Any DIY pedal builders on TB? Strut your stuff!

[Groovy Luca]

Never apologise for asking a noob question, and everything you've said/asked is all bang on topic.

Fuzz Dog, Electric Druid and Xvive are reliable, but some circuits are just fussy. Like how some PT2399-based delays need to sample a few of the chips before you find one that works (*tip, don't throw the "dud" chip out, it might work in another build). I have some Xvive and IIRC I have some NOS VTL5C3 squirreled away. Vactrols are indeed getting expensive for ol' school finicky builds that require a specific spec. NS-32 are still easy to find. I haven't built the Mootron, but you said you would get the kit ... surely the vactrols are included with the kit?

Ordering from Mouser/RS/Digikey — you've gotta do your homework and really know what you're ordering. I wasn't the first person to order humongous caps that are the correct value but wayyyyy overrated in the voltage department — and I won't be the last. I tried to give the portly caps to my friend that builds amps, he insisted I hang on to them — well I'll be darned if they won't soon become useful to me as I build a Tube Pre Pedal and an amp or two...

So, yeah, pedal BOMs don't always tell you what spec of something to get and so you see a 470n cap at a cheap price and order it and it arrives ...
470n @ 600v — the BOM didn't specify the voltage, but most likely all you needed was 470n @ 25v, maybe 36v. Rule of thumb, and there are always exceptions, but order caps that are rated twice whatever voltage your pedal will run at. For 9v, you can get away with 16v probably, but a charge-pumped pedal running at 18v should have a min 36v rating on its caps. Take this with a grain of salt, I'm not an electronics engineer.

Overall, YES, totally worth ordering from Mouser et al. Just gotta do the homework, and accept there will be times you learn from experience.

Pull the trigger on that Mootron.

Cool yes I'm studying circuits in general and I have a lot to learn but it's nice to try and understand these little boxes, thanks for your explanations.

The kit I'm looking at is this one Moo-Tron Auto Filter and they don't have the vactrols in stock.
I've also found FX25 and Mutron micro V clone kits at about half the price so I might start with one of these simpler envelope filters first.

 

[JoeDaddio]

Never apologise for asking a noob question, and everything you've said/asked is all bang on topic.

Fuzz Dog, Electric Druid and Xvive are reliable, but some circuits are just fussy. Like how some PT2399-based delays need to sample a few of the chips before you find one that works (*tip, don't throw the "dud" chip out, it might work in another build). I have some Xvive and IIRC I have some NOS VTL5C3 squirreled away. Vactrols are indeed getting expensive for ol' school finicky builds that require a specific spec. NS-32 are still easy to find. I haven't built the Mootron, but you said you would get the kit ... surely the vactrols are included with the kit?

Ordering from Mouser/RS/Digikey — you've gotta do your homework and really know what you're ordering. I wasn't the first person to order humongous caps that are the correct value but wayyyyy overrated in the voltage department — and I won't be the last. I tried to give the portly caps to my friend that builds amps, he insisted I hang on to them — well I'll be darned if they won't soon become useful to me as I build a Tube Pre Pedal and an amp or two...

So, yeah, pedal BOMs don't always tell you what spec of something to get and so you see a 470n cap at a cheap price and order it and it arrives ...
470n @ 600v — the BOM didn't specify the voltage, but most likely all you needed was 470n @ 25v, maybe 36v. Rule of thumb, and there are always exceptions, but order caps that are rated twice whatever voltage your pedal will run at. For 9v, you can get away with 16v probably, but a charge-pumped pedal running at 18v should have a min 36v rating on its caps. Take this with a grain of salt, I'm not an electronics engineer.

Overall, YES, totally worth ordering from Mouser et al. Just gotta do the homework, and accept there will be times you learn from experience.

Pull the trigger on that Mootron.

My "I need to learn to read" bin is filled with momentary switches, knurled shaft knobs, and 400v caps

 

[G.Bisson]

I've been slowly putting together a Neutrino (Mutron III clone) over the last several months and held out waiting for VTL5C3's to show up in stock somewhere, anywhere but EBay. That didn't happen, so I went the easy route and found H11F3's available that work in their place. Might give NSL32's a try in the future. I'll try to wrap up that build next instead of setting it aside for easier projects.
While my Neutrino kept getting pushed aside I considered building an OTA-type DOD FX25 filter using easier to find LM13700's. Now Madbean has a 00Funk pcb available that uses the same IC. More funky options to choose from!

 

[G.Bisson]

The 5-hole lead spacing of mistakenly ordered 250v caps actually worked out favorably for a few stripboard layouts.
Today's mistakes may be tomorrow's saving grace. Hold onto those parts until the the right opportunity comes along to use them.

 

[Deleted member 165050]

My "I need to learn to read" bin is filled with momentary switches, knurled shaft knobs, and 400v caps

I'm torn between knurled and smooth... probably 70/30 in favour of smooth at the moment. Trying to remove a tight knurled one a while back I pulled the whole center right out of a pot.

