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Sorry, it's not new pedal day; it's new printer day!!!  I've been using FedEx Office and Staples for all of my etching transfers but I finally decided to pull the trigger and save myself all the unnecessary trips and money.  After reading reviews from some of the members here I decided to go with a Brother HL3230D for $59.99.  After adjusting the printer setting and printing my first transfer I was a bit skeptical  The toner just didn't look that thick and there were a couple lines visible from the paper going through the printer. I decided to move ahead and try out a transfer and etch before coming to any conclusions and the results were amazing!  The transfer process was way easier and the toner did not bleed at all so the text and graphics were pristine!  Needless to say, I was pretty stoked to get such great results for such a cheap price. It's not pic worthy but I just thought I'd share my experience with you guys in case anyone else was in the market for a printer.

Here is another screaming baby I put together with a familiar graphic of Marv from Sin City.  For this one I decided to try to emulate the splattered blood theme from sin city and it came out pretty good for my first attempt.  I also decided to add graphics to the bottom plate for the fun of it.  Unfortunately, it will be covered in Velcro or be set on shelf to look at.  Hopefully the former!  The wiring looks a bit tight but there's actually plenty of room when the 1/4 inch jacks are inserted.  I was planning on selling this since I already have one but I may keep it and let the other one go.  Hope you likey!








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Klon!  I'm not much of an of OD guy so I kept putting it off.



Here is a BMP on a new layout I designed for 1590BB or in this case, a 1590Y (I had to bend the pot pins a bit to get it to fit right). 


and another tonebender MKII to replace the one I regrettably sold.

I got another project boxed up and verified this weekend! This one is an MXR micro Amp in front of a violet ram's head Muff multi one one PCB. The idea to pair the two is based off Jack White's setup and it's definitely balls-to-the-wall fuzzy goodness in a box!

I've been in an etching slump lately (more pitting than I'd like), but I'm pretty stoked on the layout/graphic for this one. I used a 1590XX enclosure which was a first for me.

I'm working on adding these and a couple other projects to my web store for anyone who is interested in one. I'll throw up an announcement in the buy/sell/trade forum later today.

Cheers,
Jon

I finally debugged my Univox Micro Fazer Clone and verified the new layout, which I'm pretty stoked about!  The PCB fits standard in a 1590B with a right angle 16mm pot or as I've done it in a 125B with a 16mm straight pin pot mounted on the side of the enclosure like the original (this requires opposite taper pot and works in reverse).

I had some fun with the JFET layout and added an extra pad to accommodate any JFET pinout. So far I've tried a set if 2SK30As and a set of 2N5952s and they both sound nice. I'm a little bummed that the  "I" and "L" in TrailFazer became one giant L during the etch but I can live with it.  I will be adding these to my webstore hopefully by tomorrow if anyone is interested.

Jon

I haven't had much time to build lately but I was able to finish this one off over the holiday. It's a really nice overdrive designed by Lee (leevibe). Thanks again for the PCB Lee!  While this pales in comparison to his evil genius I am still happy to build my own! I've always preferred boost pedals to overdrives but this really nice. I used a TLC2272 in place of the recommended TL072 and I'm happy with the choice. It sound clean and loud just the way I like it! 

I finished the graphics this's weekend for my EHX Small Clone clone. For those who jumped in on the Twin1965s group buy, you won't be disappointed! This thing sounds great! Very interesting sounds with the rate maxed out and the depth turned down.  The name and graphic are nirvana inspired since Kurt was known for playing one of these. Hope you like it!

Here is a tremolo I built recently for a buddy of mine. It's a Shoot the Moon Tremolo courtesy if our good friend CJ that I called the Lunatik. Unfortunately, I forgot to take a gut shot before handing it over to him. 😢 I haven't found a good place for laser printing in my new town so this etch was a bit overly pitted but it still looks pretty cool...

Hey all, I found a little downtime a finally finished my Cardinal. I've been meaning to box this one up and get if on my board since the beginning of the year. I'm pretty stoked about it! Hope you like it...

If been meaning to post this for a while now but life has been extremely busy. It's a stock AquaBoy ver 2010 with a 1776 relay bypass. It sounds awesome and the bypass works like a charm. I've been going with an angular brushed finish lately and I'm really digging the results. If anyone is interested in giving it a try, make sure your etch is nice and deep and do not over-sand (100 grit works perfect).

