BYOC - Stack Drive Custom DIY Build

[Liko]

What have I gotten myself into?

After looking at a lot of videos of a lot of people having a lot of fun with 2-in-1 drives like the KoT, Duellist, Browne Protein, D&M, and a half-dozen others, I thought, hey, could be fun. Not a big fan of the price tags or waiting lists, though. So, I figured, I'm good with a soldering iron, I can build one. And wouldn't ya know it, after some finagling with BYOC's kits, I put together a shopping cart for a stack of the Tube Screamer into the Blues Driver (most of the stacks are some variation on a green box pushing a blue box) for less than $150 shipped.

Now, it's here.

On the plus side, the directions look pretty straightforward, they don't try to do too much in each step, and there are warnings about common gotchas like installing one-way components backwards or mixing up resistor values. I'll be printing them out in full color for reference as I go (gotta love a wife that has two color laser printers for crafts).

There are, however, a few challenges to using what I ordered.

1. Both effects have 3-knob "V" layouts. However, the gain knob is the center knob of the BD board, but the right-hand knob of the TS. I want the gain knob to be the bottom of the V on both sides. Electrically, that's not difficult, but it leaves the TS PCB suspended from the top of the enclosure by 3 solder joints instead of 9.
2. I bought the largest enclosure BYOC sells (the 1610), which is theoretically a 1590BB with extra depth. However, the PCBs for two 1590B-size circuits do not fit in this enclosure side-by-side. Theoretically, I can still cram it all in there more or less as designed if I wire the PCBs to the pots at different distances from the enclosure face. However, given that I also need to find room for a 4PDT switch for circuit order, I see two options:
   1. Upsize to the 1590XX footprint. Not ideal for pedalboard space, it's not far short of two BBs wide.
   2. Use wire leads for everything enclosure-mounted that would otherwise be through-hole on the PCB (making Problem 1 a non-issue), and use the 1610's extra depth to stack the boards any way they'll fit, in a neoprene sandwich to insulate/protect them. Risky, especially as I'd have to destroy the pots that came with the kits just to try this.
   • I do not have to solve this problem for quite a while, I have plenty to work on just to populate the PCB components of both boards.
3. That "Big Knob" layout? Yeah, I got a big blue knob and a big green knob in the same Jazz-ish fluted/skirted shape as the ones that came with the kit, but neither large knob is the same shade as the small fluted knobs offered with the pedal kits. They're functional, of course, but it's noticeable (and annoying that "green" =/= "green" in the color options for the two SKUs).
   • Easy enough fix, these knobs are the cheapest part of the build, it's just irksome.
4. As a custom enclosure build, of course nothing's drilled.
   • That provides flexibility in positioning, but all it takes is one failed hole to ruin the enclosure. Which was only $6.50, but now BYOC is out of stock on them.
   • Additionally, it creates a seemingly circular build order; drill before you paint, paint before you assemble, but assemble before you drill (to get hole positioning just right). In reality, the assembly is in two halves; populate the PCB, then do everything else, then wire and assemble pots/jacks/switches. I'll figure it out.

I will post some before/unboxing pictures later tonight, as I get things arranged. As of right now I'm still officially on the clock.

 

[Liko]

Pictures, as promised:

The workspace. Spartan but satisfactory.

Option 1 for layout/placement. Would require using wire leads for all mounted components, and I'm honestly not sure it'll work at all. And, you can see the color issues.

Option 2. More conventional for a stack, could possibly allow the pots to stay PCB mounted, but there's just no room for the switch as you'll see.

Yeah, the two boards just don't quite fit side by side in this enclosure...

But I can still get some work done. Here are the diodes for symmetric clipping (I'm considering a switch for asymmetric clipping), all the 1Ks and all the 10Ks...

... Except the eagle-eyed will notice they shorted me one 10K resistor. Checked the whole bench, it's just not here. Well, there's a quirky little hardware store with hard-to-find electronics-type parts just down the road, I'll see if they'll sell me a more appropriate quantity than 100 of them. If they don't, the choices are to pay $6 for a box of 100 from Amazon, drive a ridiculously long way out to Fry's (assuming they still carry all this hobbyist stuff), or get in touch with BYOC's customer service (which I don't want to do a billion times so I'll need to list out anything else missing from the other circuit pack, which I didn't want to open and get mixed up).

