DIY Effects

[LukeFRC]

I doubt anyone cares, missing parts ordered, avoided buying another PCB for either the 1590bb or 1590a enclosures I have floating around... 

I did however spend a lot of the last couple of evenings with the laptop on KiCad, remembering what Gerbers are  moving traces around and hopefully coming up with a PCB that will work this time. About last time I laid up my first and... it didn't work (partly the circuit, partly the PCB, partly me not knowing what I was doing) so I had another go - hopefully it will work! I find it crazy that for the price of a pint at the brewery down the hill I can get 10 PCB made up and posted to me.  


In the mean time Disssa will have knocked out about half a dozen beautiful pedals.

[bloke_zero]

On 16/09/2023 at 01:18, LukeFRC said:

I doubt anyone cares, missing parts ordered, avoided buying another PCB for either the 1590bb or 1590a enclosures I have floating around...

We all care! It's a situation I can empathise with. I have an enclosure I drilled 1 too many holes in 5 years ago and replaced - I'm still wondering what I can put in there!

[disssa]

Peavey Standard MKIII Preamp:

 

[Badscrew]

3 hours ago, disssa said:

Peavey Standard MKIII Preamp:

 

What is this, please tell more

[bartelby]

16 hours ago, disssa said:

Peavey Standard MKIII Preamp:

 

 

 

I've been waiting for you to do this for years!!
I don't suppose you have an additional pcb you want to sell?

 

[disssa]

11 hours ago, bartelby said:

 

 

I've been waiting for you to do this for years!!
I don't suppose you have an additional pcb you want to sell?

 

Unfortunately not at the moment. I would like to change the PCB a little because there are one...two errors. Maybe then...

[itu]

@disssa: if you ever think about selling a PCB, or the files, I suppose there are more than two of us that might be interested in few of your creations...

[bartelby]

12 hours ago, disssa said:

Unfortunately not at the moment. I would like to change the PCB a little because there are one...two errors. Maybe then...

 

As @itu says Gerber files would also be good. For any of your preamp pedals, they all look amazing.

[LukeFRC]

Ooooo

 

not done the enclosure yet, and don’t have a multimeter that can do micro volt AC to calibrate…. But worked first time! 

[Stub Mandrel]

I found an old bbd chip, but can't find a datasheet online(!).

 

TCA350Y

 

Best I can find is the pinout.

 

pin 2 : t2
pin 3 : IN
pin 4 : V(+)
pin 5 : t1
pin 6 : Out
pin 7 : V(-)

 

Anyone got any ideas?

 

I seem to recall you need opposite polarity square waves on t1 and t2...

 

Could be the basis of a retro delay or flanger.

 

 

[Bassybert]

On 03/10/2023 at 22:51, LukeFRC said:

Ooooo

 

not done the enclosure yet, and don’t have a multimeter that can do micro volt AC to calibrate…. But worked first time! 

That’s a lot of knobs 😜

 

Looks a very nice build well done!

[LukeFRC]

43 minutes ago, Stub Mandrel said:

I found an old bbd chip, but can't find a datasheet online(!).

 

TCA350Y

 

Best I can find is the pinout.

 

pin 2 : t2
pin 3 : IN
pin 4 : V(+)
pin 5 : t1
pin 6 : Out
pin 7 : V(-)

 

Anyone got any ideas?

 

I seem to recall you need opposite polarity square waves on t1 and t2...

 

Could be the basis of a retro delay or flanger.

 

 

Scroll to page 170 http://www.introni.it/pdf/ITT - Integrated Circuits for Consumer Applications 1977_1978.pdf

[jimbobothy]

... now that is a cool manual 👍

[LukeFRC]

 

Pedal hack... both of the above images are the Musikding standard pedal enclosures - while they are cheaper than a Hammond... erm you can tell they are cheaper than a hammond... The Vong has had me do A LOT of sanding to it - and it still isn't a great finish compared to Hammond - and the L4 preamp is how it comes and you can see it looks a bit unrefined. 

Well for this preamp I'm trying stamped enclosure a la Fairfield Circuitry. I love the Fairfield aesthetic - if I suddenly had a massive bass pedal fund I might very go and buy everything they make and make some beautiful and crazy noises- I really really would like to try the accountant... and the meet Maud.... and... yeah you get the idea. 

Anyway - how to get a rough enclosure nicer and with less effort - I tried a bit of steel wool and found if you took a bit of time and only wiped in one direction you could get quite good unfinished-finish .... 

 

then I got a 14cm bolt. Wrapped steel wool around it. Stuck it in a drill press.... and I had some wierd pedal sanding machine! And, unusually for me. 
IT WORKED!
 

 

 

 

Before anyone thinks I'm showing off - my finger still hurts from the metal-stamp-test-mishap

 

 

[ahpook]

Thought I'd share my most recent pedal, largely as I'm chuffed with the enclosure.

