User Guide

Stompbox Layout is a free browser-based tool for working out where the holes go in a guitar pedal enclosure, and turning that into something you can drill to. There is nothing to install: open the app and you are in the editor.

The first time you open it you land on a demo layout rather than an empty canvas, so there is something to drag around before you have decided anything. Move a hole, fit a knob, spin it in 3D. When you want to start your own, click Clear canvas in the banner across the top.

Creating an account

You can lay out a whole enclosure and export it without signing in. What you cannot do is come back to it later, because nothing is saved until you have somewhere to save it, so a reload loses the layout. An account also gets you image uploads, your own saved components and reusable templates.

Sign up with an email address, or with Google.

Starting a project

The narrow rail down the left edge of the editor holds three buttons: new, open and export, in that order. They are icons rather than words, so hover one if you are not sure which is which.

The first one opens Start a new project, which is where every layout begins. Blank layout is the first card, for an empty enclosure. Next to it, search for the circuit or board you are building: PedalPCB, Fuzz Dog and Aion FX boards are in there, and picking one opens a layout already drawn for it, which you can then save as your own. Your saved templates share that row once you have made some.

Name the project by clicking the title at the top of the screen. After that it saves itself as you work, and the cloud icon beside the name tells you where that has got to.

Would rather be shown around than read? Help > Take a tour walks you through the editor a step at a time.

Found a bug, or missing a part? Click Feedback at the top of the editor (or Help > Send feedback) and tell us. We reply by email.

Stompbox Layout is free to use. If it has saved you some time, Support at the top of the editor (or Help > Buy me a coffee) is where to chip in.

The rest of this guide takes one feature at a time. This section takes one pedal, from an empty enclosure to a printed template you can tape down and drill, so you can see how the pieces fit together before you go looking for any of them.

A three-knob overdrive in a 125B: two jacks, a DC socket, a footswitch, an LED and three pots.

1. Pick the enclosure. Open the Enclosure panel on the right and choose 125B under Hammond. The canvas redraws as the top face with the four walls folded out flat around it, which is the shape you will be drilling. More on enclosures.
2. Place the parts, not the holes. Press L to open the component picker and choose a pot. You get a hole at the right drill size with the body of the real part drawn around it, which is what tells you whether three of them will fit. Do the same for the footswitch, the jacks, the DC socket and the LED, dropping each roughly where it belongs. More on components.
3. Put the side-mounted parts on the sides. Drag the jacks and the DC socket out onto the folded-down walls. Parts on a wall also draw how far they reach back inside, on the top face, so you can see what they will run into. More on footprints.
4. Line the pots up. Select all three, press ⌘↑ to align their tops, then ⌘⇧H to space them evenly. Snap lines appear as you drag to show when something is centred on the face or lined up with its neighbour. More on alignment.
5. Fit the knobs. Select the three pots, open Knob in the right-hand panel and pick one: all three get it. This is the step that shows you what the pedal actually looks like, and holes that looked comfortably apart often turn out to be knuckle-tight. More on knobs.
6. Read the warnings. Anything that overlaps, hangs off an edge or sits on a corner screw boss is flagged on the canvas, and the Warnings panel gives you the millimetres so you know how far to move. Clear them before you go any further. More on clearance warnings.
7. Check it in 3D. Press 3 and turn the enclosure over. Parts stand up as solid blocks reaching inside, so a jack that fouls the pot behind it is obvious here in a way it never is on a flat drawing. Press 2 to go back. More on the 3D view.
8. Export and print. Press ⌘E, take the PDF, and print it at Actual size rather than Fit to page. Check the printed ruler on the sheet with a steel rule before you trust it. More on exporting.

Tape the sheet to the enclosure, punch each centre, and drill. Our guide to drilling a pedal enclosure covers that half of the job. If you have a 3D printer, the drill jig does the punching for you and wraps the sides as well as the top.

Open the Enclosure panel on the right to select a preset or define custom dimensions. Built-in presets include:

• Hammond: 125B, 1590A, 1590B, 1590BS, 1590BB, 1590BB2, 1590BBS, 1590XX, 1590J, 1590P1, 1590LB, 1590D, 1590DD, 1590TRPB
• StompBoxParts.com: 125B Pro
• Tayda: 125B, 1590A, 1590B, 1032L, 1590LB, 1590D, 1590DD, 1590BB2
• Gorva: C65, S90, M45
• CamdenBoss: RTM5007

The 1590TRPB is a trapezoid: the top narrows toward the bottom of the canvas, and the two long walls slant in to meet it. Its dimensions show a Wide end and a Narrow end in place of Width, and it has no Swap button. Place parts on the slanted walls as on any other: the Selection panel, the arrow keys, Align and Flip all work along and across the wall, and a shape you draw there sits square to it. The 3D view, the PDF and the SVG follow the slant. The DXF draws each slanted wall square, so you can zero on its centre mark. The drill jig covers it too, slanted walls included. The Tayda tools aren't available for it.

Each preset populates the width, height, depth, corner radius, boss radius, and wall thickness for that enclosure. You can override any of these values for a custom fit.

Preset dimensions come from CAD or manufacturer datasheets, but may not match your exact enclosure. A Tayda differs slightly from the equivalent Hammond, for example. Always measure your enclosure and confirm the fit before drilling, and adjust the dimensions if the preset doesn't match the enclosure you have.

Width and height are of the top face (not the open base), and depth excludes the lid. Measure your own enclosure the same way so the numbers line up.

Custom dimensions

If your enclosure isn't in the preset list, enter its dimensions manually, measured the same way: width and height across the top face, depth without the lid. To work in inches, see Units. The swap button flips width and height to turn the enclosure round.

