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April releases available: two compressors, one distortion

Started by madbean, April 04, 2023, 10:13:08 PM

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madbean



This month we have the Bearhug, Monocle and TrashCompactor.

- Everyone here knows the Bearhug. Jon was kind enough to offer it as a regular project on mbp so much thanks to him!

- The Monocle is The Guv'nor in a 1590B. A very meaty distortion with TMB controls.

- The TrashCompactor in an mbp original. It uses a THAT4305 VCA for the signal compression. I don't know of any DIY project that uses this approach. There might be commercial guitar pedals that do, but I am not aware. Anyway, it sounds awesome and will squish you up like a 300 pound pug. The 4305 is a very tiny SMD so I am also offering it pre-soldered with a breakout board. The chips themselves are around $6 and the pre-soldered option is only $8 so I recommend it if you want to save the hassle of trying to solder it yourself.

I have demos to catch up on from the last release so tomorrow I'm going to shoot some quick 1 minuters for a few different recent projects. I'll be sure to include the Trash Compactor.

jimilee

Pedal building is like the opposite of sex.  All the fun stuff happens before you get in the box.

matmosphere

The Bearhug is so great! Might need to build another one. Though, I fear this means 1776 is never coming back, which dashes my dreams of a new version of the multiplex.

Might need to build the trash compactor too.

If you're on a comp kick and thinking of doing another small board as a giveaway maybe you should do Mictester's Really Cheap Compressor. Built one on a whim a while back and it is shockingly good on my twelve string electric.

harryklippton

Quote from: matmosphere on April 05, 2023, 08:32:02 AM

If you're on a comp kick and thinking of doing another small board as a giveaway maybe you should do Mictester's Really Cheap Compressor. Built one on a whim a while back and it is shockingly good on my twelve string electric.

Interest piqued

midwayfair

Hey Brian.

If people need to sub the JFET, the import thing is that the drain->source resistance is low (with no voltage applied at the gate) -- you want something between 200-400R ideally, but the J201 is all the way up at 1K, and if you look at the resistor it's in parallel with, you'll see that can only has a 2.7:1 ratio, whereas something around 300 would give you a 9:1. I tend to look for 350, IIRC. I sorted them a long time ago but it's been so long since I built one.

The subs here will all be lower gain things (3819) as well as near-subs like the 5952 and BF245, all accounting for pin orientation of course.

selfdestroyer

My father still uses the Bearhug I built him years ago and loves it.. Glad to see its going to accessible again.

madbean

Quote from: midwayfair on April 05, 2023, 03:31:48 PM
Hey Brian.

If people need to sub the JFET, the import thing is that the drain->source resistance is low (with no voltage applied at the gate) -- you want something between 200-400R ideally, but the J201 is all the way up at 1K, and if you look at the resistor it's in parallel with, you'll see that can only has a 2.7:1 ratio, whereas something around 300 would give you a 9:1. I tend to look for 350, IIRC. I sorted them a long time ago but it's been so long since I built one.

The subs here will all be lower gain things (3819) as well as near-subs like the 5952 and BF245, all accounting for pin orientation of course.

Makes perfect sense, thanks Jon. Luckily, the 2n5457 is available so I don't think it will be much trouble for anyone to get one. And, the SMD JFET shortage has continued onward for a while now.