ETA: there is a fourth option, BYOC sells them for 10 cents apiece, thing is the shipping will inflate that. I can get the right color knobs too, I guess.

This has the potential to be a looong project...

 

[Feral Feline]

Cool project, looks like you're off to a grand start.

I've got some 808 builds way down in the pipeline, but I've never looked into the Blues Driver — so your project interests me. My thoughts on the 808 build...



1x10k RESISTANCE IS FUTILE
I'd rather have 99 spare 10k resistors at 6¢/piece (not including $hipping) than pay 10¢ for 1 plus $hipping. What if you get a dud resistor? It happens (long story of brand new spark plugs in an engine rebuild and misfiring cylinder, shortened to... turns out roughly 1 in every million spark plugs made is a dud). Anyhoooo... this DIY creppicola is addicting, so you may as well have some spare 10k resistors laying around for the inevitable next build. It's a common value, 10k, not like 6M2 or other weirdly huge or small value — so they'll get used. Besides, I'm sure there's an electronics store near you that sells resistors in small quantities; I'm lucky as I've got a place I regularly go to that sells singles — just check and make sure it's the correct value as other customers may not be so careful ensuring that dropped resistor finds its way back into the correct parts-drawer...

Since you're possibly getting new knobs anyway, consider a one-stop shop for your build such as Any DIY pedal builders on TB? Strut your stuff!. You can get pre-drilled enclosures and/or pre-painted enclosures (I've got some BYOC kits, I like their circuits but not their enclosures), knobs, resistors, ICs, sockets, caps, everything you need to mod the TS for bass...


FOR BASS?
If this is a build for running a bass through it, have you looked at modding the TS for better bass response?
You may already be well aware of the following, but in case you aren't or for others that may be curious...

Jack Orman has a Flat-Mids Mod.pdf for taking out the inherent 808 mid-hump, but it requires rerouting a resistor from ground to Vref 4.5v, which he recommends putting on a Switch, so you can have it stock or modded. Search the interwebs for Orman's AMZ Fat Mod, too, which will help fatten up the lows. Use the R-C filter calculator at AMZ to tweak the values.

The 808's stock corner frequency: 4k7 + 47n, corner = 721Hz [TS-808s generally 720–723 Hz]. Can mod this to go a tad lower, so it's more flat response and thus won't compete with the guitarist's mid-humped Screamer.

From the aforementioned PDF w/ note equivalents added:
Capacitor — Corner Freq. (Keep in mind A440 is just above Middle-C at 261.6Hz)
0.047uF — 720 Hz stock ___ (between F5 and F#5)
0.1uF — 339 Hz __________ (between E4 and F4)
0.22uF — 154 Hz _________ (D#3)
0.47uF — 72 Hz __________ (D2)
1.0uF — 34 Hz ___________ (C#1)

I'm not suggesting going as low as 1uF, but Orman does, and I'd definitely try a .068uF or .082uF. At the very least I'd socket the input/output caps to swap in some bigger, bassier values.

General Guitar Gadgets' "KRAMPUS" is a pretty cool bassified 808-derivative, but I haven't tried it myself yet (haven't tried much of anything 808, just read lots). I bet you could build the Krampus or something close to it on your BYOC PCB; ironically, the Krampus has smallish in/out caps. AionFX has some good info in its "Stratus" build-doc (a TS-9), well, all Aion build docs seem to have good reading material for whatever similar circuit you're working on. Madbean's T-Bagger Bass Contour mod is worth a lookyloo, download the PDF (and for other projects) here. RG Keen's "Technology of the Tube Screamer" is definitely worth reading and Electrosmash breaks it down in this analysis.

Can always add caps parallel on Switches (input cap, tone stack etc) to have bass or stock settings — but given the space constraints of DIY in enclosures, seems I can never cram in as much function as the commercial builders can for any given size box. On that note...


ORDER SWITCHCRAFT
I, too, have been frustrated by trying to fit two PCBs, each meant for 1590B or 1590N1, into one 1590BB enclosure. Whether you offboard wire some or all pots, I'm sure you'll figure out what you want, but what helped me out was putting the order-switcher on the back wall: in-jack, order-switch, power-jack, output-jack — all on the back.
If only there was a 1590BBE ("E" for extended by 5mm)... the lack of those 5mm has ruined many dual-circuit plans of mine, and the next size up in Hammond's line is too big.