Need an enclosure that isn't listed? Request one by email, or use Help > Send feedback in the editor.

Press H or go to Object > Place hole to add a hole to the canvas.

Hole properties

Select a hole to see its properties in the Selection panel:

• Name, so you can tell holes apart (e.g. "LED", "Gain")
• Position, its distance from the top, bottom, left or right, measured to the nearest object or to the edge of the face
• Radius / Diameter, the drill size in mm or inches
• Backlight, on a hole with no component: pick a colour to see an LED behind it light up in the 3D view

In the Objects panel you can also toggle:

• Hidden, hides the hole on the canvas without deleting it
• Locked, prevents accidental moves or edits

Positioning

Drag a hole to move it, or type exact values into the position fields in the Selection panel. Use the arrow keys to nudge in 0.1mm increments, or hold Shift to move 1mm at a time. Hold Shift while you drag to move in a straight line, only across or only up and down. Snap lines appear automatically when a hole lines up with another object or the enclosure centre.

A component places the hole for a real part at the right drill size. Pick from the built-in library or save your own. Press L or go to Object > Place component to open the component picker.

To change a part you have placed, select it and click its name under Component in the right-hand panel. The same picker opens, and the part you pick takes its place. The cross on that field takes the part off and leaves a plain hole.

Default components

The built-in library covers the parts you reach for most: pots, 1/4" and DC jacks, toggle switches, and footswitches. Each is modelled on a real, widely used part with the correct drill diameter, and many include a scale-accurate outline (see Component footprints). The list grows over time, so open the component picker for the current selection.

These dimensions come from CAD models of real parts, so they should be accurate. Some are generic, and we can't guarantee an exact match to the specific part in your hand. Always measure your own components and confirm the fit before drilling.

An LED low-profile lens comes in clear, red, amber, yellow, green or blue. Select it and pick a Colour under Component to see that lens in the 3D view.

Bare 3mm and 5mm LEDs are in the library too, for an LED that pushes straight through its hole with no lens or bezel. Pick its Colour the same way: red, green, yellow, white or blue.

Custom components

You can save any hole or group of holes as a custom component to reuse across all your projects. Select the holes, then use Object > Save as component. Custom components appear alongside the defaults in the picker.

Need a part that isn't in the list? Request a component by email, or use Help > Send feedback in the editor.

A footprint is a scale-accurate outline of the real part on your layout. Many of the built-in components come with one automatically; for anything else you can draw one by hand (see Component body); a part with neither shows just its hole. Either way, you see its true size and shape, so you can check it fits: that it won't overlap a neighbour, overhang an edge, or foul the lid.

Depth and reach

For a part mounted on a side wall, you also see how far its body reaches into the enclosure, drawn on the top face. That makes it easy to spot a jack or pot that would clash with something inside before you drill. A top-mounted part shows only its face outline, since its depth runs straight down out of view.

Show, hide, and rotate

Press F, or use the Component footprints item in the View menu, to show or hide the outlines. The component body boxes you add have their own Component areas toggle (press ⇧A). Select a hole and set its Rotation in the selection panel, or press ] and [, to turn its outline (and body box) in 90° steps to match how the part sits in your build.

Behind the panel

To sit a part further into the enclosure, select it and set Behind panel under Component: an extra washer or nut inside, or a pot soldered to a circuit board. Its outline, the 3D view and the clearance warnings all move with it, and the hole stays where it is.

Not every part has a built-in outline. For anything else, you can enter its size by hand and Stompbox Layout marks out the space it needs behind the panel as a shaded box, so you can check clearance the same way you would for a built-in part.

Select a hole, open Component body in the selection panel, and enter the part's width and height to draw the box. Add a depth to show how far it reaches into the enclosure, and use Offset X and Offset Y to shift the box when the part sits off to one side of its hole. It is a guide to help you place parts, not a guarantee of fit.

Match it to the part in your hand

As you type, a small diagram shows the distance from the hole centre to each edge of the box: the four numbers you would read off with a pair of calipers. Nudge the offsets until those distances match your measurements and the box lines up with the real part.

Body boxes show, hide, and rotate together with the built-in outlines, appear in the 3D view once you set a depth, and print on your PDF.

As you lay out your enclosure, parts that won't fit are flagged so you can catch a problem before you drill. A part is flagged when it overlaps another, hangs past the edge of its face, sits too deep for the enclosure, lands on a corner screw boss, or wears a knob too big for the room beside it.

Where two parts foul each other, the overlap itself is shaded, so you can see which edge is fouling and how badly. A part on the top face fouling one on a side wall is shaded on both, either side of the fold between them. Where there is no single spot to point at, because a part hangs off an edge or sits too deep, the part is ringed instead. Red means it does not fit. Amber is a near miss: it clears, but only just.

The Warnings panel lists every one with the millimetres, so you know how far to move. Selecting a flagged part also shows the reason at the bottom of the screen, and the same clash turns red in the 3D view.

Show or hide

Warnings are on by default. Press W, or use the Clearance warnings item in the View menu, to hide or show the shading and rings on the canvas. The Warnings panel keeps listing them either way.

They work from the built-in footprints and any component body sizes you add, so the more accurately a part is described, the more reliable the check. Treat a warning as a prompt to double-check against the real part in your hand.

Fit a knob to a pot or rotary switch and your layout reads like the finished pedal instead of a drill plan. It makes spacing much easier to judge: two controls whose holes look comfortably apart can be knuckle-tight once the knobs are on.

Fitting a knob

Select a hole, open Knob in the right-hand panel and click the field under it. Every knob is shown with a picture, grouped by size, and you can search to narrow them down. Pick one and it appears on the canvas straight away. To take it off again, click the cross on the field's corner.

