Loco Box DS-01 Distortion & FL-01 Flanger! 80s Series MIJ

LocoBox Distortion and Flanger made for Washburn. These were sold under many labels.

Information about the origin of the Locobox effects pedals is few and far between. In the beginning, in the late '70s, all the pedals were handmade in a small factory in the city of Urawa, in Saitama, Japan. There were virtually only three men (the president, the designer and his boss) as well as six or seven women part-time jobbers. They did all the R&D, construction, testing, and even the silkscreening themselves. They started out selling their pedals to Arai Boueki (Aria), and these had the brand name "Locobox." The main brand name was Locobox, but they did make a few small runs of other brands that are exactly the same pedal. Identical to the Washburn, Studio Series, Redson, Gig, Cutec, Powervoice and others...

Distortion: 3 knobs; tone, distortion, level. Very solid die-cast case and footswitch. Went over it with our standard quality check and service and it passed. As you can see, it has a dinged up paint job and one missing case screw. Guess you can call it a "relic." The Japanese pots don't have date codes. The pots are smooth and quiet. Standard 9-volt power supply. Does also take a battery if you really want to put it in. They have a cult following as RARE early 80s Japanese distortion pedals. Sort of Rat-ish tones, in the same series as the "Stack-in-a-Box."

Flanger: A great 4-knob flanger. Goes from light shimmery sounds to the wacky jet airplane, swoopy and rollercoaster sounds. Fully tested.