A buddy has asked if i can build hima treble booster to compliment his Vox AC30 and american telecaster combination.
He already has a distortion on his Boss ME50 and is looking for another lower gain flavour of distortion so i suggested a treble booster.
I'm thinking Fryer treble booster deluxe with germanium tranny.
But i'm canvasing for opinions on what you would reccomend for this combo and criteria.
I'd appreciate your input
thanks
Rich
The fryer treble booster uses a silicon transistor, so you're unlikely to be able to drop a germanium transistor in there.
I'd suggest you either go for a silicon fryer or a germanium rangemaster, depending on whether you're going for a Brian May or Rory Gallagher vibe.
With a tele you've already got a bunch of treble, so probably worth building a booster with a cap blend mod to move between treble boost and flat boost.
If you want to go germanium, the Red Rooster springs to mind:
http://revolutiondeux.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/dallas-rangemaster-dam-red-rooster.html (http://revolutiondeux.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/dallas-rangemaster-dam-red-rooster.html)
An Oh My Darling RM:
https://www.smallbearelec.com/Projects/OhMyDarling/OhMyDarling.htm
SD
I like the Omega (http://www.runoffgroove.com/omega.html) from runoffgroove.com.
Pretty versatile treble booster, IMO. Fits
nicely onto a tiny piece of Vero and into a 1590A: | (http://www.bouron.org.uk/marc/o635.JPG) |
Mark i made the Omega as a trial and its very noisy. it has a sort of electrical hum too it it gets worse as i turn up the boost.
I did the layout as per the ROG page except i integrated the pots on the perfboard..
Did you do the perf layout too?
I'm not sure i know what i'm on about but it kinda feels like a noisy cap. Does that make sense? Is it possible?
What's the pedal powered by?
Does it hum when nothing's plugged into it?
Does the selection of pickup, or the knob position of volume/tone controls, or the position of the guitar make any difference to the hum?
How exactly did you wire the input and output jacks? I notice that some diagrams (in general) omit the ground lead to the output, which is OK if you are using metal non insulated jacks and a metal enclosure and tighten everything really well.
Quote from: Kipper4 on July 14, 2013, 07:47:44 AM
Mark i made the Omega as a trial and its very noisy. it has a sort of electrical hum too it it gets worse as i turn up the boost.
I did the layout as per the ROG page except i integrated the pots on the perfboard..
Did you do the perf layout too?
Hmmm... mine was gorgeous and crystal clear. Did my own Vero layout:
(http://www.bouron.org.uk/marc/OMEGADIY.GIF) (http://www.bouron.org.uk/marc/OMEGADIY.GIF)
I've got a bit of vero left i'll try it again later thanks Mark
built it on vero as per (exception rev pol diode added)
Same thing with the 9v power supply its just too noisy to make use of it but with a battery its excellant.
Its unboxed as yet.
I dont normally get this kind of thing any ideas why i am this time?
Quote from: Kipper4 on July 14, 2013, 03:10:42 PM
with the 9v power supply its just too noisy to make use of it but with a battery its excellant.
What kind of "9v power supply" are you using? An unmodified wall wart could easily be causing this.
wall wart but its normally very quite with most of the pedals i make. infact i prefer it over some of the others usually.
this is really annoying.
I was gonna start another thread but I figured this one is as good as any. I'm looking for a treble boost for my bass. Basically I want a smooth-ish overdrive for higher frequencies only. I have a bass booster already and I'm looking to blend the two. I have an aversion to using any designs that are dependent on components with bad part tolerances so I prefer Si NPN's over JFETs and Ge trannies.
Any recommendations?
I should say that JFETs are tolerable if they get the best sound but Ge's scare the crap out of me.
I've found adding a series 100r resistor to the power supply input followed by a 100uf cap to ground has quieted simple builds that were perfectly quiet on battery but annoyingly noisy with a power supply.
My Omega's totally fine too.
dave
Thanks for the tip Dave. I'll make a note for future referance.
Bill theres always the Brian May Treble booster that is silicone based. I've made it a couple of times but with BC109s.
Ive ordered some BC182s now to try it as per the online schemos (Paul in the lab style)
Talk to Smallbear and get one of their Rangemaster transistors (Japanese knock off instead of NOS can is fine, I've used both) and build the stock Rangemaster EXCEPT...
Switch the input cap between .05 and .1 (or .005 and .01 can't remember without notes in front of me).
Push that thing to the edge into a Vox amp and they break up ever so beautifully and subtly.