Knobs sold in more than one colour, like the MXR and Rat styles, show their colours under the knob. Pick one to see it on the canvas and in the 3D view.

Knobs are named after the part you'd order, with the style they're better known by underneath, so you can search for either. We're adding more over time.

Select several holes and one pick fits them all, so a three-knob pedal takes a single choice. Anything in the selection that can't wear a knob is left alone, so you can select the whole layout and only the pots change.

Which holes can wear one

Pots and rotary switches, at any bore size, plus plain holes roughly between 5.5mm and 10.5mm. The Knob section only appears when something in your selection can take one, so you won't see it on a footswitch, a jack, an LED or an image.

Turning it

Once a hole wears a knob, a Rotation slider appears under the knob. Drag it, or type an angle, to point the indicator where you want it. The scale runs from -180° to 180° with straight up in the middle, and positive turns clockwise, so 90° puts the pointer at 3 o'clock. The 3D view shows the same angle.

Position it by its edge

To put a knob a set distance from the enclosure edge, use Knob edge, the section under Measurements. It shows the room the knob has on each side, and you can type the gap you want and let the pot move itself.

The gap it reports is the one you can actually see, from the edge of the knob to whatever is nearest in that direction. That is the enclosure edge most of the time, and the other knob when you have two lined up. It always reads edge to edge, whatever the measurement mode is set to, and it still works while knobs are hidden.

Nothing else moves when you use it: only the pot's own position changes, so your other holes, drill files and jigs are untouched.

Room to fit, and room to turn

Two knobs can foul each other even when the parts underneath have plenty of room, so clearance warnings watch them as a pair. They catch the case you cannot see, too: a knob with a pointer or a beak sweeps a wider circle as you turn it, so two of them can sit with a visible gap and still collide half way round. The canvas shows the room each knob needs and shades the sliver two of them are both asking for, and the Warnings panel gives you the millimetres.

Where knobs show

On the canvas, in the 3D view, and in a layout you share or embed. In 3D they stand on the part's nut and bushing the way a real knob does, so you can see how far each one sits proud of the panel. They only show on the outside of the enclosure: switch to the inside view and they step out of the way, since you're looking at the back of the panel.

Knobs never reach anything you drill from. There are none in the PDF or SVG, the drill jig or a Tayda drill file, so fitting one can't change a hole position or size.

Hiding them

Press K, or use the Knobs item in the View menu, to hide or show them. It covers the canvas and the 3D view together, and it's a display preference rather than part of the design, so it sticks across projects and across reloads. The knobs you have fitted stay fitted while they're hidden, and hiding one does not excuse it from the clearance check.

A wiring board on the back of the footswitch takes up a good deal more room behind the panel than the switch on its own, and it is the part most likely to end up against a jack or a pot. Fit one to your footswitch and the layout draws the space it really takes, measured from the real board.

Fitting a board

Select the footswitch and open Board in the right-hand panel, then pick from the list. The section only appears when what you have selected can take a board, so you will not see it on a pot or a jack. To take it off again, click the cross on the field's corner.

Select several footswitches and one pick fits them all. A board lands on the switches it actually fits and skips the rest, so a layout with two different switches in it still does the right thing.

Placing the LED

Where a board puts its own LED, a dot on the layout marks the spot, and Place LED puts a 3mm LED there, with its leads running down to the board in the 3D view. Not every board has one: some pass the LED out on flying leads for you to put where you like, and those show no dot and no button.

The LED it places is an ordinary part from that point on, so you can name it, colour it, or swap it for a lens or bezel from the components library like any other. The other side of that is that it will not follow the switch if you move the switch afterwards, so place it once the footswitch has settled.

What a board affects

Clearance warnings cover it like any other part, which is the point: you find out that the board fouls the jack now rather than with the enclosure drilled. The board draws on the canvas and stands up in the 3D view, and like a knob it never reaches anything you drill from, so fitting one cannot move a hole or change its size.

Missing a board? Ask under Help > Send feedback, with a link to the product page.

Put a label beside a hole and a scale round its knob, and your layout shows the lettering of the finished pedal. It is kept small on purpose: labels and scales, placed exactly round your holes, in one style, and a logo. For anything more, take the SVG into your design app.

Adding a label

Open the Artwork tab in the right-hand panel and select a hole on the top face. Under This hole, type into Label, or press Use hole name to copy the hole's name in. Clear the box to take the label off again.

A label can carry the arrows ▲ ▼ ◀ ▶ and a true minus sign, pasted in, so a switch can read −/+.

A label sits round its hole at a Label angle and a Label gap. The angle runs clockwise from straight above the hole, so 180° puts the label underneath. The gap is measured from the edge of the knob, so fitting a larger knob moves the label out with it. With no knob it is measured from the edge of the part's nut, or of the hole itself. On a knob with a pointer the edge is as far as the pointer reaches, so type a gap below zero to bring a label underneath closer.

Adding a scale

On a hole that wears a knob, switch on Scale round the knob. The scale is drawn to fit that knob, so a bigger knob gets a bigger scale.

Naming a switch's positions

In the same Artwork section, under Position names, type the names into Names with a comma between them: CLN, CLASSIC, MAX. Leave an entry empty to skip a position, as in FAT,,GLASS. A pot or a rotary switch shows these fields once it has a knob.

On a toggle switch the names follow its lever, so each one is where the lever points. Two names stand one at each end of its throw: left and right of a switch that throws sideways, above and below one that throws up and down. Set Layout to Together to keep the two side by side instead. Three or more go in a row beneath a sideways switch, or a column beside an up-and-down one. With three, set Layout to Around the switch to put the outer two at the ends of the throw and the middle one off to the side. Side moves a row above the switch, a column to its left, or that middle name across. Turn the switch with its Rotation and its names turn with it.

