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First build in what...4 or 5 months...?
Was kindly sent this PCB from DeadendFX (THANKYOU PMoulder)

Went together an absolute treat. I didnt bother with the ferrite bead, and I only had 100k/10k trims (50k/5k specified) but that doesnt make any odds really.
Tuned as per the spec (3.4v Q5 / 1.5v Q3) and sounds really fiery. The filter switches really make massive differences. Ive build three project v's now and this one was a pleasure.

Thanks!

JHS has put out a mass produced clone of his own 1995 Big Cheese
He has called it the Cheeseball which doubles the irony as Vlad from Lovetone talked of releasing a new product in 2015 called... the Cheeseball

This announcement has already drawn some Umbrage from Dan Coggins who designed the Lovetone pedals.

I say all fair in love(tone) and war - I just hope JHS did it right
I await gutshots with baited breath

Inspired by the fact that TGP have been slavering over this for some time, and the schematic is now out there (thanks Dan Schunaker)
I have built a clone of the DRV on vero. Not built anything on vero for a long time, this went together ok - make a slight bodge which the keen eyed will see.

I must admit it sounds really good - doesnt have that sag that most normal Rats do. I appreciate some people like that, but I find it a bit bothersome.
Can't beleive the price these tend to go for.

Because I wasnt bothered to save space this has gone in a 1790xx case  buffered bypass - apparently its a klon buffer but the parts values dont ring true to me from very distant memory... I could be wrong (!) 1983 because the original is 1981 and I was born in 1983 

I havent been building, well, anything, for well over a year I think. I dug out my parts box and soldering iron to build the Dinosaural OTC-201 recently, and as I was digging around for parts, I found a bag which I had clearly purchased back in about 2016 for all the components on the shopping list to make the Heavy Water - our very own AlanP's take on the ProphecySoundSystems Infinitephase. I located the PCB and one night when my wife was on nights, I started around 11:30pm and ended with the circuit ostensibly working around 4am - lights were flashing, "stonehenge" was glowing etc 

A bit of a debug later (sound kinda ground loop) and a decision to make the Phase Range trim an externally tweakable trim care of a bit of Vero, its now boxed up.
This thing really does go from phase 90 to another dimension and back again. Super cool. I heard that DeadEndFX have the blessing to bring out a production run PCB, so watch out for that in due course.

Here are some pics. The toner transfer isnt perfect, but I just got a new printer and felt it was "good enough".









Thanks to Alan for the PCB and listening to me whinge about ground hum on his thread 

Ive had a Dinosural OTC-201 for a long while now - really an amazing compressor.
When I stumbled across Aion doing a PCB I felt somewhat duty bound to build it and do a side by side
Nice story about the reverse engineer here: https://aionelectronics.com/blog/tracing-journal-dinosaural-otc-201-opticompressor/

Suffice to say I can cop all the sounds of the original. I am somewhat partially convinced that the pot tapers arent the same
My clone gets louder more quickly, in a comparative fashion turning up the level and sustain knobs. However, the levels match up at the extremes, so I beleive the pot values are accurate.

Overall, great project. Id have loved to have availed of  Aions fixing and enclusure kit, but alas out of stock. It did mean that I could use a really nice silver hammered paint enclosure I have been stashing for oooh 7 years...!

Enjoy pics.

Following up from my earlier video comparison, I decided to add an XO Memory Man into the mix
So we have four pedals, the same loop, blind test. Two runs, with the order changed.
There will be PCB PIF for the first person to guess the right order - you only get one chance though!

The pedals in the test (from oldest to newest)

- 90s Reissue big box (EC2000) with 2x Panasonic MN3005 chips and true bypass via 3PDT
- 00s Reissue big box (EC2002revE) with 4x Panasonic MN3008 chips and relay true bypass
- Current issue XO (EC-D25revB) with 4x Panasonic MN3008 chips and true bypass via 3PDT
- Madbean Total Recall that I built with 2x Panasonic MN3005 chips, and true bypass by 3PDT

All four have had R2 changed to a 1Meg Trim pot (Analogman Input Impendance mod) and set according to my taste, in the context of the rest of the trim alignment
All four have had the clock capacitor changed, such that the clock frequency is as close to 7.5khz at max delay time as possible, for ~550ms

Answers on a postcard (in this thread)

Round 1
A-
B-
C-
D-

Round 2
A-
B-
C-
D-

Hi

A friend of mine asked me to compare my Deluxe Memory Man pedals.
Here is the video. Below is some blurb from me.

