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Red Witch Pedals releases limited edition Solaria 8-stage phaser

September 6, 2024 · 2 sources

Red Witch Pedals announced the Solaria, an 8-stage OTA phaser, on September 6, 2024. The New Zealand company's founder and CEO, Ben Fulton, describes it as his first OTA-based phaser design¹². The maker lists the pedal at 349 USD and, as of the announcement, marks it Sold Out¹.

The circuit uses Operational Transconductance Amplifiers rather than the FET devices in the company's earlier Moon Phaser, a six-stage design¹². Fulton writes that OTA phasers "give a very different sound to FET based phasers. More chewy. More 'jet-like'"¹. The maker calls the Solaria a "totally original 8 stage design" and notes that most phasers are 4-stage designs¹.

The pedal has four controls²:

Control	Function as described by the maker
Velocity	Sets LFO speed, from "a slow crawl right through to an ultrafast bubbling"¹
Mix	Blends the phased signal with the dry signal¹²
Resonance	Feeds some of the phased signal back into itself¹
Dimension	Wound back, the sound is "deep and pulse-y"; wound forward, "lighter and shimmery"¹

Fulton says the Dimension control draws on the Trajectory control from the Moon Phaser¹². Each unit is hand built with through-hole components, numbered and signed by Fulton, and uses hand-wired Neutrik jack sockets and a true bypass footswitch mounted independently of the main PCB¹². MusicRadar reports that Red Witch says the pedal works well on bass guitar and with overdrive pedals².

"I'm only building 79 of these pedals. Once they have sold out, there will be no more."

Red Witch Pedals¹

The maker states that all orders ship by DHL International express tracked courier, with freight free worldwide¹. MusicRadar describes the $349 price as one that "invites serious phaser heads only"².

Sources (2)