I'm sure there's mods-O-plenty wafting about the virtual ethers for the Blues Driver, too. Other than BYOC, I know Lectric-FX's Blooze Hound is based on the BD-2, maybe there's some wisdom to be gleaned from the build doc there. I don't know of any other BD-2 DIY projects, but I've never looked for it.

This thread may be of interest:
Any DIY pedal builders on TB? Strut your stuff!


Looking forward to seeing the BD-2 built up, and how your resolve your challenges, enjoy the build!

Cheers,
FF

 

[Liko]

Cool project, looks like you're off to a grand start.

Thanks, FF. I'll make sure to tag you when I get over to the BD side. That's a much more complicated circuit, despite being a FET boost instead of an op-amp. I'm tackling the 808 side first because the board's a bit sparser, so I can hone my skills at bending leads and getting everything to lay nice and flat before it *really* matters.

BYOC's kit actually has a number of simple mods available in the included parts. Three of note are "more clean" (lowers the minimum gain so the pedal's cleaner as a clean boost into the BD), "more gain/more bass" (recommended as a pair because "more gain" also ups the HPF into the 1.2k range, the combo both adds more gain and drops the HPF to ~260Hz), and asymmetric clipping (puts a third diode in series with one of the others). I plan to do all three on this, with the second two switchable (I'm a sucker for punishment ain't I).

BYOC also sells a kit for the BD to do the well-known "Fat Mod". I was going to pick it up but unfortunately they were out of stock. I will definitely check out Tayda, see if I can get the same parts and throw them in this kit. I'll check their other selection while I'm at it.

I must admit that while I'm not 100% sure where this pedal will end up instrument-wise, I did have my 6-string short-scale piccolo basses in mind. But, with options to make the TS side less of a 720Hz dirty boost, and with the more full-range Blues Driver available, who knows, it might just replace my Hot Wax.

 

[Feral Feline]

Great stuff. I've got the BYOC build docs, I'll have to read them, too!

 

[Liko]

Well, @Feral Feline, I said I'd tag you when I got into the Blues Driver circuit. I done did.

On the 808 side, while babysitting a file job for work, I got through almost all the population of that board, save for the missing resistor and some moddable components I'll be putting into switches:

So, while waiting for those parts, I figured I'd get a start on the BD PCB.

Unboxing:

A little more organized:

The bare board. Holy frijoles...

Oh, this came today too:

Short-bat 3-position on-on-on 4PDT, to handle circuit order. Center position will put the circuits in parallel. This is how:

First solder, a simple wire jumper:

And a few points later, here are all the unique resistor values from the kit in place:

So far, so good. Obviously a much more complex circuit than the 808. The mod kit that's out of stock is mostly upgraded polarized capacitors, swapping tantalum in place of most electrolytic caps of equal value. The actual Fat Mod is a simple switch between a stock film cap and a beefier one. Tayda has the stuff, just need to put a cart together.

 

[Feral Feline]

Very cool!

I, too, use some foam to organise bits; I've also masking-taped them to cardboard to label and organise ...

I like the idea of putting in the unique resistors first, I'm stealing that idea.

Most of all I like the 4PDT on-on-on centre-parallel, I'm stealing that too! Very cool to be able to use parallel ... my order-swappers are simple on-on switches. I also prefer short-bat toggles ( all mine are long ).

I see the BLMS sticker in the background, I need to get some short-bat 2PDT on-on-on type II from BLMS. Needed them for more than a year, but other priorities keep getting in the way of ordering...

TYPE I centre position (What I have):
◉◎
◉◉
◎◉

Type II centre position (What I need):
◎◉
◉◉
◉◎


I've got a few PCBs that require type II, won't work with type I — haven't bothered to figure out if I could offboard-wire the Type I to make it work in the circuit, 'cause the PCB-mount helps fix the PCB in the enclosure.






Thanks for sharing your build(s)

 

[Liko]

Very cool!

I, too, use some foam to organise bits; I've also masking-taped them to cardboard to label and organise ...

I like the idea of putting in the unique resistors first, I'm stealing that idea.

