I finally got around to building this one. I used markm's layout in the gallery.
I must say, this thing is a great sounding circuit. Thick and round.
The tone controls are subtle but effective.
Treble is just the high end. Turn down the treble and you still have a usable thick tone.
Turn down the bass and the low mids are still intact.
Cleans up really well for sure.
If you want less gain you could probably use 2n3904s or similar. I used everything as stock...smokin!
Here are a few clips:
www.mrdwab.com/john/Hwy89_1.mp3
www.mrdwab.com/john/HWY89.mp3
www.mrdwab.com/john/Hwy892.mp3
www.mrdwab.com/john/Hwy89smokey.mp3
All the gain chages are with the guitar's volume control or pickup selector.
I used a les Paul copy (Agile!) The gain knob was never more than 3/4 up.
Now I just need to learn to play better and learn how to post the links without the full address showing...
John
Beautiful clips, wonderful circuit! Got a strat? ;)
I have yet to take the plunge and build myself one. How does it compare to BSIAB?
---------
Jimbo
Hi john,
Yeah, this is one of if not my favorite distortion pedal. I brought it to rehearsal and let my guitarist try it. (I play bass.) He didn't want to part with it and now he wants me to make him one. He was using the Rat I built but switched to the HWY89.
When I emailed Doug for the schem I didn't realize that www.home-wrecker had a perf layout and Markm didn't have the layout you used posted at the time. I did my own quicky layout. But when I first heard it I couldn't believe how good it sounded. Doug emailed me about month ago and told he is working on some new designs that I'm sure are going to be stomp shattering. He asked if I was interested in them and of course I said YES! So I'm excited to hear what he's doing when he gets back from his break. He heard my guitarist and it sounded like he wanted to hear what we thought of it. So I will be honored. The bands myspace website is linked below.
Anyway your samples sounded excellent and it makes me want to bring it out and start jamming on it right now. Did you box it up already? I housed mine in a metal tin container. Yes I will be replacing that red switch with standard metal one soon.
http://www.myspace.com/thedarrylplummerband
(http://randallbarnett.homestead.com/files/hwy89.jpg)
I was planing on getting some clips done with a my strat but I got side tracked I guess. I'll work on those, Im curious as well!
The BSIAB2 isn't similar at all really. The Hwy 89 has a stronger lower midrange and less high end but without being too dark.
The tone controls are exactly what they say, Bass is just bass, and treble is only the high end. You can get a good sound with the bass off as well as with the treble down.
This one cleans up amazingly as well as you can hear in the clips. I didn't do much with the picking dynamics but maybe I'll get to that with the strat clips.
I haven't settled on a box for this one yet. I need to make up some more boxes. It's easier to make a few at once since cutting the pieces requires a good but of planning and setup. This one would be a good tweed covered candidate! Maybe a distressed well worn warn looking one...
I made a layout for this one today. I wanted to change a couple things from marks layout. Just compulsivness really though, no circuit changes.
John
wow! :o :o :o :o amazing clips !it is what i want for my band now !a good combination of od with fuzz!but since Doug is having a "brake" i am afraid i won't build it :'( :'( :'(
Wow... sounds great John. Congratulations on building a forum legend. I see what you mean about being "round sounding". Nice soudclips BTW. Thanks for taking the time to build and record it.
Tony, I'm still bummed that the Hwy89 you sent never made it here...
Liakos, Why not build one? The layout is in the Gallery for Mark M.
I can send you the Schematic if you want it.
John
I need to pull mine out of storage and take it for a drive. No pun intended... :icon_wink:
Those clips are great. I look forward to hearing samples with a strat...or I'll just build one and hear it for myself ;)
PM sent!
great clips!!
I had no special interest for that circuit until now...
I've found unverified layout on Markm's gallery, and a perf layout at www.home-wrecker but I cant find the schematic...
Can you send me the schematic,too?
Thanx.
Marko
You hooked me, I need to build one of these! Do you have the component values?
Great clips John, it's a little "cracker" isn't it !!
Didn't use mine for a few months - other stuff - but will use it again for sure.
MM
I tried emailing Doug Hammond for the schematic a while ago. Perhaps I used the wrong address or it got lost in cyberspace somehow, but I never got it. Does anyone know what the best way to contact Doug for the schematic is?
