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Taking a break from my still broken Honeydripper build. This overdrive sounds great. It gets a little crackly when the gain is set lower and the notes decay. The full out sounds are great, very Page like. Thanks to Haberdasher for the board, it looks fantastic and fired right up. The EQ is great with this pedal too, it feels very much like an amp EQ. The dynamics are my favorite part of this effect. You can play very lightly at full gain and get clean notes. Really great drive that doesn't get fizzy (as I am finding with most of CB's effects).

The soundclip is played with an Ibanez Prestige with SD jazz neck and bridge pickups through a Fender TRRI.



[soundcloud]http://soundcloud.com/jakefuzz/rah[/soundcloud]

So, I've been troubleshooting my new Honeydripper build this weekend and have come to a wall. Let me start off by saying that I did most of the modifications listed in the build docs. The effect passes a little sound and lots of high pitched oscillation noise. The oscillation volume is effected by the amplitude (envelope) of the guitars signal.

One major change I made was to sub most of the 1n914's with 1n4003's. I figured they are used for envelope rectification and the change won't alter the performance of the effect (I may be completely wrong though). One strange thing I have noticed is the output of the charge pump gives me about 16.5V instead of closer to 18V. Most of the effects I have done using a charge pump get really close to about 18V even under load. I have removed all of the IC's and the charge pump still outputs in the high 16V range.

I have audio probed the signal path and tested just the amp portion of the CA3080's (isolating pin 5) and both filters as well as the input fuzz section and the output stage work. The problem is coming from somewhere in the envelope generator that drives the filters. I have also swapped the LM324's without any luck (all voltages look good). I have also triple checked both the component values and the soldering to make sure nothing is out of place.

Any ideas? Could it be my use of 1n4003's in place of the 1n914's? Or could it be a power supply issue? 

[soundcloud]http://soundcloud.com/jakefuzz/marsha[/soundcloud]

This thing sounds sick! Here is the link to the original build report.

http://www.madbeanpedals.com/forum/index.php?topic=4670.0

I was initially getting a huge amount of parasitic noise. I insulated all of the input and output lines with the small coaxial cable SB sells and it works beautifully now. The pre-amp was built to the normal channel specs. I settled on a balance between the two channels but I think I could lower the treble bypass cap on the gain a bit (it is at the bright channel's stock 500pF). The lower gain sounds are pretty bright and aggressive but I kind of like it. What do you guys think? It loves to be boosted from the front end and the last phase inverter approximation adds a very fair amount of drive. I ordered a few different preamp tubes to try as the ones currently in are cheapo junkers I pulled from my buddies amp.

The demo was done with an Epiphone goldtop with P-90's through a Fender Twin Reverb. I've got some minute tweaking to do with it but I am amazed at how awesome this thing sounds.  

Been working on this one for quite a while. I noticed Juan had a similar project going and I think his graphics are a little better than mine .

This is a full voltage tube pre-amp modeled after the Marshall 1959 and 1987 plexi amps. This is the normal channel input which I am now thinking is a mistake and will probably start transitioning back to the bright channel. I am getting a little oscillation at high gain so I am going to put the 47pf cap from plate to cathode in on the last gain stage to see if that helps. Sounds very Marshally and dark (stupid normal channel). PTP wiring is probably the ugliest and biggest PITA style I have seen. I included a phase inverter approximation using the last half of a tube by running the tonestack into a typical 12ax7 gain stage. I may need to tweak around with those values as well. Uses all parts from Weber including their 12VAC to 260VAC transformer. The first half of the amp runs at 350V and the second half of the amp at 380V (at the top of the plate resistors). The heaters are run in series by a 12 volt regulator (hoffman amps). There is slightly less filtering than the actual 1959 because I couldn't fit anymore capacitors inside this enclosure! Knobs will be switched out to the Marshall brass knobs on my next SB order. Enjoy!

Well I bought a MKII from MikeB with the intention of comparing and eliminating one of the two Tonebender designs. I can't decide, they are both so awesome. The MKII is an out of control beast with an almost bass scooped eq and a ridiculous amount of gain. The MKIII is lower gain (still a ton though) and sounds gigantic, much more bass and great sustain. The MKIII is smoother as well.