I actually have four. One is a beat up older revision of the 90s reissue, with 2x MN3005 chips, and true bypass by 3PDT
The second one is a really clean later revision of the big box, with 4x MN3008 chips, with relay true bypass
Thirdly, I have a Total Recall that I built with 2x MN3005 chips, and true bypass by 3PDT

Not featured is my XO Reissue in the small die cast case. This has 4x MN3008 chips, and true bypass via 3PDT
I did a comparison myself and this sounds very close to the others, too.

I should note that for all these pedals (even the unfeatured XO), the 100k input resistor has been changed to a 1Meg trim, and typically set to between 300k-500k
Anyone who has built this circuit knows that tweaking all of the many trims is an artform, and the different delay chips, feedback trim positions etc define how much you want to drive the front end of the preamp, hence the variation. This is referred to as the Analogman input impedance mod (although Im sure Howard Davis would take credit also).
Additionally, I have tried to clock the max delay time as close to 7.5khz as I can, by tacking on small parallel capacitors around the 240pF stock cap, which is frequently referred to as the Analogman clock or delay time mod. Analogman goes a bit far in my opinion pushing it to 600ms delay time; mine are clocked for as close to 550ms as is reasonable. YMMV but I dont really need that much delay time (I think the sweet spot is about 400-450ms, depending on play style) and once you go to 600ms+ there is a clear introduction of ring-mod-ish sounding clock noise artefacts.

For what its worth, I think any of the pedals I have really work for the classic DMM sound (eg the Edge, Eric Johnson and many others) and the corksniffers will tell you the MN3005 ones are the best. The honest truth is, whichever one is biased and set up the best will sound the nicest. A poorly calibrated MN3005 will sound like ass compared to an XO, or a 4x3008 clone done right.

The Big Box ones are undeniably cool, but in real estate starved boards particularly for live/road use, I see no reason not to build a Total Recall.

Enjoy, and happy to answer questions.

Hey all

Recently got an EHX EC2000 early 90s MN3005 memory man
it was DOA, expected (acquired as for parts / to fix).
addressed all the obvious issues, replaced all the op amps.
I have fully operating delay controls, but no clean sound mixed in.

Anyone familiar with this know what I should check next?
I havent changed out the compander, or delay chips as that all sounds "legit", and the schematic makes me think its just something simply like a cold joint or a dead cap on the PCB. Nothing obvious to the eye though.

this is the closest schematic I could get
http://bee.mif.pg.gda.pl/ciasteczkowypotwor/SM_scena/Electro-Harmonix/Electro-Harmonix-Deluxe-Memory-Man-Delay-Reissue-(Rev.A)-Schematic.pdf


I have changed out the blend pot, no difference. So I am reckoning its something to do with
R1 / R2 / R3
C1 / C2
R28

Otherwise I dont really see where I am losing the clean sound.
I can of course audio probe in due course.

Scruffy?!

HI

Are any reputable quality PCB makers currently doing boards for the Boss Blues driver BD-2, and the Hot Cake
While I am asking, does anyone know what R Keeley does to the BD-2 for his fabled mods?

thanks

Ian

Looks like Boss listen to the internet

https://www.boss.info/uk/products/dc-2w/
https://www.boss.info/uk/products/mt-2w/

The latter will keep the memes rolling, surely.

I am actually very keen to get the DC-2w assuming the price isnt horrific...

Just had to show off my fresh-from-the-postman Clusterfuzz JR in, I beleive limited edition, doo-doo brown sparkle.
Its really cool!

Thanks so much Brian for this most wonderful of prizes

Hi

Drawing your guys attention to my latest post on the Build of the Year thread, Not to humble brag, I just want to make sure eligible parties see this

http://www.madbeanpedals.com/forum/index.php?topic=27400.msg266658#msg266658

My only wish (not quite stipulation) is that if you do win, that the prize attempts to stay in the Madbean fraternity, and preferably not sold, rather PIF'd or traded.

Best

Ian (Lace)

Hi

Any veros out there for a simple noise gate (to get rid of hiss on a metal/rock distortion pedal)?

Thanks

Ian

Hi

anyone got any suggestions for ready to build PCBs for something like a Rectifier (triple wreck?) with an integrated noise gate?

At a push I dont mind two PCBs but an all in one solution would be grand.

Recommend-me-do!

GO!