On a hole that wears a knob, the names stand round the knob instead. On a pot they are spread over its scale, which suits MIN, MAX. On a rotary switch each name sits where the pointer lands, and Scale round the knob draws one mark for each. A rotary switch from the library starts at its own click, 30°; on any other hole, set Step between positions to the angle it turns per click.

Marking the power jack

Select a DC jack on a side wall and switch on Power symbol under This hole. The polarity symbol is drawn on the top face beside the jack, and follows the jack when you move it. Choose the Polarity, type the supply into Voltage (9V DC, or 9-18v DC), and set how far in from the edge it sits with Gap. Clear Voltage to keep the symbol alone. It is sized with your labels until you set its Symbol size under Whole face.

Marking the jacks

Select an audio jack on a side wall and set Jack arrow under This hole to Input or Output. An arrow is drawn on the top face beside the jack: an input's points into the pedal, an output's points out. Every arrow shares one size and gap, set under Whole face, so a row of them stays in line. For words instead, like OUTPUT or CV IN, type them into the jack's Label: they print on the top face beside it, reading along the edge. A jack carries one mark at a time: words, an arrow or a power symbol.

Arrows on a toggle

Select a toggle switch from the library on the top face and switch on Arrows under This hole. Two arrows are drawn where its label goes, pointing the two ways the lever throws, and they turn with the switch. With a label as well, they sit on the line under it.

A border

Switch on Border under Whole face for a line round the face. It always sits inside the area Tayda can print, and it leaves a gap wherever a label, arrow or symbol sits on it.

Printing a logo

Place an SVG image on the top face, select it, and switch on Print as artwork under This image on the Artwork tab. Its filled shapes are drawn with the labels and scales, in 3D and in the SVG export.

An image in one colour prints in your ink, or set Colour to Its own colour to keep the colour it was drawn in. An image with several colours prints in its own colours. To go in the print file, it needs to be filled shapes. If it has text, stroked lines or gradients, a warning beside the switch says what to change in your design app. You can still switch it on to see it on the enclosure in 3D, as drawn, but it is left out of the print file and listed in the Warnings panel.

One style for the whole enclosure

Every label and scale shares one look, set under Whole face on the same Artwork tab, below what you have selected. The tab stays open as you click from hole to hole.

• Ink, white or a colour of your own, and the Enclosure colour it goes on
• Finish, a clear coat Tayda add over the print at extra cost: gloss on the print, or matte over the face. When you order, choose the same coat in Tayda's dashboard
• Under Typeface: Family (Inter, Barlow Condensed or Bebas Neue) and Weight, for every label, number and name
• Under Labels: Height, Gap (how far every label sits from its knob; setting it replaces any Label gap given to a single hole), and Uppercase text to draw every label and position name in capitals without retyping it
• Under Scales, the marks round a knob: Style, from plain ticks to dots, arcs and ladders, and Numbers for 0 to 10 or MIN and MAX round it. Gap, Line weight, Depth and Number height are for fine adjustment
• Under Position names: Separator, a space or a slash between a toggle's positions when they are in a row (CLN / CLASSIC / MAX), or lines from the switch out to each name, Gap, how far from the switch they sit, and Text height
• Under Arrows and power symbol: Arrow size, for every jack and toggle arrow, Arrow gap, how far in from the edge a jack's arrow sits, and Symbol size, the height of the power symbol's circles
• Under Border: Inset, how far in from the edge of the printable area the line sits, and Line weight

The Scales, Position names, and Arrows and power symbol groups show their fields once your layout has something for them to style. Until then each one says how to add it.

Reset to defaults puts the style back as it started, and every change can be undone. The style is saved with your project.

This hole has its own Reset to defaults once you have moved a label or a switch's names on that hole. It puts their angle, gap, layout and side back to follow Whole face, and leaves the label and the names you typed.

Where it shows

On the canvas, beside each hole, and in the 3D view, where the enclosure is painted in your enclosure colour and the labels and scales are drawn on it in your ink. You can change any of it while you are in 3D, which is the easiest place to judge colours against each other.

Labels and scales go out in the SVG export on a layer of their own, as outlines, ready to finish in a design app. They are not on the PDF or DXF, the drill jig or a Tayda drill file, so adding one can't change a hole position or size.

Ordering a print from Tayda

Tayda's UV printing service prints artwork onto an enclosure. Open Export and choose Tayda Print to see your labels and scales as they sit on the top face, then download two files. The print file is the one Tayda take. The design file is the same artwork with your holes and knobs on a guide layer: open it in your design app to add anything more, then delete the guide layer before you order.

The tab lists anything it had to leave out of the file, and anything worth a look before you order, such as a label that touches another. Check your file in Tayda's PDF Analyzer, and order one enclosure before you order several. Drill it from the Tayda drill instructions so the holes and the artwork come from the same layout. For a real order from start to finish, see how to get your enclosure drilled and UV printed by Tayda.

It covers the enclosures Tayda print: the 125B, 1590A, 1590B, 1590BB, 1590BB2, 1590XX, 1590D and 1590DD. It's a one-off purchase that covers every project you make, and the price is shown when you pick it in Export. Get the print file at the bottom of the Artwork tab opens it too. After you pay you come back to the Tayda print file in Export, and your files appear there as soon as the payment comes through.

Hiding it

Press A, or use Artwork in the View menu, to hide or show labels and scales, on the canvas and in 3D together. Like the knobs toggle it is a display preference, so it sticks across projects and reloads, and hiding them removes nothing.

