any places i should stay away from? Who has the best bang for the buck?
Don't know of any you should "stay away from", Matty, altho others probably do...some ARE cheaper in quality than others.
I like Smallbear Electric (specifically geared to us here! Small scale/individual service, love to use them for most things incl. enclosures, DPDT/3PDT switches, hard to find parts), Ebay for small basic stuff (R's, C's...kits of R's and C's...breadboards, bulk transistors and the like), Newark Electronics or Mouser and Allied Electronics for harder to find things (odd chips).
Tubesandmore.com for tube stuff, transformers from them or Mojo musical supply, among others...
Overall, I find Ebay to be 'bang for the buck' but am careful not to get things that are 'critical' from there, such as SPECIFIC LEDs, transistors/jfets needed for vintage stuff - Smallbear for that. Sometimes a few cents more is well worth is as they've already thought about what you're doing with the parts... all of it is cheap enough other than just a few components, anyway...
Let's not forget the store on the wonderful site you are currently using.
Good call, haven't had the chance to buy anything from here, believe it or not! I'll make a point to!
In NA For one stop shopping in pedal building, getting everything you need to build a pedal, ie., only one shipping charge, i'd only consider Small Bear. Otherwise it's a bit here a bit there, shipping charge here, shipping charge there, wait for this wait for that...
dave
I will always be a diehard Tayda Electronics fan. I don't know if they target us specifically as their market, but they definitely cater very well to pedal building with a killer selection and great prices. They don't beat Smallbear's consistency in quality (though I've only had a couple problems with Tayda parts, particularly PT2399's) or customer service, but they're cheap. 8)
For resistors, caps, diodes (including LED's), common IC's (4558's, TL0XX ect), common transistors (most mosfets, bjts and jfets), pots, sockets...Tayda for me. You won't get any better by paying more somewhere else. Same 1% tolerance metal film Xicon resistors everyone else sells, but for a penny a piece. Same Alpha pots everyone sells for $1.00 or more, for $0.50. The stuff's all made in the Far East, so rather than pay some US distributor/dealer to import them, mark them up and then pay shipping on top, I order from the source.
For hardware (enclosures, jacks, knobs, switches ect.), I go to Smallbear and Mammoth. Smallbear has the jacks, knobs and switches I like, as well as a few of the less common IC's and some other more niche products (not to mention the best pre-tinned wire I've ever used). I use Mammoth's custom enclosure service because they do a great job.
The Far Eastern hardware (jacks, switches) tends to be flimsier and , but a 1% metal film resistor is a 1% metal film resistor, whether you pay $0.01 or $0.10 each.
-Ryan
I'll stretch a point here for arguments sake. I've ordered from digikey and mouser for decades - but not for pedals, I'm very new to it. There are many, many options with caps and pots, and picking thru the length, width, height, and voltage, wattage, and/or current ratings, shaft length, hole sizes, metric/SAE, and all sorts of other specs, can be a bit challenging. It ain't rocket science, but one might want to let the hard work start at the breadboard. Tayda seems to not have quite as broad an industrial selection (I could be wrong) as the others, but it still offers plenty of opportunity for mistakes. Dumb mistakes perhaps, yes. I waited a long time for a Tayda order, my only one so far, to come back, and I found some pots I had ordered had a threaded shaft in which the threads came a little too far up the shaft, such that my set-screw knobs would not fit. A specification was surely there somewhere and I overlooked it.
Savings you can evaluate for yourself. You can probably get part numbers - digikey, tayda (a little closer to our needs), and track down the pedal friendly parts, but places like smallbear, this website, mammoth - most of the shopping is done - they don't sell parts, they sell pedal parts. Uncle Steve went to China so we don't have to!
Mouser for the most part; Digikey or Smallbear if M doesn't have what I'm looking for (like the long pin pc mount pots), then Tayda for the die-cast boxes.
Quote from: blackieNYC on June 23, 2015, 10:44:22 PM
I'll stretch a point here for arguments sake. I've ordered from digikey and mouser for decades - but not for pedals, I'm very new to it. There are many, many options with caps and pots, and picking thru the length, width, height, and voltage, wattage, and/or current ratings, shaft length, hole sizes, metric/SAE, and all sorts of other specs, can be a bit challenging. It ain't rocket science, but one might want to let the hard work start at the breadboard. Tayda seems to not have quite as broad an industrial selection (I could be wrong) as the others, but it still offers plenty of opportunity for mistakes. Dumb mistakes perhaps, yes. I waited a long time for a Tayda order, my only one so far, to come back, and I found some pots I had ordered had a threaded shaft in which the threads came a little too far up the shaft, such that my set-screw knobs would not fit. A specification was surely there somewhere and I overlooked it.
Savings you can evaluate for yourself. You can probably get part numbers - digikey, tayda (a little closer to our needs), and track down the pedal friendly parts, but places like smallbear, this website, mammoth - most of the shopping is done - they don't sell parts, they sell pedal parts. Uncle Steve went to China so we don't have to!