The MKII has a trio of OC75's. The MKIII is an amalgamation from my germanium stash. From Q1 to Q3 it goes: Amperex AC128 (hfe 60), Mullard OC81 (hfe 90), ITH GET895 (hfe 260). Help me decide!   maybe I should just keep both...

MKII
[soundcloud]http://soundcloud.com/jakefuzz/mkii[/soundcloud]


MKIII
[soundcloud]http://soundcloud.com/jakefuzz/mkiii[/soundcloud]

So I built up a Mysterioso that Haberdasher etched me. I've found that a get a very fizzy sort of high frequency crackling that rides on top of the normal notes. It is only apparent when the boost is down. Very annoying. Anyways I was wondering if some others who have built this long retired PCB had this same issue. I am using it with the mids switch off and it happens in both buffered and bypass mode. Sounds very much like it could be a characteristic of the circuit itself.

Other than that though this thing sounds great. Super smooth overdrive that sustains forever. Really awesome sounding. I am just hoping that this crackle is user error 

Getting ready to test this bad boy out. As soon as roomie wakes its is time to make some crying seagull and whale noises! Ill post better pics when I get everything working properly.

https://taweber.powweb.com/store/pdlptsch.jpg

$20 for a transformer that can run a tube preamp at ~250V plate voltages from a 12VAC supply. I am seriously thinking about building a Marshall Superlead preamp without all the channels, phase inversion and cathode following stages (one 12ax7).

Pepperspray, build docs here
http://www.madbeanpedals.com/forum/index.php?topic=3921.0

Sounds much darker than I was expecting, probably the higher volume on the amp.
http://soundcloud.com/jakefuzz/pepperspray


King of Klones, Sounds really good. Pardon the hum, all my un-boxed pedals do that. I lowered my expectations for this pedal based on what people were saying about the KoT but this actually has some very useable sounds on lower gain settings; higher gain tends to get too fizzy. Opamp is an OPA2132, hard diodes are an LED and and BAT46. Soft clip diodes are BAT46>BAT46 || BAT41>LED. Input cap is 47n, needs some post gain treble filtering I think.
http://soundcloud.com/jakefuzz/kok


PS: Whoops, forgot. Guitar is a telecaster with nocaster pickups and a twin reverb.

Finished this up tonight. Its been completed for a few days but I felt the need to do some tweaking as usual. Knew I had to have one of these when I saw the schematic and heard Albini's demo. Built mine to the Albini spec and it sounds nothing like his. I have heard that his was very unique though, the lower octave sound on his is ridiculously prominent. Mine does sound pretty interesting though. Very aggressive, fuzzy overdrive is what I would call it. Very interesting sounding mid-range harmonic content. I find the Germanium diodes too fizzy. After tweaking for the last few days I've settled on a high gain BC108C from CDIL (hfe~450) for Q2 and a GE 2N404A (hfe~80); I tried a ton of higher gain devices in this position but I really liked the sound of this one better for some reason. The diodes I liked best were one orange super bright 3mm LED and a BAT46, had a real hard time choosing between the BAT46 and 41 though. Also R2 is now 47K and R1 is 100K, got these values by putting in trimmers. R1 is good after about 50K but there is definitely a sweet spot on R2 from ~50-150K.

Overall very cool. I like it a lot, it sounded way different than anything else I have or have heard so I felt the need to box up this bad boy!

This is the fourth time this has happened to me. Today an all original Fender 5E3 went on sale on craigslist for $100. Dude had no idea what it was. It was a little thrashed and repainted but original nonetheless. I emailed him 15 minutes after he posted and someone had emailed him just to tell him the value of his amp 

Just wondering if anyone else saw this. This has happened to me three other times in exactly the same way. Orange County Fender Vibrolux and cab in mint condition $100, San Diego Fender Brownface Deluxe $100, San Diego Magnatone 440 $100. Is it impossible to snag these deals? $100 seems to be the magic number for people who don't know amps. One of thee days...

Well I think I will be doing more tweaking this weekend but here is a clip of it with a few different effects.