Switch to 3D for a solid view of the enclosure with your holes cut into each face, then rotate and pan to inspect the layout from any angle. Use the 2D / 3D toggle on the canvas, or press 3. Switch back to 2D (or press 2) to move things; reloading always brings you back to 2D.

Click a part in 3D to select it, or Cmd-click (Ctrl-click on Windows) to add more; selected parts glow blue. Your selection carries between 2D and 3D. With a part selected you can change its component, knob and colours in the Selection panel, pick parts from the Objects panel, and delete them, and see each change on the model straight away. The enclosure, its labels, scales and enclosure colour, and undo and redo all work in 3D too.

Built-in parts, and any component body you have given a depth, show as solid blocks reaching into the enclosure, so you can check nothing clashes inside before you drill.

The gear button in the corner of the 3D view opens View options, which holds two:

• X-ray, to see through the shell to those blocks and the cavity inside
• Orthographic camera, which drops the perspective, so holes that line up on the enclosure line up on screen. Worth switching on to check a row of pots by eye: with perspective, the far end of a row leans away from you and an even row can look uneven.

The canvas opens in outside view: the enclosure as you'll drill it, seen from the outside. Picture it sitting open, top face up, with the four walls folded down and outward until they lie flat, so the top and every side sit in one plane in front of you.

Inside view shows the same layout the way you'll wire it, from the inside. Picture flipping it over to rest on its top face, then folding the walls flat the same way: now you're looking down into the open enclosure. Left and right swap to match, and any part with a footprint shows its back, so the lugs and terminals you solder to line up with the holes you drilled.

Switch between the two from the View menu, with ⇧I, or the view badge on the canvas, which always shows which side you're looking at. Your drill exports and shared previews always stay as seen from outside, so what you send to drill never changes.

Press I or go to Object > Place image to add an SVG image to the canvas. Images are useful for overlaying decal artwork, PCB outlines, or reference graphics onto your layout.

Image properties

Select an image to adjust:

• Position, top, bottom, left, or right distance relative to its nearest neighbour or the enclosure face edge
• Size, width and height
• Rotation, angle in degrees
• Opacity, transparency from 0% to 100%
• Anchor X / Anchor Y: the image's reference point (see Set a reference point below)

Images are stored in your personal library. Upload new SVGs from the image picker dialog.

Note: Only SVG files are supported.

Set a reference point

An image snaps, aligns and rotates about its middle. For an asymmetric part (a jack, or a knob whose indicator sits off to one side) you often want it to line up by its mounting point instead.

Select the image and set Anchor X and Anchor Y in the Selection panel to move the reference point. The artwork stays put: only the reference point moves, and snapping, alignment, rotation, and the measurement readouts then use it. A small green marker shows where it sits; set both values back to 0 to recentre.

Not the same as the multi-selection anchor in Alignment (⌥+click), which chooses how a group of objects aligns.

Click the shapes button in the bar at the bottom of the canvas and pick Rectangle, Ellipse or Triangle, or use the matching Object > Place item. Most shapes are annotation: mark out a zone or highlight part of your design. A rectangle or triangle can also become a cutout, a real opening in the enclosure rather than a drawing on it, with the Cutout switch at the top of its Properties. For your own circuit board, use the circuit board button instead.

Shape properties

Select a shape to adjust it in the Selection panel:

• Width and Height, its size in mm
• Rotation, angle in degrees
• Corner radius (rectangles only), to round the corners
• Fill and Stroke, the inside and outline colours; turn the fill off for an outline-only shape
• Opacity, transparency from 0% to 100%

Drag a shape to move it. To resize it, drag one of the handles on its corners and edges, or type a Width and Height. Lock the aspect ratio in the panel to keep its proportions while you resize, or hold Shift while dragging a handle to switch the lock for that drag.

Annotation shapes appear in your SVG export. To include them on a printed PDF, tick Include annotation shapes in the export dialog.

Cutouts

A rectangle or triangle can be a real opening instead of a drawing: the slot for a slide pot, a window for a display, a rectangular hole for a connector. Select a rectangle or triangle and switch on Cutout at the top of its Properties in the Selection panel. Ellipses stay annotation.

A cutout is drawn like your holes, without the fill and outline colours you gave the shape. Switch Cutout off and your colours come back.

Set the Corner radius to half the bit you drill the corners with: a 3mm bit leaves 1.5mm corners. An inside corner is never sharper than the tool that cuts it. Leave it at 0 for square corners.

Cutouts carry to every drill template at their true size, and they do not wait for the Include annotation shapes toggle the way the shapes above do. They open up in the 3D view as well, so you can see the panel with the opening in it.

To see an LED shining through an opening, pick a colour beside Backlight, under the Cutout switch. The cutout glows in that colour in the 3D view. Click the slashed tile to turn it off.

Clearance warnings watch them too. You will see one if a cutout does not sit on a single face, so it cannot be made as one opening, or if it runs over a corner screw boss.

The drill jig has each cutout open at full size, so you can trace round it onto the enclosure. In a Tayda drill file, cutouts go on the Shapes tab and holes on the Holes tab, and cutout sizes are exact, without the allowance for powder coating that the drilled holes get. Tayda's form takes a triangle at one angle only, so the drill file leaves out any triangle at another angle and says so: use the PDF or SVG for it.

Some parts bring their own. Fit a slide pot from the components library and its slot arrives with it, already sized and placed, and it stays a cutout because that is what the part needs.

Circuit boards

Add your own circuit board inside the enclosure with the circuit board button in the bar at the bottom of the canvas (choose Rectangle), or Object > Place circuit board, and click to drop it where the board sits. It is green and see-through, so the parts under it still show. Its size and its board settings are all under Properties in the Selection panel. Each part ticked on it shows its pads on the board, on the canvas and in 3D, so you can see how close they sit.