Mind you its a pos ground circuit which can be off-putting.
Quote from: Kipper4 on July 14, 2013, 04:35:51 PM
wall wart but its normally very quite with most of the pedals i make.
Make yourself a little box (can be plastic) that contains a large-ish filter cap, a three-terminal regulator and a small output cap. Wall warts really do need the extra filtering.
There used to be a simple filter vero floating around, I have it on another PC and cannot for the life of me remember who's it was (I thought Adriano's but I can't see it on a quick skim through his gallery).
Protection diode, filter caps, low parts and very effective for cheap wall-wart issues with gain pedals... Who can find it?
Game on.
Quote from: mistahead on July 14, 2013, 11:52:50 PM
There used to be a simple filter vero floating around, I have it on another PC and cannot for the life of me remember who's it was (I thought Adriano's but I can't see it on a quick skim through his gallery).
Protection diode, filter caps, low parts and very effective for cheap wall-wart issues with gain pedals... Who can find it?
Game on.
http://www.beavisaudio.com/projects/Huminator/
http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=92731.0
Type "treble boost" into the search. There are a number of TB threads here.
Quote from: Gus on July 15, 2013, 06:32:25 AM
Type "treble boost" into the search. There are a number of TB threads here.
Already done that Gus. Thanks but and i will probably do it again.
Whats this about transistors Smallbear? Pm me please with some more details.
I did the series resistor and cap to ground and its so quite now. Thanks again Its appreciated Dave.
I think i will make a note in my booky and use it in transistor circuits in the future.
i will make the huminator and whats more is i have a beavis drawing somewhere for a filtered power supply that i already use on my breadboard.
it's got to be similar to the huminator already?
Can i build the rangemaster and just use an AC125?
Omg I just stuck a J201 in the place of the 2n5457. this thing has some oumph (technical term) mind you it depends on how you set the trimmer.
Wow differant ball game there. Sweet overdrive. set the range to suit your sound too.
After fiddling around and getting sub-standard results I gave up and bought the OC44 (is it?) metal can and their half-the-price japanese transistor, tested and packaged with the R's that suit the transistors ratings in the circuit.
I've tried all sorts of things in the Rangemaster - you can't lose as the base circuit is simple and cheap and the transistor COMPLETELY changes the game. You really want the mid/trebble switch on the input cap too - that gives it a lot more to work with.
Most people who do an RM want a single device that hits a fairly narrow gain bucket, and we can and do offer various types at a price. However, if you are willing to do some experimenting, you can get superb results in the RM circuit by cascading two low-gain, low-cost devices as a Darlington pair:
https://www.smallbearelec.com/HowTos/GeDarlingtons/GeDarlingtonPairs.htm
The ideas in that article make use of devices that most people overlook, so they remain cheep and readily available for the moment. The pedal that I developed around them, the Oh My Darling:
https://www.smallbearelec.com/Projects/OhMyDarling/OhMyDarling.htm
is really cool. I would love to hear a shootout between it and any of the boutique RM clones out there.
Low gain darlington pair?
Mind blown, why do all the best ideas seem so simple in hindsight...
some of the intrinsic disadvantages of darlingtons. the bias voltage typically adds together for a 1.2-1.4v requirement since voltage drops twice from Q1 VBE and Q2 VBE. I suppose this is actually one good thing about germanium darlington, since Ge is .2v instead of .65-.7v like Si diode junctions, afaik. However, this still does make biasing trickier.
I've also read DPs aren't as fast at responding as a single transistor.
if you do go for DP, try a high gain in Q1 and a low gain in Q2, then reverse them, and see if there's any noticeable sonic differences.
http://www.radio-electronics.com/info/circuits/transistor/darlington-pair-amplifier.php
Quote from: mistahead on July 15, 2013, 11:56:41 PM
why do all the best ideas seem so simple in hindsight...
A heavy economic incentive--in the form of several thousand "remainder" devices--is good stimulus for "ideazz."
Quote from: Thecomedian on July 16, 2013, 02:56:24 AM
if you do go for DP, try a high gain in Q1 and a low gain in Q2, then reverse them, and see if there's any noticeable sonic differences.
Thanks for the article reference! The land-mine that I knew about when I started experimenting was the multiplication of leakage and noise, Q2 * Q1. I took R. G. Keen's suggestion and used the lower-gain/lower-leakage devices as Q1, figuring that those would also likely be lower in noise floor. That has worked well; I had no problems with biasing or hissiness. I was very pleased with the complementary Sziklai pair, because it makes use of low-gain PNP parts in the Q2 position.