I hit on the foam idea pretty early. That's also one of the reasons I went for the unique values first; on this board, there were a lot of unique values, so it spaced out the remaining resistors in the foam pretty quick, so hopefully it's harder to misidentify (though I test each value one last time before I put it on).

The 808 didn't have so many distinct values, so on that one I did it exactly the other way, putting in the most common values first. It's kinda six of one, but I think going through all the one-offs was the better idea overall.

Most of all I like the 4PDT on-on-on centre-parallel, I'm stealing that too! Very cool to be able to use parallel ... my order-swappers are simple on-on switches. I also prefer short-bat toggles ( all mine are long ).

I see the BLMS sticker in the background, I need to get some short-bat 2PDT on-on-on type II from BLMS. Needed them for more than a year, but other priorities keep getting in the way of ordering...

TYPE I centre position (What I have):
◉◎
◉◉
◎◉

Type II centre position (What I need):
◎◉
◉◉
◉◎

I've got a few PCBs that require type II, won't work with type I — haven't bothered to figure out if I could offboard-wire the Type I to make it work in the circuit, 'cause the PCB-mount helps fix the PCB in the enclosure.

Thanks for sharing your build(s)

I hear ya. In my case the switch isn't part of any PCB so that frees me to use either orientation, and I actually diagrammed it out both ways just in case. I'm not sure if the wiring path could be any simpler, or if wiring all the grounds together instead of routing them alongside the hots will be an issue (electrically it shouldn't matter but there could possibly be noise or bleedthrough issues). Guess we'll see when I get there.

In the meantime, I went to Tayda. Electronics hobbyist smorgasbord, definitely bookmarked. Only two problems. First, everything's so cheap that I didn't make the $5 minimum with the quantities I needed, so I'll have a few spares of each value I'm buying. Second, they had everything I needed to finish wiring both kits, except for silver mica caps, which are part of the BD upgrade kit (they replace a few film caps to smooth out high-end harshness). Tube Depot had them at a decent price though (also bookmarked).

 

[Feral Feline]

IIRC, I got Silver Micas from Small Bear, and Amplified Parts.

I may have suggested Tayda as a "one-stop shop", but the frustrating reality is there's no such thang — there's always that one bit that isn't carried or out of stock that drives the $hipping costs of a project up.

Nudder problem can be quality. For instance, I've got some really good knobs from Tayda, but also some low-grade stuff, but — scuttlebutt I've heard is Tayda has improved in many areas, but it's been a long time since I needed to order from Thailand. I see Tayda's added Wima caps, so I'll probably order some of those and see if they're legit or knockoffs (I wouldn't really know unless its painfully obvious).

 

[Liko]

Replacement/upgrade parts on the way from Tayda and Tube Depot, add about $15 to the original tab of $145. We'll see what the grand total looks like once I've bought the stuff I'm looking at for the enclosure. In any case I think I'll be doing pretty well, fingers crossed and knock on wood.

I got some time yesterday evening to do some more soldering. Here's all the resistors in place:

... And here are all the diodes that the mod kit won't upgrade, plus the IC chassis:

Just the caps and transistors to go. I say "just"; there are no fewer than 10 FETs of 3 different types in this circuit, nearly 20 film caps and half a dozen polarized. Compared to this, the 808 circuit really is very simple.

The shipments on their way right now have the parts to finish the 808, so I think once I have those envelopes in hand, I'm going to go back to the 808, finish all the wiring to board and test that pedal in isolation with temp hookups, then do the same for the BD. Then, we can start talking about hooking them together under one shell.

As for the shell, the plan is a combination of spray paints and hydrographic film. I'm torn between carbon fiber and this spaghetti-looking wire tangle pattern. When I make a decision, I'll show some images of the raw pattern. Either way, over the top of that will be a rattle-can gradient of translucent blue and green, some method of lettering, be it paint pen, waterslide or possibly the wife's Cricut, and a crap-ton of clear poly.

 

[Liko]

Had some time this weekend, got some more soldering done on the BD board.

All transistors in place:

... except that I mixed up a 3904 and a 3906 (PNP vs NPN), at the bottom right. I will tell anyone who doesn't already know, soldering a 3-pin transistor is easy, de-soldering one isn't. I was a hairsbreadth from just cutting the triode apart and ordering a new one, before I finally got a well-tinned iron to liquiefy all three solder points simultaneously. Even then, cleaning up the site so it would take the proper transistor was neither fun nor clean, and I'm not 100% certain I didn't ruin the transistor anyway applying heat for so long. We will see.

