Rangemaster sounding a bit ropy

[corbs]

i'm currently building a rangemaster from a shematic from generalguitargadgets.com.

it has an AC128 in it with and using the standard 0.005uF (0.0045uF actually) input cap it sounds very weak, hardly boosting (if not sucking) with almost no gain, but it does sound like the treble has increased.

A .033uF or .05uF seem to work well for single coils, between .005uF and .001uF for humbuckers.

trying the higher value caps above as well as some up to 10uF produces much more boost and gain but still sounds like it's missing something. other than having resistors with a higher watt rating i can't see any much diff in the components i'm using (although i haven't done a gain test on the pnp).

any ideas?

[MartyB]

Sounds alittle like a weak or leaky tranny.  Can you measure hFe?  That reading should be fairly stable on your meter.

[cd]

Sounds alittle like a weak or leaky tranny.  Can you measure hFe?  That reading should be fairly stable on your meter.

Or it could be leaking (false Hfe of 100) and have a true gain of 10.