Custom Ruby TROUBLE! HELP!

[Burton]

Hello everyone.  I built this circuit, a custom Ruby amp with an npn booster and tone controls, but all I am hearing is a constant high pitch sound.  Sometimes the sound stops when I wiggle the ground wire of the speaker (probably just disconnecting it), but I can make the sound return by plucking the guitar strings.  I'm pretty new to electronics so I don't completely know all of the "rules" of electronics (where to put grounds, where you can and cannot put connections, etc), so I probably wired something wrong... Before I start desoldering, can anybody tell me what could be wrong with this circuit just by looking at it?  I think it's probably grounding issues, because I kinda took some shortcuts for grounding, like connecting two resistors together then grounding them, istead of each seperately (see R10 - R11), and connecting a pot lug to the circuit instead of directly to the ground (see connection C - pot 1 lug 2 - actually.. I don't even know why I did that.  It would probably be easier to just connect directly to ground).  So, can anybody spot any mistakes?  I also could have made a mistake in translating the schematics to the layout.  Oh yeah, and one more thing - I accidentally ordered .015 uf film caps instead of .01uf, but I'm not sure if that makes a difference.  The next step is splitting it apart and testing each circuit alone (npn booster, treble/bass control, ruby).  Here are the seperate schematics and the layout I derived from the shcems.  If everything looks theoretically correct, then I can post pictures of the circuit because it might have to do with soldering or something.. but the circuit is almost exactly like the layout.

<edit> oops forgot to post the pics, here they are






In the circuit, the input is on the booster, the output of the booster is connected to the input of the tone control (single wire, not grounded), the output of the tone control is connected to the input of the ruby (single wire, not grounded) and the ouput of the ruby is connected to the +speaker, -speaker is grounded.  The speaker is a 2" computer speaker.

[Burton]

UPDATE:  I just tested the NPN booster circuit alone (few desolders and resolders) and it works great, so it's not that.. moving on to the ruby...

[Threefish]

Just tried to post and I see you've tried the npn on it's own. Good idea - isolate all three of the circuits and see what you get from each individually. You've obviously figured out that this will be easy to do by using an input signal like the radio, and taking an output from the 2nd lug of your gain1 and 2 pots and the volume.
The noise you get sounds like a wrong connection somewhere.
I haven't studied your layour, but have you got an audio tester probe? http://www.diyguitarist.com/PDF_Files/DIY-AudioTester.pdf . Plug a constant audio source like a radio into your input (careful with the volume...), and start poking around from the at the first input of your circuit, and work through the audio path. At some point you may get a drop in volume, noise, or nothing, and it's around here you can start looking for a problem. I did this once and got all the way to the end, where i'd wired up the output to the wrong side of a switched socket....
Duh.

You mention your grounding is a bit rushed - a good practice is to try and connect all grounds to the same point, or a small number of points, and then choose one of these as the point to connect the others to.

[Burton]

Thanks for the advice, but I don't have an audio test probe!    I guess that would be good to have.. BUT! read on

UPDATE 2:

I isolated the Ruby section of the circuit, and it works!! First try! I was amazed.. I actually built a guitar amp!! Sorry for the excitement, but this is all pretty new to me - especially since it works on the first try!! Now I've got to just get all three circuits to work together.  I've narrowed it down to two problems

1) something in the tone control circuit (which I doubt because of it's simplicity)
or
2) grounding between circuits (I'm pretty sure this is the one.  I'll have to resolder everything back together and try this, then I'll get back to yall)

[Threefish]

Don't be sorry about excitement. Heck, I get exited about acheiving things that plenty on this forum can do in their sleep. It's always good tweaking or changing something and then finding it actually works.

I don't really understand tone circuits, but if Aron designed it, it will work.
There is something going on in your tone circuit. I'm struggling a little here, but have a look at your Bass pot. I think there's something screwy with the H and J points on your layout. You've got C6 across the pot with your little diagram at the bottom, but if you have point J going to lug 3, and lug 3 being the input, you've got your signal going to ground via R7. I think your H and J points need to be reversed.
THe H on your layout should go to lug J on the pot, and J on the layout to H on the pot. I think.

Can someone else confirm this?

[Ardric]

You've connected the +9 supply for the NPN booster to the +9 supply for the Ruby.  They're all sharing a common 100uF filter cap on the Ruby.  I bet signal is being coupled through the power supply from the Ruby to the boost, causing the squeal.

Try leaving the Ruby alone, but filter the boost's power further.  Run the +9 through a small series resistor (100 ohms or so), and then another 100uF cap to ground.  Looks like that empty space below R5 would be perfect.

I had a similar problem with a ROG Thunderchief preamp into a ruby-like amp on the same 12V power supply, and this fixed it for me.