Compared to transistors, caps were a breeze:

The ones still not mounted are part of the mod kit. Between Tayda and Tube Depot I got the parts I need to complete both circuits. Tube Depot's silver mica caps (replacing some small-value ceramics) are out for delivery today, but USPS still hasn't seen Tayda's package, probably because it's on a slow boat from China (Thailand, actually).

I also threw in the towel on trying to get both circuits to fit into the BB-size enclosure I'd originally ordered from BYOC. Whether portrait or landscape, there's something that just doesn't fit (and usually many somethings actually). I found a 1590J (as wide as a XX, slightly deeper but not as tall) that should do the trick, it will be here tomorrow.

To drill that enclosure, I got a "lightning deal" from Amazon on a set of step bits. Would I use them on steel? Probably not, but for aluminum they're fine, and cheaper and easier to use for that purpose than a full set of oxide-coated metal drilling bits.

So, the roadmap is:

1. Finish both boards with desired switchable mods
2. Test both circuits in isolation
3. Do final measuring and positioning
4. Drill enclosure
5. Test fit
6. Paint/hydro-dip/finish enclosure
7. While layers of finish are drying, wire the "full" stack circuit together and test
8. Final fit/function test
9. Rock out with manly bits showing

 

[Feral Feline]

Yup, I've desoldered multi-pinned bits more often than I'd care to admit, and it is indeed a PITB.

However, I've never soldered transistors, I always use SIP sockets.

I snip off whatever's needed, solder the socket and insert the transistor; no frying the transistor in the soldering process. I've never had a transistor come loose, though of course that could happen in time or due to manufacturing tolerances (like MTB tires and rims, some tires are easy to mount and others are a son-of-a...

Here's a Muff PCB and a couple of daughterboards I completely socketed, so I can try out different ideas beyond the solder-bench's breadboard and listen to them in situ — like at gigs or friends' studio/rehearsal space etc...






I learned the hard way that step-bits are NOT great for 1590A builds (didn't go right through the far side, but there's divots opposite of the holes), but steppers are handy for just about anything else. I stick tape on mine so I know how deep to push 'em.


Your work is tidy. My caps are often at odd angles and even my resistors usually look wonky. I've tried all sorts of tricks attempting to keep the resistors lying flat and straight. Still haven't found one that works for me.

 

[Liko]

Well, Christmas held up the shipments, but no biggie, I guess I needed some family time.

In the meantime, the Tayda Electronics shipment finally showed up, and the Tube Depot shipment came in a while back, so now I finally have all the parts to finish populating the boards. Yay!

Oh, so satisfying to finally have this lower corner of the 808 board soldered in. I left the electrolytic cap off so I had room to get the missing 10K in. Now both are in place.

Notice the upper left corner; the missing components are a diode for asymmetric clipping (it's either the diode or a wire jumper), a cap for bass response (switching between 47nF and 220nF, the higher value preserves more bass) and a resistor for gain (4.7kohms is the stock value, swapping to 2.7k gives the gain dial more fire). I want these mods to be switchable.

Here are the switches:

Yeah, I'm kinda bad at positioning stuff on switches. You'll notice I have the ins and outs on the end poles. The point is to use the switch to jumper/short out the components I don't want in the circuit, leaving the ones I do want in that mode. This ends up cleaner than trying to use the leads of the resistors to and from the board.

To do that job, I sacrificed an old computer IDE ribbon cable. Yeah, the wires are really fine-gauge, single-conductor and not designed to solder. But they do still take it, and as long as I'm careful once they're wired to the board, it will reduce some wire clutter.

OK, on to the Blues Driver. I put in as much as I could that wasn't going to be replaced by the mod kit. But, the mod kit's out of stock, so I ordered the listed parts from Tayda and Tube Depot.

Uh-oh. Apparently I was not aware, when I placed the order with Tube Depot, that the silver mica capacitors I was ordering were built for making, y'know, tube amplifiers, and so they are rated for 500V. The pedal won't see 50. But, they're the right values, and this part's dragged on long enough, so in they go:

Likewise, the big green cap is a .1uF film cap, rated for 100V instead of 50. I really need to look more closely when spec'ing these things. But, like the mica, they fit. The tantalums - yellow droplet things - are just fine.