Not sure if this is really that cool to post here, but I have a couple of discussion points on this awesome pedal
So yea I made a clone of the Clusterfuzz from Function(fx)



Firstly, its really cool. Everyone that likes fuzz should probably buy one, or at least build one to appreciate it.
Lots of sounds from overdrive to Lovetone Big Cheese - its the closest I have heard to copping that classic sound.
I adapted the vero layout from a popular vero website, but expanded it to fit across a standard vero board and make it less of a squash.
Next up I decided to use vero mounted pots, but rather complicated in a sandwich fashion. Quite a few jumpers and a bit of head scratching, with a liberal use of DIYLC to design the board. Uses an onboard rotary switch too.



Worth noting early that I decided to ditch the no clip option having prototyped the vero to make sure it worked right and not really loving that option, plus something had to give because the mini rotary only has 4 options per pole.



As you can see in the pictures the sandwich is acheived with headers, and the pins are actually the inserts from a row of headers but removed from the plastic.
I had to drill the vero to accomodate them more snugly, and individually solder each one. Honestly the amount of time I have spent on this.







Because this was to be my coolest vero build ever I decided before boxing that rather than labels I would use the other pole of the rotary to add traffic light LEDs for the clipping modes.



Something I noticed from my initial testing of the verification vero was that the pedal is really bright. Maybe its my amp or maybe the vero/schematic that was traced is wrong. I think it doesnt sound this bright on the youtube videos I watched...but anyway...it is what it is for now.

So I did some experimenting with the cap to ground after the tone control. This lead me to paralleling a 6.8nf and a 10nf for a few combinations to darken the tone a bit, ended up with this as an internal dipswitch. Those extra few rows of vero came in handy!  At the extreme of clockwise, the same sounds can be acheived, but the roll off counter clockwise is more extreme. It would be cool to hear some thoughts on this, particularly if the 2.2nF indicated from the trace is correct, and how the value was arrived at. Other ways to add bass back would be interesting to discuss, too.




Im quite proud that my vero chops have stood the test of time; its not a medium I have indulged in much since the first year or so of building pedals maybe 7 years ago now. We are very spoilt by the PCBs available today.

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed the read, and to Bean, Pickdropper and CJ et al the Clusterfuzz is really great.

Ciao,

Ian

post script.

I think if I were to do this again I would have planned to do the LED indication from the get go, and then wire it instead of an indicator LED for the footswitch; would have been cooler in hindsight. Also, I reckon I could have somehow managed to "vero-board mount" the switch for the filter if I had been smart.

Thinking about the bass response, Im wondering now about playing further with the filter switch capacitors. Do the designers have any thoughts on the potential effectiveness of that?

Hi

Can the 2015 layout of the current lover be run on 15v from a charge pump, like the old version?
Im 99% sure the answer is yes, but wanted to check here first.

cheers

Ian

New cheap TC pedals

http://www.tcelectronic.com/guitar/pedals/

Notable the dimension C clone is back, previously discontinued by Behringer but with mono output and true bypass

http://www.tcelectronic.com/3rd-dimension-chorus/

The past week or so spent rehousing these cheap  clones of veritable classics from the Boss back catalogue
VB-2 Vibrato (Behringer UV-300) and FZ-2 Hyper Fuzz (Behringer SF-300)


Both have been made true bypass, and the Fuzz has removed the boost mode, as I wouldnt ever use it.
Vibrato retains the rise function but loses the momentary activation mode, again by choice.

The big issue with these is removing the existing potentiometers and replacing them. I used 9mm pots for the Fuzz, with trimmer style for the Treble and Bass.
For the vibrato, I used 16mm with wired standoffs. The extra switch parallels C15 (47nF) with a 330nF cap to give a slower range to the LFO for real warped vinyl sounds.

Honestly it was a hell of a lot of work, but quite satisfying.
For the Vibrato, I hardwired it into the unlatch mode, but used a throw of the footswitch to replace the tactile switch, and retained the original illumination method from the PCB mount LED. For the Fuzz it was a case of finding the flip flop transistor with a bit of trial and error and jumpering it such that the pedal is always on.

If any one is attempting and needs details, just ask.

Anyone got any pros and cons for a cheap bit of fun like this?

https://www.gearbest.com/kits/pp_367832.html?currency=GBP&vip=2094323&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIot2RpKjn1gIVqQrTCh2A4AYSEAQYASABEgLMxvD_BwE

Would it be useful for things like the BlueShift Chorus and Deluxe memory man calibration?

Hi

Pretty sure I read the build docs multiple times and didnt miss this
Is there a way to adjust the output volume? I feel like the chorus boosts the volume a noticeable amount.

Thanks

Ian