If your board is not a rectangle, give it its real shape. In your PCB tool, plot the board edge layer (Edge.Cuts in KiCad) as a DXF, then choose Import outline from the same button, or Object > Import circuit board outline. The board arrives at its true size, notches and curves included, and parts are checked against that shape, so one sitting in a cut-away corner is not flagged. Holes and cutouts inside the board are left out.

To make the DXF in KiCad, open the board in the PCB editor:

1. Choose File > Plot.
2. Set Plot format to DXF.
3. Under Include Layers, tick Edge.Cuts and nothing else.
4. Click Plot. The file is saved in the output directory shown at the top, with a name ending -Edge_Cuts.dxf.

The other settings can stay as they are: inches or millimetres both import at the right size.

An imported board keeps the size it was drawn at. If it turns out to be back to front, select it and use Flip horizontally in the toolbar. To change its shape, delete it and import the new outline.

Under Parts on the board, tick every part whose legs go through it. Jacks, switches and anything else left unticked are checked against the board, as are the enclosure's walls and corner screw bosses, and a part that hits it gets a red triangle beside its name and a clearance warning.

Mounted on sets how deep the board sits. Pots takes the height from the ticked pots, since a PCB-mount pot holds a board at a known height, and shows it greyed. Standoffs lets you type it. Thickness is 1.6mm unless you change it.

A snap-in pot has no nut, so it sits on the board rather than the panel. Tick it and it moves back to wherever the board is. A horizontal snap-in pot on a side wall can be ticked on a board under the top face, and its distance from the wall is its Behind panel setting.

A right-angle DC jack or a horizontal snap-in pot on a side wall, ticked on the board, has to sit at the board's height to solder to it. If it doesn't, it gets a red Align button beside its name and a clearance warning. Press the button and the part moves along its wall to sit on the board.

Pin a part and its distances to the board's edges are drawn on the canvas, measured where its legs meet the board. They follow the board as you nudge or drag it, so you can put the board exactly where the drawing says. Press the pin again to hide them. Hover a part to preview its distances. On a board with an imported outline they run to its outer rectangle, not into a notch.

In the 3D view the board draws as a green slab with the pots' legs through it, and a clash shows red there too.

Click any object to select it, or drag on the canvas to draw a selection box. Hold ⌘ and click to add or remove objects from the selection. Press ⌘A to select all objects.

To pick up every hole that matches your selection, choose Edit › Select same (or right-click) and then Diameter, Component or Knob. Change a field in the Selection panel and it applies to all of them at once.

Grouping

Select multiple objects and press ⌘G to group them. Grouped objects move and transform together. Press ⌘⇧G to ungroup.

Layering (z-order)

Holes always sit on top of images. To choose which image is on top of another, use Object › Order or the raise and lower buttons on the toolbar.

Duplicating & deleting

Press ⌘D to duplicate selected objects. Press Backspace or Delete to remove them. Deleted objects can be recovered with undo.

When multiple objects are selected, use alignment shortcuts to line them up precisely:

Align

• ⌘←, align left edges
• ⌘→, align right edges
• ⌘↑, align top edges
• ⌘↓, align bottom edges
• ⌘H, centre horizontally
• ⌘V, centre vertically

Anchor a multi-selection

With several objects selected, centring, flipping, the measurements, snap lines and the Top/Bottom/Left/Right fields all work from the middle of the selection. To work from one object instead, ⌥ (Option/Alt)+click it to make it the anchor. ⌥+click it again, or the selection outline, to clear it.

Distribute

Even out spacing between three or more selected objects:

• ⌘⇧H, distribute horizontally (even spacing)
• ⌘⇧V, distribute vertically (even spacing)

To space objects across the whole face instead, choose Object > Distribute > Horizontally across face (or Vertically across face). The face edges count as part of the spacing, so nothing ends up against an edge. Select objects on one face first. It works on a single object too, centring it on the face in that direction.

Pick what comes out even at the top of the Distribute submenu. Space centers evenly spaces the centres. Space edges evenly evens out the gaps between the holes themselves. Space knob edges evenly evens out the gaps between knobs, and works when every part you have selected has a knob. If spreading would make parts collide, nothing moves and you are told why.

Flip & mirror

• ⌥H, flip selection horizontally (reverse order)
• ⌥V, flip selection vertically (reverse order)
• ⌥⇧H, mirror horizontally (create a mirrored copy)
• ⌥⇧V, mirror vertically (create a mirrored copy)

Build evenly-spaced rings of holes around an existing hole or image, such as a ring of LEDs round a rotary switch.

Select exactly one hole or image to act as the anchor, then click the compass icon in the right-side panel tab strip to open the Place around form.

Fields

• Number of holes, how many to place around the anchor (1–36)
• Placement radius, distance from the anchor's centre to each new hole's centre. It starts far enough out for the new holes to clear the anchor.
• Start angle, where the first hole sits (0° = up, clockwise positive)
• Angle step, the angle from one hole to the next. It starts at an even ring, and shows when Number of holes is 2 or more
• Hole diameter, size of each new hole

Live preview

As you type, a guide circle and markers appear on the canvas showing exactly where the new holes will land. Nothing is committed until you click Place, or press ⌘↵ (Ctrl+Enter on Windows) from anywhere while the panel is open. Switch tabs or change selection to abandon without committing.

After placing

The new holes are selected (and grouped together if there's more than one) so you can fine-tune their properties in the Selection panel. The original anchor is deselected. Press ⌘Z to undo the entire ring in one step.

