Building a simple wood guitar pedalboard

After finishing up this lovely guitar rack over the summer, I was faced with a dilemma; a decent-sized board of nice wood and no obvious projects to use it on.  At some point my mind went back to the drawer of scarcely-used pedals and the disorganized tangle of cords that kept me from ever using them.  Since pedalboards are ridiculously overpriced to buy, building one would be the perfect DIY solution to all of these "problems" at once.

To preface, I should point out that my cheapskate ideology isn't very accommodating to fancy schmancy pedals when I already have a modeling amp that can seemingly do everything (except wah and looping; the distortion was more because it looks cool).  

So, although my pedalboard takes minimalism to the next level, it's no problem to make it as big as your tastes and equipment demand.  Scaling horizontally is as easy as cutting two boards longer, and scaling vertically, while not quite as simple, still only requires some first-grade math and adding another plank.

I also initially planned for the board to be angled, then decided to lay the planks flat for a more durable and easier project.  The challenge you take on is up to you, although I'll say I haven't found myself wanting for an angled board even once.

While most saws I have access to are pretty dull and awful to work with, the chop saw is incredibly sharp and fast.  I used this to the absolute maximum for this build, to the point of near silliness, as you can see above.

I designed my board to fit three to four pedals and a power supply, and measured accordingly.  It's simply two slabs with a gap between them for the connector cables and power wires to fit into.  Two legs prop up the bottom, and I didn't feel a need to close off the bottom with another board.

Measure twice, cut once.  Drilled and countersunk for screws.

I decided to throw some wood glue on the "legs" before screwing it together, for good measure.  It's had absolutely no durability problems, despite being hauled through a couple cities.

Now this part may seem a little silly to some, but it works great for me - I custom fit the board around this Behringer wah pedal.  Yes, I shaped my woodworking around a $50 pedal by a low-end brand.  And I've been happy with it, so do what you want!

This primarily meant drilling four holes to fit the feet.  Measure real carefully here and it'll be a beautifully OCD-satisfying experience as your pedals are locked into place.  Measure wrong and you'll spend a long time with a file trying to make a fit that you will never be completely happy with.

It wouldn't lay quite flat still - forgot about the battery cover.  A little routing took care of that nicely!  This is also the point where you'll want to drill holes for power wires from your power supply, as you like according to the setup you have.

It'd hardly be a gig-worthy piece of kit if it were left as raw wood - I used an old can of 2-in-1 stain/sealer, and two coats made this look pretty dang good in my opinion.

Once populated by the pedals in question, it's a fine looking piece of kit!  It's survived moving between houses, frequent stompage, and my roommate kicking it out of the way twice daily for about 6 months now and looks no worse for wear, so I'd consider that a success!

It's about as gosh-darned simple as you can get for woodworking and it has an element of class that plastic and velcro boards never will, so I hope you'll build and enjoy them as well.