 

[Deleted member 165050]

I've been slowly putting together a Neutrino (Mutron III clone) over the last several months and held out waiting for VTL5C3's to show up in stock somewhere, anywhere but EBay. That didn't happen, so I went the easy route and found H11F3's available that work in their place. Might give NSL32's a try in the future. I'll try to wrap up that build next instead of setting it aside for easier projects.
While my Neutrino kept getting pushed aside I considered building an OTA-type DOD FX25 filter using easier to find LM13700's. Now Madbean has a 00Funk pcb available that uses the same IC. More funky options to choose from!

I made the FuzzDog Mutron III clone using XVive VTL5C3s which aren't too bad to source over here (I got them from Thonk for that pedal and a few others). There's quite a few fakes on fleabay though.

 

[JoeDaddio]

I'm torn between knurled and smooth... probably 70/30 in favour of smooth at the moment. Trying to remove a tight knurled one a while back I pulled the whole center right out of a pot.

I've only ever purchased smooth 1/4'' but mainly because I prefer having a set screw even though they can be a pain sometimes. And I know that most people never actually see the pot shaft but I do feel that the solid ones just appear higher quality. There was a sale on some knobs and I thought I had the filter on to show 1/4'' sooth shaft but I apparently did not and now have like 20 useless (to me) knobs. I figure one of these days there will be a good cause I can gift them to.

But the heavy click Tayda momentary switches? I have no idea why they even make them and I don't think I'd give them away for fear of being called a bad friend

 

[Deleted member 165050]

But the heavy click Tayda momentary switches? I have no idea why they even make them and I don't think I'd give them away for fear of being called a bad friend

Click momentaries can be useful for circuits that are prone to switch bounce, I had a soft momentary on the mode switch on my Parasit New Wave but it would jump 2 or 3 modes, replaced it with a click momentary and it was fine. Soft momentary is better on some of my other builds though.

 

[mdalamond]

Thanks man! Yes this is my first build so be kind guys
Runoffgroove Ginger kit from TH custom, enclosure painted, stenciled and dropped on the floor by me so it's already a relic lol.
I highly recommend the kit, it was easy enough even for a first timer and good quality IMO, only complaint the jacks are kinda trash, the TRS basically fell apart so I just put in a standard Switchcraft and don't plan on using batteries.
View attachment 4231950

View attachment 4231946
View attachment 4231947
View attachment 4231951

Recorded a couple tracks with it today at a reggae/rocksteady session, I'll upload them in a minute.
sounds nice thick and full at low gain settings, and equally as good overdriven, nice little pedal.
Want to thank everyone in the original thread First pedal build advice for their help!

Luca

Edit: here are the tracks (jazz bass with flats > ginger > DI. No eq/fx, just a little compression on the way in)





If anyone's interested I'll track a little demo with the gain cranked

What did you end up setting your bias voltage to. I know the basic rule is half the supply voltage but this circuit has way to much overdrive with the bias set at 4.5v . Mine sounds very close to yours and I set mine at 6.5v on this one.

 

[AudioTaper]

All of this talk of the FX25 makes me want to fix mine. It sports a September 1983 serial number. The previous owner took it apart to replace the battery snap and broke all kinds of stuff.

Heres the rest of my filter collection. I need to add a CDXL 440 reissue from PedalPCB and the Meatball clone from the other place (MusicPCB? I have it written down somewhere)

The 2nd FX25 there works great, has a really odd serial number that starts with 02 instead of 22. I'll have to do more research on the production date.

 

[Groovy Luca]

What did you end up setting your bias voltage to. I know the basic rule is half the supply voltage but this circuit has way to much overdrive with the bias set at 4.5v . Mine sounds very close to yours and I set mine at 6.5v on this one.

Good ear, I set both at 6v as it's recommended on the FuzzDog build pdf. I agree, when I tested it before boxing it they were just under 4v and had too much gain/od.

Also mine has two red LEDs on D6-D7, but the kit also came with two 1N5818 which should be in the original circuit. That's a TH custom mod I think. I haven't tried it with the diodes, what do you have in yours? How would they change the sound?

 

[Feral Feline]

So much great info being shared in the thread, such as...

I've been slowly putting together a Neutrino (Mutron III clone) over the last several months and held out waiting for VTL5C3's to show up in stock somewhere, anywhere but EBay. That didn't happen, so I went the easy route and found H11F3's available that work in their place. Might give NSL32's a try in the future. I'll try to wrap up that build next instead of setting it aside for easier projects.
While my Neutrino kept getting pushed aside I considered building an OTA-type DOD FX25 filter using easier to find LM13700's. Now Madbean has a 00Funk pcb available that uses the same IC. More funky options to choose from!

I had no idea the H11F3 could sub for a VTL5C3.
Cheers.


As for pots smooth or ribbed... I prefer board-mounted pots to lugged pots, and the former are always smooth while the latter are always ribbed, for your pleasure. I prefer a set-screw, so a smooth shaft it is for my preferred potentiometers.

