My Wampler Germanium Tumnus Deluxe has landed - indeed a pretty special overdrive, but could do with a couple of improvements

I’m really glad I managed to land one of these, while it was something of a challenging experience (ordeal even) all-round. I already reported that it took me 40-50 attempts across a 9 and a half our period to secure one of these.

The whole checkout process was so sensitive - that you could not really change any of the options or it would glitch out and crash again. As a result I was compelled to go for a rather dear shipping option of c $73 - which meant that my purchase price was @ $353 or £285 in my native currency. On top of this were the import and customs charges - which amounted to a further c £75 (c $95). So my final cost of acquisition was $448 or £360 equivalent - which leaves my Scandinavian value-centric soul somewhat conflicted.

There’s no wonder I’m sensitive to pricing these days - and could never really afford to go for the new Sinvertek SHODA and SHODB pairing @ $699 and $999 - as there would be such excessively exorbitant import charges for those values!

Controls - Bass, Mids, Treble, Volume, Gain, Buffer push-button on side.

Several have commented on a few of the aspects of this limited edition. The fact that it has a slightly lower output profile - which is wholly understandable (different clipping profile) - you therefore need to crank the Volume a little higher to achieve unity values than the standard Tumnus editions. Which for me is entirely predictable and no great shakes really - the pedal sounds fantastic - beautifully textured and with a balanced output profile.

I tend to have it set with Bass @ 2 o’c, Mids @ 11 o’c, Treble @ 2 o’c, Volume @ 3 o’c, Gain @ 3 o’c, and I fairly liberally flip between Normal and Hot output Modes.

My main niggle is in the choice of Footswitch - which is one of those clunky brittle crunchy ones - probably one of those ubiquitous Alpha types that were industry standard about 10 years ago. But things have moved on since then and most quality pedals nowadays have either soft-click or soft-touch varieties. For me it really impacts on the quality feel of the pedal - and kind of cheapens the experience. Most of my surrounding pedals on the board feature soft click or soft touch switches - it’s really only the cheaper varieties typically that have those crunchy hard-click switches!

I believe I also mentioned when I very originally reviewed the original Tumnus Deluxe - and wherever you have simple binary option toggle switches - you should rather have second footswitch to toggle that option. So in this instance you can flip in and out of Hot Mode on-the-fly! 

So this is not quite the ultimate Klon pedal as many are billing it - very decent for sure - and right up there in the hierarchy - but it does have a couple of flaws, however small they are.

I always try to consider the entire pedal ownerships and deployment experience - and all the little details matter - especially when speaking comparatively and within context. I also have the Beetronics Wannabee on the board (with its soft-click footswitches), and it’s Klon voicing is really exceptional - and pretty much the equal of the Germanium Tumnus Deluxe - just not quite so granular, but still pretty shapeable!

I also still have the Anasounds Sandman Dual Overdrive on the board - which has an excellent Klon voicing - meaning that there are currently 3 excellent Klons on my board - and all top tier!

It’s also worth mentioning that Way Huge sneaked out a Joe Bonamassa Special Diodes Limited Edition of its Conspiracy Theory Klone - a 550 unit limited ’Deep State Conspiracy Theory Diodes’ run - which sold out very quickly, in fact way before I could put out an article. I’m sure a few managed to snag both of those recent rare diodes editions - which for most it was surely a matter of one or the other! I would surely always go for the Wampler variant in such a contest.

So in short, I’m happy that I managed to land one, but from a value and experience basis it might have been a step too far in some ways. With all my acquisitions I have to balance the raw cost of the pedal with availability and likely additional charges. For a whole variety of reasons Brexit has made overseas pedal acquisitions much more complex and more costly than they used to be - which can limit my reach on occasion. And that is often why it’s so important for me to secure a discount if I can - as I’m always trying to get in as many and as varied a selection as I can each month. And excessively expensive pedals mean that I end up with a lot less to share!

Everything needs to be carefully evaluated, and taken with a pinch of salt!

Would be great to hear from those of you who managed to land either one of those rare diode editions Klones - for those of you who secured a Germanium Tumnus Deluxe - are you broadly in agreement with my sentiments here - or do you have a different take on this pedal?