Hey John,
Great work, and nice clips as well!
I am sure you will do a great enclosure..... I like the distressed idea a lot...would love to see that done..... you could use a little 1 grit on it and do one heck of a distress job....some rusty chains....many many options....
Keep us posted!
Mick
Here are some strat clips, excuse the playing. I'm much more a builder than a player!
www.mrdwab.com/john/Hwy-89strat.mp3
www.mrdwab.com/john/Hwy-89strat2.mp3
All volume was controled from the guitar. (I have a treble bleed cap on the guitars volume that brightens up the low vol settings)
Let me know if there are any gliches as they may have happened on the upload, (dial up here only...gasp)
John
Hey, thanks for sending the schematic!
Ironically, Doug sent out an email to all those that requested the schem shortly after you sent it to me. The reason I bring this up is that you all may find this email of interest:
QuoteI no longer participate in diy electronics, so this is
the last Highway 89 schematic I'm handing out.
For everyone on the forum:
Feel free to PM, email, or otherwise share the
schematics with each other.
The Highway 89 has an impedance-scaled tone stack
based on the Dr. Z "Route 66" amplifier (hence the
"highway" name). In deference to Dr. Z, I did not want
to post the schematic. At this point in time it may
not make much difference as I've seen many Route 66
derivative amp schematics posted since, over the
years. So I leave that up to your collective
judgement, whether you want to post the schematic or
not. Either way, it doesn't matter to me. I was never
protecting "my" part of the design- it's a DIY project
and I expect people to copy and use it.
However, I'm not going to respond to any more email
requests for it as I'm busy with other stuff now.
Feel free to share this message with everyone on the
forum.
Thanks for your interest,
Doug
I have the same email, with the Schem., if anyone can post it I'll sent it to you.
Well...here it is then... Thanks Doug!
(http://www.mrdwab.com/john/Hwy89.gif)
John
Quote from: Basicaudio on March 29, 2007, 04:21:11 PM
Now I just need to learn to play better and learn how to post the links without the full address showing...
John
(replace "u r l" with "url" no spaces)
Normal link showing the url [u r l]www.the-url-you-want-to-link-to.com[/u r l]
Linking word/s without showing the url [u r l=www.the-url-you-want-to-link-to.com]THE WORDS YOU WANT TO REPLACE THE URL WITH AND CLICK ON GOES HERE[/u r l]
Note where the url it self goes
paulw ;D
Thanks Paul! Now I can all fancy and post the link with just the text I want.
I appreciate it.
John
Sad news to hear Doug Hammond is not doing it anymore. If you read this I hope what ever your doing is inspiring. Why? Because I think you've inspired alot of people.
I've certainly enjoyed making your designs and playing your pedals. In a world which Bon Scott called 'dog eat dog' thanks for sharing some cool sounding creative pedals
I'd reckon a 21 canon salute to boot!
Rock on Mr Hammond!
Huh, I wonder what happened with Doug. Well, I'm sure there's a good reason, whatever it is.
"For those who design pedals to rock, we salute you!"
I talked to Doug on the phone a few weeks before he left.
he was tired of the way the way things were going around here, all the things he mentioned in those controversial threads here right before he left.
it is a shame, he is a great guy and helped/influenced many many people.
I think we forget how diversified Doug's interests are. He's not JUST a pedal tinkerer (check out those amps). Nor is he a guy in a band living in his parents' basement.
Respect for the contributions and generosity. Respect for the choices made.
Speaking of which, has anyone heard from "Troubled" Tom Pollock?
QuoteI talked to Doug on the phone a few weeks before he left.
he was tired of the way the way things were going around here, all the things he mentioned in those controversial threads here right before he left.
it is a shame, he is a great guy and helped/influenced many many people.
Yeah, some people get burned out "listening" to all the crap people can spew out. I keep away from things like that as much as I can - I got enough troubles in life! That's his choice. I can respect that.
Yes Doug has done some cool stuff. If you can find a Sweet 16, check it out.
I have wanted to discuss this, so here goes.
What is an impedance scaled tonestack and how does it differ from the standard Marshal/Fender stack. Obviously John likes it.
