for me. That said I hope the thread is accurate enough that when you all go out and buy your trems, you get about the same results. I already caught one mistake in the thread. I said both pedals had a knob labeled 'Speed', when in fact the Diaz is labeled 'Rate'. They both have a 'Speed' footswitch. Anyway, hope someone gets some use out of these impressions.

davei, I emailed the company you mentioned about that box, but never got a reply. And a couple more emails have gone to Diaz, also with no reply. They must have better things to do. For those wondering what this is about, I was trying to build something like zvex's powerplate idea to power my old Diaz pedals. Unfortunately the standard hammond MXR box is slightly smaller and the bottoms don't fit. In fact I can't find any bottom that does fit, and no one, including several well know pedal builders I've emailed, seems to know who makes the boxes that Diaz uses. Simple idea, no glory. If anyone knows who makes these things PLEASE let me know.

Great review mapleneck! I almost went for the demeter the other day, but it sounds like I really want the diaz. Has anyone heard the newer ones? I also like the frantone alot for the switchable waveforms, but someone said it wasn't very deep.

What I should probably do is plunk down for the lovetone wobbulator thing and be done with it. :-)

Others I'd like to try: the bjf SYT and the sherlock tremit.

Morgan

You might email GuitArtMan about the Frantone. He learned after selling his that there is a trim pot inside that suppossedly deepens the depth.

Also try the Demeter before dismissing it. It is an awesome product. I love mine and will not be selling it anytime soon. The trem it makes is very useful and has a place. My post just reflects my love of the bigger sine trem. Others I have read didn't care for it. Sine trem has a place but isn't appropriate for every musical setting. As someone pointed out, it can tend to be all or nothing. You have to really finesse them into a subtle trem. They want to be big all the time. The Demeter is more polite and seems to be happy where ever you set it. Its forte IMO is the more subtle settings though. I just worry about people blowing hundreds of dollars because I said I liked something. Try before you buy, YMMV!

Thanks mapleneck. I guess I'm not exactly looking for polite or subtle. I like things fairly choppy (square wavey) and deep and pulsey, hypontic, but also i do some very fast stuff now and again. I've been through the supatrem, guyatone vtx, and the t-rex thus far.