I finally finished up my Hamlet courtesy of a generous Christmas gift from Haveyouseenhim. Thanks again brother! I rushed through the graphics and got the labels out of order which made wire routing a pita, but it worked out in the end. I still have to get it biased up but it sounds great already! Thanks to Midwayfair for this great project!

iTead updated their Cam file used to generate the gerbers since the last order I placed and I'm a little unsure how to move forward. I generated the gerbers and went to drag the files they need for a 2-sided PCB and one of the files they say they need is not there (Outline layer: pcbname.GKO). My gut tells me to just send them all of the files generated by the CAM but I really don't feel like finding out I'm wrong in the middle of next week. Any advice?

Thanks in advance!

Hey all! Hope everyone had a great holiday season. I'm still recovering from a moonshine incident on New Years Eve!  Ugh... Anyway, here are a couple of recent builds I thought I would share. Hope you like em!

Nuke the Moon EXP (STM optical tremolo in an expression enclosure):






If you want to hear a demo or learn more about this build you can check out my contest entry here:

http://www.madbeanpedals.com/forum/index.php?topic=12782.msg120315#msg120315

Harmonic Fuzz (Interfax Harmonic Percolator Clone):

I finally got an AquaBoy put together and I love it! The delay time is a bit limiting but for most of my live gigs it will be perfect. Hope you like... 😄

Here is my finished harmonic percolator. I really like the germanium diode clipping in this one. Definitely a unique fuzz. I was going to etch the faceplate but I like the way it looks as is with the toner transferred from PnP blue. It seems pretty durable too! If anyone is interested in one of the pcb's let me know!

I recently found a local surplus store and I've been living there ever since! I've already cleaned them out of all of their old stock 5mm Panasonic caps! Anyway, they had a black Friday sale and I spent quite a bit of time (and money) looking at what they had.

I found some axial capacitors that are apparently smd caps inside a glass casing. Has anyone used these? The ones I found are in the pf range and would be used in place of ceramic caps. I was wondering if there are any red flags or if these are okay to use in audio circuits (I'm not sure what brand they are). Here is a pic of the caps:



I found these diodes as well and was wondering if anyone could identify them. The stripes are black-brown-red and the letter T is printed in yellow. I tried to look it up but couldn't figure it out. The average  FV is around 0.24V. Here is a pic:




Here is some other stuff I picked up in bulk!

So I'm building a Shoot the Moon in an expression enclosure and I am trying to limit the minimum and maximum speed. Does anyone know how to do this? I've tried an ICAR 100K, a C100K and a C50K (special thanks to Joe for special ordering the C100K and for giving me the C50K on the house!). The ICAR and C100K are both okay but it goes excessively slow for this application and a little too fast as well (not as critical).  The C50K does clamp the slow end, but it bunches up the middle in a bad way. Are there any modifications I can make to this circuit so I can use the C100K and clamp the speed a bit???

Thanks in advance,
Jon

After reading alanp's "because it's there" post and watching the video Gledison posted about the Radio Shack Optical Moneypit er uh I mean Tremolo I thought it would be cool to start a thread where we could post our most impractical/challenging/crazy builds. Really any build that you done and asked "did I really build that?" Anything goes really so pics and videos are welcome!

Here is mine. It is a Shoot the Moon tremolo in a 1590A designed so the 1590A takes up about the same amount of space as a 1590BB! I cannot imagine using it on my board (takes up too much space) or selling it (I put a lot of time into it). Not really sure why I built this thing other than for the challenge! I guess I will just hoard it for the time being!

Hey all, here are my latest builds:

Blue Warbler: This is a blue warbler using a layout I created with the help on Midwayfair. I decided to remove the tremolo section and go with the vibrato mode only. I also made the Decay external rather than a trimpot. Mostly because I was originally going to build this in an enclosure with a STM and I wanted to have two rows of 4 knobs. Not really a good enough reason honestly! It is definitely better as a set and forget control (as Jon suggested  )...





Harmonic Percolator: This is basically an Albini version of the percolator using a PCB I designed. I decided to use 1N276's germanium's in place of the 1N695's and they sound awesome! I actually prefer this build compared to my previous build which used the 1N695's. However, that build used a Tayda PN3565 and this one uses a PN3565 from another source so that could be causing some of the difference as well.





(Another) Screamin' Baby: The graphics came out much better on this one! It's just a stock 808, but it sounds great! Maybe it's those NOS European 1N4148's I got from Chromosphere! 

I am getting ready to build a version 2 Aquaboy and wanted to make sure a couple things would work before jumping in.

1. Can I run  it at 15V like the Aquaboy DX?
2. Can I use a daughterboard to cascade two MN 3005's - or - two MN3008's???  I have "verified" MN3005's but I bought some MN3008's just in case they are fakes...

Thanks in advance!