Also, for those about to mod, the final stage could be a number of things other than the Blackfire. Fuzz Face, Mu-Amp, Vulcan - maybe 2 stages, JFets, BMP, MOSFET, whatever...
Hope Doug stops by from time to time. :icon_cool:
Ah..back on topic...
An impedance scaled tonestack is a low impoedance version of a high impedance tone stack (or the other way around)
Basically lowering the resistance values and increasing the capacitance. So scaling by 10 would be from 1M to 100K.
This lowers the impecance of the circuit at the point of the tone stack.
There is a bit a bout this in the Doctor boogie thread towards the end. Go to do to get a nice low impedance at the circuits output in order to drive effects better after the circuit in question. The tone and controls will sound the same in theory.
Worth a mod or two maybe. Although the Stock circuit here sounds nice as is me thinks.
You could add another type of output and switch between then for different tone option.
John
The Highway 89 is pure badassery. My band recorded some simple demos recently, and on our signiature tune I'm running that thing the whole time, full-on, and it sounds incredibly musical even as it melts your face. I'll post it for hearing when I have it up somewhere.
can i use NPNs in this design?
i have lots of spare NPNs... no PNPs...
2n5089s are NPN
2N5089s are available everywhere...even radioshack! That is one of the reasons this circuit is a nice one to build. Common transistors. I just soldered mine straight in with no sockets. You could probably get a few different sound by swaping out a transistor or two for 2N3904s etc for low gain sounds.
John
I finally got around to building this one, nice indeed! I'm gonna have to try some lower gain trans some day. Even though Doug is gone...Nice job man, Kudos!!
Finally I see and hear the thing...
I don't know about you guys, but it seems a Tonebender III-killer to me. It has more of a "Fuzz" than distortion. Hendrix would have loved it my guess.
The emitter follower is very "sexy". It is biased near cut-off, so it must give very assymetrical response.
Thanks for the explanation. The last 2 transistors are a BlackFire Stage from Joe Davidson. He has said that 2N3904's will be noisy, but since only one stage is used rather than the 2 of the BlackFire, it may be OK. I have always thought this would be cool to morph into a BlackFire and make the last stage switchable. IIRC Doug said the BF had a SLO sound to it. :icon_cool:
2N5088s are overpriced here! what the~!
they cost 6x normal transistors!
ill be building mine with bc549's
These trannies sond nice as well in that circuit.
I have a bunch of 2N5088, and I can send you sone if these are hard to get over there, no charge ofcourse :)
PM if you'd like some
Cheers
I've made different transistor based overdrives/fuzzes/distortions and I have liked very much those 2N3904's for lower gain OD type stuff and BC107's and BC109's for higher gain.
BC109C is one a h*ll of a gain beast if you are after that. BC547's and BC549's are alternatives probably easier to find nowadays.
That HWY-89 circuit looked like one that I have to build.
I've got bunch of old 2N2219's which sound very amazing in a silicon fuzzes. Also I've got lots of 2N3439's which are very low gain. I've measured hfe values from ~30 to ~120.
Would be worth to try those too. Got them for free from my dad's old job. They were throwing all the old electronics stuff away. My dad asked do I need old resistors, caps and trannies and all that kind of stuff (N.O.S). Quess what I replied...
Soundclips sounded nice. When I'm back from easter holiday I'll build one immediately.
I would probably make a vero-layout during my holiday.
Happy Easter everyone.
-Dingleberry
Highway 89 is just a block away from my house.
Quote from: mcasey1 on April 08, 2007, 03:46:53 PM
Highway 89 is just a block away from my house.
And you haven't tried to plug your guitar into it yet!? :D
My band has a myspace page now. The guitar on "Don't Waste Your Time" is a P90, a Silvertone 1484, and the Highway 89.
http://www.myspace.com/leopoldandloebchicago
Quote from: Phorhas on April 08, 2007, 03:54:38 AM
These trannies sond nice as well in that circuit.
I have a bunch of 2N5088, and I can send you sone if these are hard to get over there, no charge ofcourse :)
PM if you'd like some
Cheers
for free? wow... you must be rich~! well, im living overseas [if youre in US]...