The Sunking uses a 10n bass cap and has a BAT41 and BAT46 (I blew up my LM313's  ) and has the 1M gain resistor. The fuzz is my purple CV7112 Fuzz Face, the wah effect definitely gets a little less when playing with fuzz, time to tweak some more 

http://soundcloud.com/jakefuzz/waffle-wah

Finished this last night. Got an old Vox V847 for $20. Refinished the bottom in hammertone verde green. Etched a faceplate for it too. External frequency pot. Uses two 2n2925's that Tim hooked it up with; they have gain of about 200. Haven't been able to test it yet, its going to be a long day at work knowing this is waiting for me  I decided to call it the Waffle; a little play on Whipple and Wah-Ful 

http://soundcloud.com/jakefuzz/dirtbag-long


http://soundcloud.com/jakefuzz/hybrid-awesome-fuzz

So I replaced the upper limiting resistor for the BBD clock on my Dirtbag to 24k and now I have about 600ms of delay time with very little distortion, awesome! I also figured out why this sounds more spacious than the carbon copy, the delayed repeats start to blend into each other after a while making this wild wall of sound, the CC repeats just distort and stay separate. Its really long, I tried to set it up how I would use it in different situations so use the comments to skip to something you like.

The fuzz is my test fuzz box with Q2 = 2SA1015 (hfe~160) and Q1 = IT308B (hfe~50). Sounds really cool, one of the best combos I've found yet.

So weird. It is an old karaoke system that was meant to plug three microphones into you television set so you can sing along with your VHS tapes. Has three individually buffered and amplified microphone inputs, master volume, equalizer and best of all MN3207 based chorus/delay. It also has a cool Db meter and line level shifter switches. Got it for super cheap. Going to use it as a parallel mixer and output buffer for my pedal boards.

A few HD vids. You can see ive been kicked out of the house to the garage. Videos are all first takes, i had about a 30 minute window to get this all done. hope you like them!

Whew, after much stress Keefe saved my Dirtbag with a CD4047 just in time. Just so you guys dont make the same dumb mistake I have taken a nice big picture of the inside and how the regulator heatsink is attached to the enclosure. 

This build uses MN3005's from the ebay seller Magazine Vault. They appear to be legit but I think I still have some tweaking to do. Repeats are perfectly warm, but I am getting a max of about 480ms, which is fine for me but it would be nice to wring a little extra out. Other than that it sounds absolutely unbelievable, I just did a rough bias without an audio probe. Depending on where the feedback knob is you can just go into these ambient dreamland jams that sound so amazing. I did a rough comparison with the carbon copy; the Dirtbag is not as dark sounding as the CC and has much less grain to the repeats. The repeats are also punchier sounding. The max delay on my Dbag is about 75% the max on the CC.

I did an etched faceplate mounted on a Hammond factory finished enclosure. The faceplate looks good, the imperfections in the lines make it look even cooler. It warped pretty bad when I quenched it from the iron so it is lifting by the slightest hair on one corner. Used a variable voltage regulator (LM317) tuned to 15 volts on Vero. Mini chicken heads from Small Bear are probably my new favorite.

Thanks so much to Keefe for getting a CD4047 on super short notice.

Demos in the new year when I get my microphone back from a friend.



With the rest of the setup

Not reading the data sheet for the LM317T thoroughly enough, I didn't realize that the heatsink was connected to the voltage output. The regulator is definitely fried (conduction between in and). Worse this was in the initial tests of my MN3005 dirtbag, my hopes are not high that all my IC's haven't completely fried. Very depressing, running to rat shack to pick up a new regulator. Either a build report or make fun of how stupid Paul is thread in the next hour or so. 

I. What is a Microcontroller and why do I want one?

A microcontroller is like a miniature computer. We can send data in (both analog and digital data), we can process that data and we can output data. What we want this data to come from or go to is totally up to us. These devices are typically very handy for data acquisition; this is where we hook up an array of sensors (thermocouples, piezoelectric...) and output the zeroed and semi processed data to a computer for analysis. In fact there is an entire company that deals in high quality DAQ systems called National Instruments (you may also be familiar with their Labview software). Another application is as a controller; this is where the computer is taking in sensory input and using that data to intelligently control a system. Imagine a robot or a CNC mill, if you tell something to move to (x,y,z) position how does the device really know it is exactly at (x,y,z)? Just like you need your eyes for sensory input to tell you when you are driving inside the lines on the road, many systems like this need sensory feedback to operate correctly.

