First build on a solderless breadboard. Put together a SHO from a schematic I found on the internet. Works fine but is noisy. Is that normal for a breadboard build ? Is the SHO a noisy boost ? I don't want to solder it onto the Veroboard I have if I should maybe change out a component or adjust the build somehow. Thanks in advance :)
Yeah, breadboards will usually be noisy compared to the finished product.
Mosfet is a bit noisy, but I think that just one stage won't be so noisy. I built it, and it's ok.
SHOs are not a clean boost, it should add a little grit. Beyond that though generally breadboards are a little noisy, or at least it's a lot more likely they will pick up some interference. It shouldn't sound like old school TV static turned up louder than the guitar signal, but it's probably not going to be silent when you aren't playing.
Once you get it boxed up it should be a lot quieter.
You can add little capacity between D nad G electrodes (see attached schematic). It will lower inner noise at output and diminish HF noise from input signal. Electric guitars generally have utmost usefull freq at cca 7kHz. Upper freqs are not desirable for any distortion or other clipped effects; so, this capacity can even rise up to 1nF or more! Little noise you can get with J-FETs too. Noise index for them is cca 1-1,5. Lower than for MOS-FETs or most of bipolar transistors. Second attachment is about BF245.
Thanks all, yeah it isn't a clean boost for sure, at full volume its like an overdrive.