Big plus from me! I order from Mouser and Digikey frequently as well, pedals are only a part of what i build , for pedals, Steve's got it sorted, he's done the leg work, sorted through the myriad of options and narrowed it down to what serves this madness best. Never have to worry about the quality either, that could never be said of some of the other pedal enablers.
dave
Where are you Mattyboy? There are some other options on this (https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@54.1366966,-5.1306148,5z) side of the Atlantic.
Theres also Bitches Love My Switches out of Brooklyn, NY. Lawrence will treat you right.
Quote from: bluebunny on June 24, 2015, 02:37:35 AM
Where are you Mattyboy? There are some other options on this (https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@54.1366966,-5.1306148,5z) side of the Atlantic.
Minneapolis, Mn
I found this guide helpful.
http://www.guitarpcb.com/PDF%20Files/A%20Beginners%20Guide%20to%20Effects%20Pedal%20Components.pdf (http://www.guitarpcb.com/PDF%20Files/A%20Beginners%20Guide%20to%20Effects%20Pedal%20Components.pdf)
Quote from: Mattyboy on June 24, 2015, 01:39:29 PM
Minneapolis, Mn
Used to visit the Twin Cities often in a previous life. Sadly not often enough nor recent enough to tell you where to get stuff locally. :icon_frown: Go with what the other guys are recommending. For my $0.02, stop by Smallbear if you can - Steve's a great guy and does a lot to support many around here in these crazy endeavours.
In the Twin Cities area, people......go to axeman in St.Paul. They are a surplus store and have switches, resistors, caps, and NOS tubes (GE, RCA, Zenith to name a few) by the millions. Very inexpensive aswell. Not to mention many other assorted weird but cool shit
I go with smallbear or mammoth for everything.. Pretty good so far for a noob like myself.
Quote from: Mattyboy on July 09, 2015, 08:49:30 AM
In the Twin Cities area, people......go to axeman in St.Paul. They are a surplus store and have switches, resistors, caps, and NOS tubes (GE, RCA, Zenith to name a few) by the millions. Very inexpensive aswell. Not to mention many other assorted weird but cool shit
Good to know, I'm just south of there and make it up from time to time.
I use Smallbear, Bitches Love My Switches, and Mouser, and Tayda. I haven't had a bad experience with any of them.
The personal service from Smallbear, and BLMS is outstanding!
Quote from: lapsteelman on July 09, 2015, 10:56:19 AM
Bitches Love My Switches
Not only a killer name, also killer pricing and killer service.
Smallbear for the majority of my stuff.
Digikey for some enclosures.
Mouser for some of the oddball stuff.
Tayda now and then.
Now the bad, just one...
Futurelec
While they have a lot of stock, shipping time is unacceptable.
When I order from any of the above, I get it in 3 - 4 days, sometimes less.
Futurlec takes like 6 weeks.
I'll second that complaint about Futurlec. Not fast at all. Six weeks was about right. And their toggles were super cheap feeling. But they were the only place I could find the BC549s I needed. I've had only good experiences with the usual suspects: Smallbear, Mouser, Digikey. Haven't used Tayda before but I definitely will start.
In the past, I've used Mammoth a LOT and it's been mostly good. They slip up on little stuff every once in a while and lots of times things appear to be available on their site but they end up being backordered when I get my shipment. This is a pain sometimes because perhaps I would have chosen another supplier for my whole order. It seems counter-intuitive that they would prefer that I go somewhere else with my order, but if they were upfront about it they would keep my business in general. As it is now, I only use them when I can't get something somewhere else.
Only other complaint is only half a complaint. Pedalpartsplus. I used them for some custom screened enclosures. It took foreeeeever! And when I emailed to inquire about them, they weren't very nice to me. However, when I got them they were gorgeous! Next time around I used Mammoth and it was quicker. But the quality of the powdercoat wasn't nearly as nice. PPP's were silky smooth and flawless. Mammoth's had considerable "orange peel."
With ordering, it seems like you have to decide what is most important to you for a particular situation and go with who meets those requirements best: selection, timeliness, accuracy, customer service?
I've had an order from futurlec as well. happy w/ the stuff, but took ages. but, I'd go back to them for pots, because they have 14mm long shaft types, and a more consistent range of pots generally than tayda.
all the IC's I got from futurlec were proper branded, as well.
I've used Futurlec for 3 orders, each was held up by them waiting for restock for just 1 or 2 items. The quality was good, no issues with fake parts. I will use them again for stock-up orders that aren't needed immediately.
Smallbear and Mouser here. I did do one single large order with Tadya when I wanted "every film cap value ever made" LOL. Since any of my parts could end up under some pro musician's toes in the heat of the moment, I take as few chances with quality as possible. It may take months or longer for something a little substandard to rear it's ugly head. Inevitably it happens anyway but as I said, any reduction in the odds I can achieve, I typically take.
and how were those tayda caps, karbo?