Snap lines

As you drag objects, snap lines appear automatically when an object aligns with:

• The centre of the enclosure face
• The centre of another object
• The midpoint between two aligned, evenly spaced objects, useful for centering a component between two others in a row

Coloured guide lines indicate the active snap.

Grid snap lines

Press G (or use the View menu) to overlay evenly spaced snap lines on the top face, and objects will snap to the grid intersections as you drag. Set the number of columns and rows in the Grid section of the Enclosure panel.

Grid lines are useful for common layouts like “4 knobs in a row” without having to calculate positions manually. They can also be pinned as measurement references in reference mode.

Measurement modes

Toggle how positions are measured:

• M, toggle between measuring from the centre or edge of a hole
• ⇧M, toggle measuring against the enclosure edge or a reference point
• Tab, cycle through available measurement targets

Dimension lines with values appear in real time as you drag, showing the exact distance from the measurement reference.

Quick measure to any object

With a single object selected, hold ⌘ and hover any other hole, image, or enclosure edge to see the distance from your selection, without changing what's selected. Release ⌘ and the overlay disappears. Handy for quick checks like “is this 8 mm from the jack?” without re-clicking.

Reference mode

Press R to enter reference mode. Click on snap lines (including midpoint lines) to pin them as measurement references. Press ⇧R to clear all references, and Escape to exit reference mode.

Units

Sizes and positions are in millimetres unless you switch to inches from the Preferences menu, or by clicking the mm/in readout in the status bar.

Use the toolbar zoom buttons or the keyboard shortcuts to navigate the canvas:

• ⌘+, zoom in
• ⌘-, zoom out
• ⇧1, zoom to fit (the whole enclosure)
• ⇧2, zoom to your selection

Scroll with the mouse to pan around the canvas. To zoom instead, hold Option on a Mac, or Alt on Windows, while you scroll.

You can also hold Space and drag to move around the canvas, or drag with the middle mouse button.

Scrolling to zoom keeps whatever is under your pointer where it is, so you can work on one corner of a crowded layout without panning back after every step. The buttons and the keyboard shortcuts zoom to the middle of the view instead.

Theme

Switch dark mode on or off from your account menu (your picture, top right). The app defaults to your system preference.

Every action that changes your layout is tracked in the history:

• ⌘Z, undo the last change
• ⌘⇧Z, redo

The undo/redo buttons in the toolbar also show whether history is available. Every change to your layout can be undone. Undo and redo work in the 3D view too, so a label, scale or colour you change there can be taken back without leaving it.

Press ⌘E or click the export button at the bottom of the left-hand rail to download your drill template, and pick what to download from the File type list. PDF, SVG and DXF are free. The drill jig, the Tayda print file and the PCB export are in the same list and are bought separately: each wears a crown, which stays once you own it. If you don't own the drill jig yet, the PDF, SVG and DXF have a link to it.

PDF

A vector PDF rendered at 100% scale, ready to print. The template includes guide lines to help with alignment on your enclosure, and every sheet carries your project name and a cm/inch ruler so you can confirm the print is true size. Toggles let you include the following, and only the ones your layout has something for are shown:

• Labels, each hole's name and drill size, and the size of each cutout. The top of the sheet says whether the sizes are in mm or inches
• Component footprints, outlines of placed components plus any component body boxes (off by default; see Component footprints)
• Images, any SVG images you've placed
• Annotation shapes, the rectangles and ellipses you have drawn. Cutouts are not on this toggle: they are part of what gets made, so they always print.

For an enclosure too long to fit one sheet, the PDF tiles across A4 pages to trim and tape, with the option to print on a single A3 sheet instead.

Important: When printing, make sure to select "Actual size" (not "Fit to page") in your printer settings. This ensures the template is dimensionally accurate.

Once it is printed and taped down, our guide to drilling a pedal enclosure covers the rest: punching the centres, pilot holes, and step drilling to size.

SVG

A scalable vector file with enclosure outlines, hole circles, and crosshairs. Useful for importing into vector editors like Illustrator or Inkscape for further customisation.

DXF

A drawing for CAD and CNC, in millimetres. Every hole and cutout is drawn at true size, each side of the enclosure sits on its own layers, and a small datum cross marks the centre of every side so a machine can be zeroed on it. Hand this one to whoever is drilling or milling your enclosure for you.

PCB (KiCad)

A KiCad board file to start your circuit board from. Your pots, LEDs and toggles are placed on their footprints where the holes are, and your enclosure's top face is drawn on User.Drawings, with a line inside its walls and round its screw bosses showing where a board fits. It opens in KiCad 8 or later, and is bought separately.

If you have drawn a circuit board on the layout, the file uses it and the parts ticked on it. If not, Parts lists the parts on the top face, and any parts in the walls that solder to the board, such as a PCB-mount jack, to pick from. The board is a rectangle fitted round them, ready to resize in KiCad. A part with no footprint yet is marked on User.Comments for you to place. Point at a part in the list to ring it in the preview.

In the component lists, a part with a footprint carries a green KiCad tag, so you can pick parts that land on their pads.

Pots says which side of the board they solder to: the bottom (B.Cu) unless you change it. With the pots on the bottom the layout is mirrored, because KiCad shows the board from its top side. View > Flip Board View shows it from the pot side, as on the enclosure. The preview in the export panel shows the board the way KiCad will open it.

Changes you make in KiCad stay in KiCad. To move a part, move it in your layout and export again. If you reshape the board in KiCad, plot its edge and import it as a new circuit board, then delete the old board and place the new one where it was.

Hole diameters

Need just the drill sizes? Go to Tools > Hole diameters for a table of every hole and its diameter, shown in your chosen units.