As with the 808 board, the Blues Driver has a switchable mod, a "Fat Switch" that ups the value of a capacitor to increase low-end response. Definitely want that, so here's another SPDT with the caps:

I am holding off on wiring in the ribbon cable, because of its more delicate nature. I may change my mind, if I decide to set up isolated test rigs for each pedal. I don't think I'll be doing that until I can put each circuit in the enclosure, because there's a lot of "DO NOT WIRE THE POTS UNTIL YOU'VE MOUNTED THEM" warnings on the Interwebs. That part of the build is apparently much more fiddly than you want it to be, and I am heeding the warning and waiting for the enclosure to be ready.

Regardless, that didn't stop me wiring in the ins and outs. As these will go together in a switchable stack config, I'm soldering in my own lead wires to go where they need to go instead of to where the instructions say to put them.

This is where it gets a little more interesting; up to now, I can put the kit together just by following instructions, color by numbers, connect the dots. But, because this will be a stack drive, once each one is mounted in its position in the shared enclosure, I basically throw away the remaining instructions, and wire it up my way.

So... the enclosure. The 1590J showed up a couple days ago, and while it sounded big enough, but on receipt it turned out to be wider version of the BB enclosure on its side, and while the boards now fit, they won't once the pots are in place. The board, pots and switch, fully wired, are a full 4" long, and the 808, BD and the 4PDT switch that I want between them on the face of the pedal, total about 5". So, it has to be the 1590X/1790NS, at a nominal 5.5"x4.5", to fit everything in properly.

That enclosure will probably be here Wednesday or Thursday, and next weekend will see me drilling and fitting. Fingers crossed I don't ruin it, because, yeah, that would be the natural expectation on this build so far, in terms of having all the right parts in one place at one time and having them actually work.

 

[Liko]

Small update; the family's been busy putting Christmas away (and still not done yet) so I haven't had a ton of time to make progress, but I did take an hour or so to myself. With the boards largely wired, focus has shifted to the enclosure. The BB-size wasn't big enough, the J size wasn't big enough. So, say hello to the 1590X:

(From the left, X, BB and J)

I will likely find/invent projects for the other enclosures, and in the meantime they can stick around. The X is the same footprint as an XX or NS, but taller, so I have more options for positioning the jacks without worrying about colliding with interior components.

After a few measurements of the enclosure, boards and components:

...I translated all that to the enclosure in pencil, followed by Sharpie dots:

... followed by diameter markings; the pots, being 6mm or just over 1/4", are the weirdest measurement, but I have a step bit that can do it:

And here's a test placement of most of the surface components:

I haven't marked holes for the LEDs yet, that's mainly because I'm not sure exactly where I want them. The normal position supported by the PCB is toward the center of the knob cluster, and that's certainly not a bad place to put them as they can just poke through a 5mm hole, protected from most impacts by the knobs. It's also one less thing to have to screw in and then unscrew to get the circuit in and out of the enclosure (which I foresee happening a lot).

However, I'm also considering using another couple lengths of the ribbon cable to move them down to between each gain knob and switch, in bezel mounts. In this area, they can be either inline with the switch and gain knob like the Duellist, or to the inside of the pedal, like a certain purple and gold stack you may have seen. Either way, the bezel mount would make the pedal look just that little bit more put together and professional, for just a couple more bucks. Whether that particular finishing touch will matter once the enclosure's been through my amateur attempts to put graphics and a finish on it, well, that remains to be seen.

 

[Liko]

Another update. I got the holes drilled, and most of the shell-mounted components installed:

All drilled holes are perfect so far, except for the LED bezels. Those showed up yesterday, I will need to widen the holes I drilled for them (I drilled to the diameter of the LEDs themselves, just need to ream out to 5/16", NBD). The boards are just laying on the pot pins right now, not fully soldered in place.

After all the components are test-fit, I start soldering the overall pedal together, with a couple additional modifications. The big knob on the 808 side is actually the tone control, and I want it to be the gain control which is in the upper right. The pots are in the position I want, but will need to have their connections made with wire leads, requiring me to cut/bend the terminals of those pots. That leaves the board hanging off the "ceiling" of the enclosure by the solder joints of the volume pot in the left corner, with maybe a little extra structure from various wire leads. I'm thinking a little hot glue on the Tone pot shell might be in order. However, once again time is short on weekends, though I will likely have time on Fridays for the next few weeks to make more progress on this.