"But Paul i really don't care about all this stuff, what does it have to do with guitar effects?"

I am not going to talk about DSP in this thread; just how we can use microcontrollers for analog pedals. A microcontroller is a digital device, it deals in zeroes and ones and if we try and pass our guitar signal into it we no longer maintain that coveted all analog signal path. So what we want to try and do is isolate our digital device from our guitars signal. Obviously this limits what we can actually accomplish with the microcontroller.

The two primary analog applications of a microcontroller that immediately come to mind are function generators and switching devices. Switching devices are straightforward and using a microcontroller gives us lots of control over how this switching happens. Function generators (or as we know them LFO's) are used to modulate certain parameters in effects. We probably all have effects that use an LFO; think back to your tremolo or your phaser. These effects use a periodic waveform (sine wave, triangle wave, square wave...) to make time based changes in your guitars signal.

So we don't want to pass our guitars signal through the microcontroller; we just want to find ways to use the device to control the signal path as it is. This is the interesting part. To do this we need an external device that we can control using a digital signal but stay isolated from the analog path. This is where devices like relays, vactrols and digital potentiometers come into play. It is easy to control light or an electromagnetic coil using a digital signal; so we have these devices that use these phenomena to influence a photosensitive P-N junction or a mechanical switch. The creativity comes from using these devices in the circuits we have to make new and interesting guitar sounds.

II. Sign me up.

So how do you get started? I've mentioned numerous times something called an Arduino in the past. This is a board that interfaces with an already existing microcontroller (made by Atmel). The interface is open source and is is made to be very user friendly. You can pick one up on Amazon for around $30. This board includes a USB plug that you will use to link your PC to the microcontroller. This PC to Arduino link is used to load programs you've written in the free Arduino compiler onto the microcontroller. The USB also provides +5v power to the Arduino board. I believe this is the most simple device for a beginner to get started making microcontroller projects. This device also includes header pins for all of the outputs and inputs, this is very handy when you are trying to design something and need to quickly hook up and test, very much like a breadboard.

"Okay i've bought an Arduino, now what?"

Well now you need to learn a little bit of C. What is C? C is a computer programming language. We all know computers think in ones and zeroes, obviously humans don't think in ones and zeroes. C is like the language we can use to tell the computer how to operate. A compiler program translates this language that humans can understand and turns it into something the computer will understand.

C isn't too difficult to use and I think many of us could pick it up very quickly. I personally think the best way to learn C is to read through well documented example programs. As you go through the programs look up the definition of each command and what it does (obviously start with a simple program). After obtaining a fundamental understanding of each command change around some of the parameters and see what happens. This is especially interesting if you already have the Arduino plugged in; you can change the blinking of lights or see the changing input of an LDR.

After that it is all about creativity. There are so many sensors and control devices the application possibilities are endless. Obviously we want to focus on pedals so we will be dealing mostly with isolated type devices. A few of my engineering friends have done interesting things with uControllers like program their rice cookers to make perfect rice based on moisture content and another made an entire automated beer brewing line. I just finished programming LCD screens to display a set of images for a Biomed company. Get creative!

Here is the link to the Arduino website. This is the best resource for example programs and a description of all the native functions as well as general C syntax. It is bookmarked in my brower!    <nerd>

http://www.arduino.cc/

Hope that helps everyone out. Lets come up with some new and wild ideas for uControllers in guitar effects.

A friend of mine works as a recording engineer at a local studio and needed someone to play Hendrix-esque licks for a JFK library video. I brought in my warhead, screwdriver, fuzz face and wah and I my playing gets to be in the short film!

Even better check out where I did it and what I did it through...

View from the recording room, anything outside look familiar?


Looking from the control booth into the rec room


And we recorded using this Matchless. Guess who's? Hint: he sort of dresses like Hendrix and is pretty androgynous... oh yeah and he loves purple