The Tonepad Tubescreamer works as an incredible treble booster with the stock parts. IMO.
i got some BC239's off the bay and made the greg fryer treble booster deluxe. Its nice.
http://www.paulinthelab.com/2013/03/greg-fryer-brian-may-treble-booster.html
I also experimented with the EHX LPB
i messed a little with it just to see how it would perform.
I subbed the 390ohm with a 330ohm (just what had in stock)
Used a BC109 transistor. Then tried the BC239 a bit more gain there too.
Also modded the input cap with a parrallel 10nf/2u2 blend pot network. for control of the range. a bit Like in the Easyface
i was wondering if i put a parrallel cap say 47u with the 330 ohm coming from the emitter to ground like ive seen in some other circuits .
Would i get more gain with this mod?
I found the LPB a little underwhelming, but I'm still boxing it up with a muff fuzz and naming it Katinka.
Tim Esc. had the utility boost, again play with the input cap and choose exactly the range of gain via NPN transistor choice and you've got something I rate higher than the LPB.
I tried the input cap blend technique in the front end of a fetzer and it just wont work. Totally ineffective.
Should i try to move the input cap after the first resistor (68k) and between it and the j201 gate.
Anybody tried this?
heres a link to the ROG Fetzer valve.
http://www.runoffgroove.com/fetzervalve.html
There i did it again !!!!!!!!
Think big go small.
I built a version of the rangemaster seen here (final schematic in pdf)
Although i've tried biasing it all differant settings reason being i used a 100k trim pot in the place of the 68k resistor.
Its got hum like almost as strong as if i go directly to the +9v terminal and thats on the input and it gradually gets worse the further on into the circuit i probe.
anyone ever built this
please help im stuck as to how to debugg it to.
http://www.seymourduncan.com/tonefiend/wp-content/uploads/DIY%20Club%20Project%204%20v03.pdf
That schematic shows them using a 50k volume pot :o .... I wouldn't even think it would bias with that and the other resistors being original.... I would go with the original 10k output pot..
Quote from: Kipper4 on July 20, 2013, 05:59:21 PM
I built a version of the rangemaster seen here (final schematic in pdf)
Although i've tried biasing it all differant settings reason being i used a 100k trim pot in the place of the 68k resistor.
Its got hum like almost as strong as if i go directly to the +9v terminal and thats on the input and it gradually gets worse the further on into the circuit i probe.
It's possible that you have made a mistake in wiring and that you can make this build work as the OB (Original Builder) intended. However, the PNP/Negative Ground implementation of the RM is known to be troublesome; other posters have reported intractable problems with motorboating noise. I strongly suggest either building positive ground or finding an AC127 or other suitable NPN device. My suggestions regarding Darlington pairs also stand.
its highly likely i have made an error Steve.
I havent dismissed your idea with the darlingtons mate. I'm holding off for now until i know more about them.
The only darlingtons i keep are mpsa14's i think.
I need to do some more reading on them.
I might try the 10k pot in it too thanks for the suggestion and insight.
I just built the OB and even it was noisy with my goddam wallwart ,with batterys it was still noisy but workable.
I've yet to build the huminator.
Thanks guys
the Range master sounds good on SS amps but stick a dirt pedal in front of it into a tube amp and its amazing.
What a shame you cant put a range master (flat out mode) ie with no boost control on the output of a dirt circuit and put both in the same box.
I imagine it would be a nightmare with a + and _ ground circuit both in the same box.
What would be a good not to expensive npn germanium transistor to make a negative ground rangemaster so it could be bolted onto the end of a dirt box
I just bought some ACa67 to try in an npn style rangemaster for the bolt on trial
if you have an opinion dont be shy
Have you looked at this thread?
http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=101292.0 (http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=101292.0)
You can use a med power Si like a TIP29
thanks Gus i liked the revolution darlington style one. Makes a note of schemo on a piece of paper. (save for later)
everybody has there own ideas of what caps to blend between.
I like your designs too.
My filedmaster negative ground circuit still wont work i might dismantle it and reengineer for positive ground with a pnp and see what happens
is it possible to put a small 100r resistor across the power supply to help tame noise as advised before?
If so do i put it on the + or _ volt rail. Bearing in mind its going to be a positive ground circuit.
thanks
if positive ground circuit, put supply bypass resistor in negative supply and cap from resistor to ground. watch your bypass cap polarity.
thanks mate