 

[Liko]

Been offline for a while, time to catch up here. LED bezels arrived, it was easy enough to ream out the holes I'd already drilled.

Rather than test each board independently, I decided to go for broke.

Wired everything up, turned it on, and surprise surprise, my soldering skills need a little work. With circuits off, the bypass worked. On, the TS side let signal pass, but the gain knob didn't add any dirt. The BD side didn't work at all.

Troubleshooting step 1, straight from both manuals, is "re-flow all solder joints". Did that, and the BD side worked much better, except the LED. Minor, but I like to know the status of my effects, so I troubleshot. Turns out I burned out one of the contacts trying to get the switch to take solder. So, replacement switch time. Lesson learned; the switches I got from BYOC as part of the kit were far superior in quality to the ones Amazon sells. Theoretically intercompatible, but the BYOC switches pop less and feel better when switching. Oh well, I'm a little over the electrical work at this point, so if it functions, it stays put.

There were also issues with the order switch; parallel worked if both pedals were on, but if you turned one off you'd get howling feedback. I traced the diagram, tested every path, no improvement. Eventually, I gave up on parallel, and swapped out for a two-position switch with a simpler switching path for TS->BD and vice versa.

After a full re-flow and replacing the BD switch, the Blues Driver circuit functions, but is a little "spittier" in most settings than I expected. Probably means there's still a transistor somewhere that's starved of rail power. But, I actually kinda like the sound, and it's much improved from when I first turned it on.

The 808's problems turned out to be in the feedback loop. Recall, way back when, that I had decided to make the asymmetric mod and the more gain/more bass mods switchable. Well, if the tiny little ribbon cable wire connecting the solder points to the switches with the actual components breaks (or pulls out because the wire doesn't take solder well), you're basically left without a feedback loop at all, so the circuit functions as a two-knob clean boost. Re-flowing the switch terminals, making sure the ribbon cable wires are connected, and voila, a perfectly-working TS-type overdrive.

So, at this point, the pedal functions about 90% of the way I envisioned; the BD is a little rougher an overdrive than I had thought it would be, and I don't have parallel pedal order. Many combinations of the two at varying gain/volume settings still give me very nice "low-medium-high" stack options.

Now that it's all working... I need to tear it all out of the shell, so I can paint/finish the enclosure. Which has me scared out of my mind, hopefully understandably; the rigid mounting is very likely what's keeping many of the wire joints continuous, and pulling it all back out and putting it back in is similarly likely to break something else. But, I want to be done, so I can put my tools away and tear down my workbench to get some much-needed room back in my studio/study. I have one last three-day weekend of vacation days, and in stark contrast to the current "Snowmageddon" that left my family without power for two nights, we're forecast to have temps in the 60s on Saturday, perfect weather for having the garage door open to ventilate the various spray cans I'll be applying to this shell.

Fingers crossed.

 

[Feral Feline]

Hey! Was just wondering about you and your build!

Sorry to hear your parallel switching didn't work out, particularly because I was going to crib it.

Yes! Questions... Morphology? Longevity? Incept dates?


I saw the dotted lines in your diagram showing the 4PDT to be a type-2 switch (alco in the third diagram)...

Image courtesy of Jemsite.com

Link Removed



... Squealing when one is bypassed, and it doesn't matter which one?

I know you've resorted to a simpler order switcher, I'm just fixated on pondering the parallel problem still. If it doesn't work in parallel so be it, but I want to know why.

What about putting buffers on the order switcher, so that the bypassed signals are still running through a buffer? Probably on the return side...
With the BD on and the TS "off", it's still conducting clean signal through its bypass and back to the 4PDT and causing squealing. Squealing can only be from a short-circuit feedback loop, but nothing's really changed from when the TS is on, apart from the fact the signal is being conditioned, hence my suggestion to run buffers on the return portion of the BD and TS.


Maybe pose the question in the DIY thread: Any DIY pedal builders on TB? Strut your stuff!
Somebody with better knowledge and experience there might have a solution or at least an explanation.



At any rate, good to see the project progress.

Cheers,
FF