Al Heeley

They sound like a can of worms being opened to me.

[quote name='clauster' post='530045' date='Jul 1 2009, 10:30 PM']Treat compressors and limiters like women - be prepared to try quite a few (maybe a lot) but when you find one that's right for you, never let it go![/quote]I think thats where I'm going wrong. I try one out for a few months then a nice new shiny one comes along with different buttons and switches promising to give me all I desire...

What a star! TVM!

Just bought an SYB-3 off ebay but I can't find a manual for it, anyone be able to help me out or point me in the right direction?

rosewood fingerboard, maple neck, I think you mean. Hmm, no - to clean and refinish without sanding off the lacquer in the affected area is not feasible. To repatch once the lacquer is removed is tricky - it will leave a mark. If it were a workhorse instrumnet and not a priceless relic I'd remove the lacquer (personal taste) clean up the blemishes then go for a tru-oil finish.

[quote name='mrcrow' post='519363' date='Jun 20 2009, 03:12 PM']definately not superglue[/quote] Heh - I always use a tiny drop of superglue, its perfect, quite brittle for a soft sideways blow , the nut comes away easily without damage yet is held really firm very quickly.

[quote name='Muse_Cubed' post='520591' date='Jun 22 2009, 11:07 AM']It depends if the lacquer contains a UV quencher...acrylic by itself does absorb some UV but not all. I'll probably do a test run on the back to see.[/quote] Not sure this is correct - this glow in the dark pixie paint seems to imply it has luminous filler particles in it, which is entirely different to UV-fluorescing paint and will not be affected by any uv-absorbers added into the acrylic lacquer. Luminous paint glows from visible light contact, not UV-specific light.

Anyone have experience of using an MXR Dyna Comp for bass? Does it limit the lower frequencies? Is it moddable to work better for bass?

Been out to try the Behringer and the Boss you're right about the Behringer, so very cheap but the tracking is really hit and miss. Does loads of really silly sounds of no real use. The Boss is a little more than I'd like to pay but it seems to give a good wide range of synthy envelope tones and the tracking is pretty good. the Ibanez 0one looked interesting as its in the right price bracket for me, but I can't find one nearby to play with. Digitech do one too but no-one has one in my local guitar shops.

OK thanks guys - appreciate the comments. Not really striving for a particular sound , just wanting a funky envelope follwer type of thing and some synth tones to play with, if it was half decent it would have been worth a £45 punt but since you have now mercilessly ridiculed the poor thing I will content myself with finishing off my home build Bassballs. I guess you get what you pay for.

Anyone have experience of the BSY600? [url="http://www.behringer.com/EN/Products/BSY600.aspx"]http://www.behringer.com/EN/Products/BSY600.aspx[/url] Its so amazingly cheap for a basic synth pedal, is it any good at all? I'd love to play around with some funky effects but i'm not sure I can justify a couple of hundred quid on an EH X or other synth pedal for the bass.

Well I would have thought so, it would be too powerful to use as a boost or pre-amp, but micro amps have been around for ages: [url="http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2178773507860258243"]http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2178773507860258243[/url]

Never bought anything from Stewmac, my meagre salary does not support such extravagence. I got my binding from Touchstone tonewoods when I was buying the fingerboard and some fretwire.

hey Mikey, that is cool, what a great way to spend July! I prefer blondes over blue stained maple, a nice figured maple top - leave it blonde and go for black accents, possibly a maple fingerboard with black binding , would look really cool with black hardware. Classic and understated. Also I could not resist shoving a neck puppy in it for versatility. Look forward to seeing it. Have fun

Hi and wwelcome to the forum. For the binding trim I use white plastic binding trim. Available from a number of guitar/luthier supply outlets online. I tend to use Luthier Supplies and Touchstone Tonewoods but you should become familiar with Allparts, W.D, Axes R Us and a myriad of others if you are to tackle a first homebuild. Good luck and post pictures!

No sorry, that's beyond the basic equipment I have available at home.

Have a read thru this post here: [url="http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=44838.0"]http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/inde...p?topic=44838.0[/url]

Looking sweet! Good work sir.

Caution - can of worms here. Allparts and AxesRus as well as quite a few other popular parts outlets blend pots are not true blend pots, even though they insist they are: they are more like 'double-taper' - the centre position will have some residual resistance from both the A and B side which will mean its quiter in the centre than it is at 10 or 2 position. A true blend pot will have zero resistance from both sides in the centre and they are harder to get hold of.

JPG, PDF, PSD, GIF, BMP, etc. please

Yes no problem if its not too big/complex (like anything over 40 components and 3 IC's I deem too complex) The etching gear is not expensive if you go the non-uv route, you can use a laser printer to print onto the blue press'n'peel paper which is heat-transferred to the pcb blank then etched in the normal way with ferric chloride. What put me off for a long time was it is a faff getting all the stuff when you only want to do 1 or 2 stompbox circuits, so I tried with Veroboard a few times but had little success. Once you have the gear its not too much trouble rattling off a few small boards. They make the circuits so much easier to put together and guarantee a far greater chance of success. I'm going to charge a measly £2.50 per board if its a stompbox-size one plus a flat rate £1 for p&p. Send me the pcb image and I'll have a look for you.

[quote name='YouMa' post='486149' date='May 12 2009, 05:18 PM']If you get round to doing the qtron or Mutron 3 clone i would be very interested as long as the qualitys very good,i have a nightmare trying to get certain parts for pedals im building while in the u.s. its dead easy to get anything even old bucket brigadr chips and the like.[/quote] If you post me a link to the pcb I'll have a look at it.

I'm getting together some stuff to make a few custom PCB's for people on the UK Guitar Buiders forum. Generally we're talking about small etched and drilled PCB's to put together a stompbox pedal - tubescreamer, micro-amp, compressor, treble booster, that sort of thing (-the simpler circuits!). If there's anyone frequenting this forum that's into making their own pedal or interested in having a go, and needs a pcb etching, let me know, and for a nominal fee to my Paypal account to cover consumables I will knock one out for you. Alternatively if you're interested in having a go yourself, I posted up a How-To guide somewhere, pm me and I'll sned you the link. I realise this is a particularly niche and geeky area so am not expecting floods of requests, otherwise I may have to go out and commandeer more lolly sticks and Chinese take-away containers for my production line.