The drill jig is a template you 3D print from your own layout and drop over your enclosure. Every hole centre becomes a bore you punch a mark through. Take the jig off and drill each mark, to suit the hardware you are fitting. It wraps the sides as well as the top, so jacks and DC sockets are covered by the same seating. It's a one-off purchase that covers every project you make: see pricing.

Any cutouts in your layout are open in the jig at their full size and shape. Trace round each one onto the enclosure, then cut to the line.

Click Get a drill jig at the top of the editor to open Export with the drill jig picked. Once it's yours the button reads Your drill jig. After you pay you come back to the same place, and the download appears there as soon as the payment comes through, usually within a few seconds.

It's a marking template, not a drill guide. Punch each centre through it, then take the jig off and drill. A twist drill run through the bores cuts them oversize as it goes, so the jig would lose accuracy the more you used it, and it would do so unevenly.

Printing it

Print the file as it comes. It arrives lying plate down, which is the orientation it's meant to print in, so it needs no rotating and slices without supports.

Don't scale it. The fit depends on the part coming out at the size it was built, so anything that changes the dimensions works against it. We print and test in PLA, though nothing rules out other materials. What matters is that your printer is dimensionally accurate, not which filament is on it.

Fitting it

Dropped over the enclosure, the jig should go all the way down until the plate lies flat on the top face, and pushing it on and lifting it off should take hand pressure rather than a tool. The plate carries a small triangle at one edge and your enclosure's name on the inside face, so you can tell which way round it goes and which enclosure it was built for.

A gap you can see at the top edge is normal. The jig grips at one depth, part way down the enclosure's walls, and those walls slope inwards towards the top face, so above that depth there's meant to be daylight. It's also why the jig can look like it's standing off the enclosure while gripping perfectly well. What matters is that the plate sits flat and stays put.

The plate sitting proud is the one thing that's never right. The punch only reaches a few millimetres through the plate, so if the plate is held up off the enclosure the punch stops short of the metal and marks nothing at all. Don't force it: check you're using the enclosure the layout was drawn for, then measure the print as below.

Checking a print

If you want to know whether a print came out right, measure across the inside of the jig with calipers, just below the plate. The app tells you what that should be for your enclosure where you download it: press the ⓘ beside Measure your enclosure first. On a 1590TRPB, which narrows toward one end, it gives the length and the width across the middle. If yours comes out wider, your printer is running large, and that's worth correcting there rather than in the file.

A tenth or two under is normal and does no harm. Prints tend to come out fractionally small, and a slightly smaller jig simply grips a little tighter. It's the other direction that matters: if yours measures more than about 0.3mm over, that's enough clearance to feel, and it's worth correcting your printer before you print anything else dimensional.

Take the reading just under the plate and nowhere else. Further down, the walls are deliberately cut away so they can't grip, so a measurement at the open ends will be larger and tells you nothing.

If it seats but barely marks

A jig that drops on perfectly and then leaves faint marks, or none at all, is telling you the bores are too small for your punch. The punch is a cone, so a blunter one wedges in the bore before its tip reaches the metal, and it does that without any sign that anything is wrong.

The fix is to match the jig to your punch. With the drill jig picked in Export, choose Match to my punch, print the small test strip it gives you, and press your punch into each hole in turn. The right hole is the smallest one that still leaves a clean dent. Enter that and every jig you export from then on is cut to it. It's per printer and punch, not per project, so it's a one-off.

Still not right?

Email stompboxlayout@gmail.com with your enclosure, printer and filament, and the measurement from "Checking a print" above. That one reading rules out most of what can go wrong and is the quickest route to an answer.

Tayda Electronics offers a custom drilling service for enclosures ordered through their store. Stompbox Layout can generate the drill instructions in the format Tayda expects, and import a design you started in Tayda's own tool.

Sending your design to Tayda

Go to Tools > Tayda drill instructions to see a table of all your holes with:

• Hole name
• Enclosure face (A, B, C, D, or E)
• Diameter, automatically increased by 0.4mm to compensate for Tayda's powder coating
• X / Y offset, measured from the centre of each face

The table includes a direct link to Tayda's drill template tool where you can enter these values.

Important: Always double-check measurements before ordering.

Importing a Tayda design

If you already have a design in Tayda's drill template tool, you can bring it straight into Stompbox Layout. In Tayda's tool, use Download Text File, then go to Tools > Import from Tayda and choose that file.

A preview shows exactly where the holes will land on your current enclosure before you add them:

• If the design comes in upside down, use Flip 180° to turn it the right way up.
• Tayda drills holes 0.4mm oversize for powder coating. Switch on Remove 0.4 mm powder coat allowance to bring the holes in at their original sizes instead.

Rectangles and triangles in the file come in as cutouts. The holes and cutouts are added to your current layout in a single step, so one undo removes them all. Your enclosure is left as it is; if the file was made for a different enclosure, a note warns you the holes may not line up.

All your projects are saved automatically as you work. The cloud icon next to the project name shows the save status.

Project operations

• Open (⌘O), browse and open a saved project
• Save (⌘S), manually trigger a save
• Make a copy, duplicate the current project with a new name
• Save as template, save the layout as a reusable starting point
• Delete project, delete the current project

Locking

Use File > Disable editing to lock a project and prevent accidental changes. The lock is visible in the titlebar and can be toggled back with File > Enable editing.

Public projects

Click Share in the titlebar and switch your project to Public. Public projects can be viewed (but not edited) by anyone with the link.

Share link

The same Share popover gives you a Project link to copy and send to other builders or post in forums.

Embedding

It also provides ready-made Embed code: an <iframe> snippet you can drop into an external website. See the Embed Widget documentation for details and more snippets.

Press ⌘K in the app to see the full shortcuts reference. Here's a summary: