Rangemaster spit

[8mileshigh]

Hey guys,

The Rangemaster I built with a NOS Hitachi transistor (2SB77) from Small Bear sounds great but I've never played the real thing so I don't know if it sounds the way it's supposed to or not.  It does spit a little when I dig in, is this normal ?  I assume all you booster freaks out there know what I mean when I say "spit".  I've only played it though my old 72 (1987 modded) Bass Master and not the 69 Bandmaster so I don't know if this is amp specific but I heard the Rangemaster is supposed to produce smooth overdrive.  Any comments ?

Readings on the Hitcahi are
C:-8.12
B:-0.57
E:-0.01

Just for fun, I tried one of my AC188K germaniums in the Rangemaster today and found it sounded sweeter on the clean side but more spit than the Hitach when pushes but I'm sure it could be corrected with a better bias. 

Readings for the 188K are
C:-5.81
B:-0.83
E:-0.78

All of this new stompbox building stuff has got me in serious trouble with my wife since I'm supposed to be renovating the basement but that's been on hold for the last month   

Maybe I sould go down there now and fire up the saw 

Chris

[Peter Davidoff]

Hi,

Rangemaster is a great effect! Please adjust C voltage around 7.0 volts with each tranny you use! For this replace 68k resistor with 100k trim pot!

Succsess!

[8mileshigh]

Hey Peter,

Thanks for your reply, for some reason, I thought the collector was supposed to be biased to 8 !

I finally got off my ass and biased the AC188K collector to about 6.8 and the spit in now gone and I'm pretty happy with the tone now.   Makes the amp sound as if it's much louder, just on the verge of breakup.  Pretty cool.  Happily, I  socketed almost everything on my perf board so I'm going to try replacing the ceramic caps next with film to see if it will smooth out the tone.

Chris

[Bron-Y-Aur-Stomp]

Hey Peter,

Thanks for your reply, for some reason, I thought the collector was supposed to be biased to 8 !

I finally got off my ass and biased the AC188K collector to about 6.8 and the spit in now gone and I'm pretty happy with the tone now.   Makes the amp sound as if it's much louder, just on the verge of breakup.  Pretty cool.  Happily, I  socketed almost everything on my perf board so I'm going to try replacing the ceramic caps next with film to see if it will smooth out the tone.

Chris

here you'll get info on that:

http://www.geofex.com/Article_Folders/Rangemaster/atboost.pdf

[mac]

Looking at your readings it seems that the AC188 leaks a lot more than the Hitachi, if you used the same bias.

My advice is: try different Ge until you find the one you like.

mac