The thing is, you can't always get what you want/need, and sometimes a pot value or taper is required that doesn't come in smooth shaft board mount. Or, in the case of my Parasit Flash Filter Deluxe build, I wanted different pot placement than the PCB offered, and the one pot I needed to relocate also happened to be the one whose value only seemed to be offered in a solder-lug splined shaft version — how fortuitous!


(I may have gleebed the following idea from earlier in this thread or elsewhere on the interwebbations, I don't recall where exactly, but...)

POT TIP!

If you prefer a set screw as I do, and all you've got is a spline'd pot,
take this tip from me, it's free:

Put the break-off tab-bit in the shaft-split; Keep it in place with solder, just a trace.
The knob's set screw won't run through, and the shaft can't snap with a solid gap.



I've read about bypass bounce, but to the best of my knowledge haven't experienced it yet. Good to know about the soft and hard momentary switches, though. Thanks Ficelles.

 

[mdalamond]

Good ear, I set both at 6v as it's recommended on the FuzzDog build pdf. I agree, when I tested it before boxing it they were just under 4v and had too much gain/od.

Also mine has two red LEDs on D6-D7, but the kit also came with two 1N5818 which should be in the original circuit. That's a TH custom mod I think. I haven't tried it with the diodes, what do you have in yours? How would they change the sound?

I did mine on stripboard, the layout called for 5818s that I didn’t have so I used 5817s. I may build another one and socket those 2 to try the leds. I don’t think they make to much of a difference but unless I have the circuit built and swap them out I can’t say for sure. In comparing yours to mine I don’t hear a discernible difference though. But I do like experimenting.

 

[Passinwind]

As for pots smooth or ribbed... I prefer a set-screw, so a smooth shaft it is for my preferred potentiometers.

The thing is, you can't always get what you want/need, and sometimes a pot value or taper is required that doesn't come in smooth shaft board mount. Or, in the case of my Parasit Flash Filter Deluxe build, I wanted different pot placement than the PCB offered, and the one pot I needed to relocate also happened to be the one whose value only seemed to be offered in a solder-lug splined shaft version — how fortuitous!

When using PC pots in applications where I'd want a wire lug, I use these:

That prevents breaking the swage joint on the individual PC mount pins, which I've done far too often in the past when swapping pots from one application to another. Naturally, I roll my own little daughtercards. I do some of them with a simple rectangular pad instead of a through-hole, which makes swaps a lot easier. The ones in the picture cost me around 25 cents apiece, shipping included, FWIW.

 

[AudioTaper]

Back to filters for a second.... MusicPCB had the MeatSphere back in stock (I called it a Meatball in my previous post but I cant edit it) The wife gave me the 'another pedal build?' look, but then I showed her the prices of a used Mutron lll. 'Get it'
Ha, that one was easy!

 

[Feral Feline]

When using PC pots in applications where I'd want a wire lug, I use these:

View attachment 4233989

That prevents breaking the swage joint on the individual PC mount pins, which I've done far too often in the past when swapping pots from one application to another. Naturally, I roll my own little daughtercards. I do some of them with a simple rectangular pad instead of a through-hole, which makes swaps a lot easier. The ones in the picture cost me around 25 cents apiece, shipping included, FWIW.

Those look great. Much nicer than my hacked up vero or perf for adapting PC pots.





Audiotaper, have you compared the Meatsphere pricing with DeadEndFX's equivalent PCB? Just curious.

 

[Passinwind]

25162575[/URL], member: 86934"]Those look great. Much nicer than my hacked up vero or perf for adapting PC pots.

I could do some without the proprietary logo in a few different formats and put up board shares on OSHpark. That’s a standard Alpha pot, but I’ve also done them for MEC pots, dualies, push-pulls, encoders, etc. It can be a big time saver for some of the stuffI I build for sure.

 

[AudioTaper]

Audiotaper, have you compared the Meatsphere pricing with DeadEndFX's equivalent PCB? Just curious.

I forgot about DeadEndFX. They are about $6 higher than MusicPCB (shipped). I'll have to poke around their website more, they seem to have a lot of boards.

 

[76jazzbass]

Those look great. Much nicer than my hacked up vero or perf for adapting PC pots.





Audiotaper, have you compared the Meatsphere pricing with DeadEndFX's equivalent PCB? Just curious.

While back I built a Meatsphere from a kit I bought from Musikding. The build was mostly spread out over year and not sure if I messed up somewhere or possible wrong part but doesn't work very well. Very hard to dial in and tiny range but when it does it pretty cool. One of these days I'll dig into it but I hardly ever have the time

 

[mdalamond]

I could do some without the proprietary logo in a few different formats and put up board shares on OSHpark. That’s a standard Alpha pot, but I’ve also done them for MEC pots, dualies, push-pulls, encoders, etc. It can be a big time saver for some of the stuffI I build for sure.

I’m in , I have a bunch of alpha pots I could use them on. I sometimes find discounts on the pc pin pots so I buy them up . This is a great solution.