 

Found the picture of The Mothership, sorry.. Marquess of Anglesey in a magazine and knew it had to go on a fuzz. Lo-tech approach - cut the image out and stick it on the primed enclosure.👍

 

The fuzz is a Fuzzdog Conkador fed by a Fuzzdog MXR MicroAmp clone, which sounds very nice indeed, or very bad

 

Edited October 15, 2023 by ahpook

[bloke_zero]

On 14/10/2023 at 20:31, LukeFRC said:

Well for this preamp I'm trying stamped enclosure a la Fairfield Circuitry. I love the Fairfield aesthetic - if I suddenly had a massive bass pedal fund I might very go and buy everything they make and make some beautiful and crazy noises- I really really would like to try the accountant... and the meet Maud.... and... yeah you get the idea. 

I tried this - I reccomend experimenting with a spare enclosure or something. The amount of force required to get a good imprint is quite high, so you will want to have a piece of wood inside directly supporting the metal as you strike it, otherwise it is possible to dent/deform the metal. I think they also flow ink inside the stamped indentation or something as otherwise it's pretty illegible.

 

In my head I think it went: 1. stamp lettering, 2. clean with IPA (so ink can stick), 3. ink lettering, 4. buff/clean surface. But that was just what I thought on the basis of not having really got it right.

 

Look forwards to seeing your results - it's a lovely aesthetic as you say!

As for getting the finish - maybe dremel? Though you probably want something with a larger polishing surface so it's nice and even.

[bobbass4k]

Yeah I found it hard to get good results with stamping. I eventually worked out a good process of -

 

-big sturdy block of wood inside enclosure 

 

- couple of self tapping screws with big washers through the pot and footswitch holes to stop it sliding

 

- clamp block of wood in workmate/ vice

 

I also found it useful to use a punch to tap a dent in, just to give the stamp something to bite. I may have just had cheap stamps but sliding was my main issue. As bloke said, the force required is pretty immense.

[LukeFRC]

I played with the back of an enclosure as a test piece - I've found that the wood block behind wasn't hard enough - steel jewellers bench anvil and a lump of steel that a mate found had better results. I still need to work out the best way to set up a stamping process so I can align to a baseline.... I think that S is upside down too!

Edited October 16, 2023 by LukeFRC
The K marks were on wood

[bloke_zero]

1 hour ago, LukeFRC said:

I played with the back of an enclosure as a test piece - I've found that the wood block behind wasn't hard enough - steel jewellers bench anvil and a lump of steel that a mate found had better results. I still need to work out the best way to set up a stamping process so I can align to a baseline.... I think that S is upside down too!

You're already getting better results than me! Ok, time to get some kind of mini anvil!

[tauzero]

On 14/10/2023 at 20:31, LukeFRC said:

Anyway - how to get a rough enclosure nicer and with less effort - I tried a bit of steel wool and found if you took a bit of time and only wiped in one direction you could get quite good unfinished-finish .... 

 

then I got a 14cm bolt. Wrapped steel wool around it. Stuck it in a drill press.... and I had some wierd pedal sanding machine! And, unusually for me. 
IT WORKED!

 

Before putting the front panel label on the Vong-Filterung that you kindly sent me (I did think I had it working at one stage), I put a polishing wheel into the pillar drill and tried that. It wasn't a success.

 

I now have a USB -> MIDI box and will shortly have a Zoom patch switcher box which I want to polish up, both in 1590A boxes, so more experimentation is required. Polishing kit (three buffing wheels, three polished) now ordered from Ebay.

[LukeFRC]

19 minutes ago, tauzero said:

 

Before putting the front panel label on the Vong-Filterung that you kindly sent me (I did think I had it working at one stage), I put a polishing wheel into the pillar drill and tried that. It wasn't a success.

 

I now have a USB -> MIDI box and will shortly have a Zoom patch switcher box which I want to polish up, both in 1590A boxes, so more experimentation is required. Polishing kit (three buffing wheels, three polished) now ordered from Ebay.

How come the polishing wheel didn’t work? Here’s my end result - not perfect but not aiming for that! 

[LukeFRC]

Well that photo tells you not a lot!

[LukeFRC]

30 minutes ago, bloke_zero said:

You're already getting better results than me! Ok, time to get some kind of mini anvil!

Only wee 2mm letters mind 

[PaulThePlug]

My revamp of a Joyo British..

...and a Behriger Beady-Eye

[tauzero]

10 minutes ago, LukeFRC said:

How come the polishing wheel didn’t work? Here’s my end result - not perfect but not aiming for that! 

 

Well, it didn't have the desired effect - it did clean it up a little but not a lot. Going to have a look at my bench grinder to see if I can mount a polishing wheel onto that.