The wah pedal is a long-standing fixture on many pedalboards. The Cry Baby wah was the very first pedal I bought – and I still have it – but I’ve always preferred a “darker” tone in my wah sound. I find that when you “open up” the Cry Baby (toe down position), it’s too “pitchy.” Yes, I know, that’s not a word, but anyone who has run into the high-pitched squeals of an open Cry Baby wah knows exactly what I’m talking about. I could have replaced my wah pedal with something darker, but like many guitarists I didn’t want to spend $250 on another piece of gear. Correction: I wanted to spend the money on gear, but I can only hide so many guitar-related purchases a year, and adding another wah pedal seemed redundant.
I scoured the internet for mods and adjustments that I could make on my own and I was happy to find several websites, videos and articles that showed me how to change the tone of my wah pedal. But I encountered a problem: all of the instructions for the simple modification I wanted to make were scattered across many articles and not one of them had clear pictures and directions that were easy to follow, all in one place. It took me way longer than it should have to make the very simple modification because I spent most of my time flipping back and forth between various web pages and videos.
I pieced together the steps for my wah pedal “surgery,” and I learned a few simple things that I’m going to pass on to you so that you can find everything you need to do the modification right here on one page, saving you time – time which you can use to play your guitar. This modification was done on a Cry Baby wah, but any wah that has a similar mechanism can be adjusted the same way.
Tools Required:
A Philips head screwdriver
Your Cry Baby wah pedal

Time Required: 10-15 minutes including testing and secondary adjustments.
1. Take your Cry Baby wah pedal and turn it over so that the pedal you step on is on its back.

2. Unscrew the back panel of the wah pedal using the Philips head screwdriver.

3. Once you have your wah pedal open, look for a black plastic rack/arm and the pinion/gear that it rotates along.
4. Unscrew the white holder and push the arm back, as in Figures 1 and 2.

Figure 1

Figure 2

5. With the wah pedal’s toe position facing away from you, turn the pinion/gear forward or backward by one or two gear treads. If you want more high end squeals, turn the pinion forward towards the toe. If you want less high end, like I did, turn the pinion away from the toe of the pedal. You don’t need to adjust too much in order to have a relatively big effect on your sound. Figure 3 shows you a visual of what you are adjusting and the desired effect.

Figure 3

6. Click the arm back into position and tighten the screw in the bracket.
7. Don’t cover the wah pedal up yet! You need to test if you like the new levels of “swoop” you’ve created. Plug it into guitar and move the pedal up and down to see if you’re happy with how “pitchy” or not you have made it. If you like it, great, you’re done. If not, adjust the teeth of the pinion/gear forward or back until you’ve reached a “swoop” tone you’re happy with.

Remember to test before you put everything back together!

8. Once you’re done with the adjustments, screw the back cover on and put it back into your signal chain.
9. You’re finished! Voilà! A “new” wah pedal with a tone that matches your playing style without spending a dime.
I plugged a Michael Kelly Classic 50’s Series 57 Tele-style guitar, featuring a Little ’59 Seymour Duncan (with coil tapping capabilities) in the bridge. Coupled with a great Tele, the Little ’59 sounded like a great hard rock machine, capable of the wah sounds I’m after, and I was thrilled to hear the “darker,” deeper tone my wah adjustment gave my sound.
Give this simple modification a try. It costs you nothing but you’ve got everything to gain. Your tone will thank you. Let us know how your modification goes!