***Edit 4/15/26

I am still taking some mods/repairs, however I'm very picky about what I'm taking on. If it's something that takes an hour or less of labor, sure. Above that, which is most mods, I'll be passing on those. Thanks!

***

So I started Loophole Pedals back in 2016 with pedal modifications. It's been a long journey since then. I've modified hundreds of pedals since then. I've learned so much through the process and made so many solid friendships in the modding and DIY community.

The first pedal I modded was the legendary Line6 DL4. The pedal suffers from footswitches that wear out from standard use, and I'm honestly shocked that the manufacturer never remedied the problem in the two decades the pedal has been around. The pedal also has some open space at the top that is perfect for drilling out to add additional "hacked" features. We would add a looper mode shortcut and a couple other options that made the pedal more versatile.

While I did enjoy the process of mastering modifying certain pedals, others definitely were a pain to work on. By the time I studied the circuit and taught myself how to do the mods on some pedals, I would end up working for pennies compared to the hours I put into the piece. 

All in all, I made plenty of money building my brand around custom modifications; serving users of brands such as Boss, Line 6, TC Electronic, Keeley Electronics, Way Huge, Strymon, Ibanez, MXR, JHS, Electro-Harmonix, and many others. At the peak, I offered mods for over 80 unique pedals both modern and vintage. 

Despite my success, I continued to feel less and less satisfied modding pedals. I've broken it down to a few reasons...

1. Building someone else's brand

No matter which pedal I modded, I was handcuffed to using someone else's product. I was able to lower my costs by becoming an authorized dealer for some brands, but I was still trapped filling my Instagram with other people's logos. I also found that the only mod packages that sold were pedals that had big brands behind them. I worked on far more Boss and Line6 pedals than boutique pedals or Joyo/Chinese pedals.

2. Finding Less Joy

Working on the same kind of mods over and over again made me feel like I was stuck in my professional growth. It became difficult to look forward to another order coming in as it became just...another mod. I didn't feel like I was being creative like I used to when I would come up with a new mod idea. I learned just about as much as I wanted to on the modification side and yearned to build more of my own creations. In fact, I started growing a wait list for the release of my next batch of Grey Matter drives, only to find that there simply wasn't enough time in the day to do mod orders AND build my own product line.

3. Difficult to guarantee work

Because mods are essentially "hacks" to an existing circuit, it was difficult to guarantee the work I was putting into modifying a pedal. Some of the units that would come in would be well over 20 years old, on their last leg after numerous gigs and better times. My warranty would be for "parts and labor" but how could I follow up with a warranty when I was voiding the manufacture warranty on everything I modded? It placed a lot of liability on myself and forced me to replace some units that simply died on the operating table.

4. Not scalable

When you run a business, you have to be constantly thinking, almost paranoid, about how to grow your business. Mods required me to have hands on every single project. I had to wait for the product to arrive from the customer. Unpack it. Test it to make sure it even worked before I operated on it. Log it in a queue, and inform the client it arrived safely. Then there was disassembly of the unit and finally the actual mod process! Then reassembly, repackaging, shipping, and a customer service follow through. Talk about a LOT of work! There was a time where I was able to outsource some of the mod services to a close friend in the mod community, however I saw my profits dwindle with the additional overhead to a point where I was wondering why I was even doing mods in the first place.

I've grown to the point where I'm not able to grow Loophole through modification services. It's a great way to get your name out there by piggybacking off other well known brands, but by it's own nature, it is limited to the reputation of someone else's brand. It was fun in the beginning but eventually caused a drain on my own joy. Guaranteeing one's work is limited to the mod. If something dies on the table, I would be on the hook for the replacement. Finally, it's destined for "hobby" businesses and I'd like to scale eventually.

 If you're looking for someone to mod your pedal, feel free to reach out to some of the other giants in the pedal mod community like Johnny @ Alchemy Audio.

-Mike @ Loophole Pedals, 2/24/26 5:56pm.