parts opinion

[23]

ok guys, Ive built a good many pedals and ordered almost all my stuff from the bear... what some of your opinions on the best parts...
like what caps, resistors, polarized caps, silver mica or ceramic, etc....
If you were spending money on a pedal and knew what you know now, what parts would make you go..."yeah thats it" I already know 1% metal are good reisistors.
oh yeah and im not talking about mojo parts from the 50's either

yeah I know wiring has alot to do with it too.... anyone know where OLC gets the wire for there kits, I like the feel of it.

[jacobyjd]

The answer for questions like this always ends up being something like this:

Depending on the application, different parts are better for certain things. What's better in a situation where a 5% resistor will do the exact same job as a 1% just as well? The answer here would be the cheaper one, most likely.

Nothing is always better anywhere--it completely depends on the application.

That said, here are my preferences, based on what I value in building:
-whatever resistor is on hand, be it 1% or 5%
-whatever electrolytic caps are on hand
-pre-tinned wire from smallbear
-monolithic multilayer ceramic capacitors
-alpha pots from futurlec

[23]

Monolithic multilayer.... im assuming are the box caps? Where do you find these...ive only used panasonic and xicon, well because thats what bear had... You always see the baby blue/ black electrolytics, what about the shiny black or shiny blue ones or tantalatums (spelling screwed).

[JKowalski]

Usually you will find that different manufacturing/type parts make no recognizable difference in circuit operation. Like Josh said, it depends on the application - SMD vs. Through Hole, Large vs. Small, Expensive vs. Cheap, Mechanical quality vs. May-die-on-you parts...

Everyone here probably gets slightly if not totally different types of parts when they make an order. There are so many parts out there, so many parts no longer being manufactured, so many parts coming into manufacture, that there is never an absolute best.

Josh uses a list very similar to mine. For small value caps, I use whatever, they all sound the same to me. I have a huge mismatched collection of ceramic/multlayer ceramic/film/whatever caps and I choose them for specific projects mainly on voltage rating and the size of the different packages I have available. 1% resistors, only cause I have a huge assortment, I wouldn't mind using other types and I do sometimes.

I think what you should ask rather then "what are the best parts to buy" is "what parts should I NOT buy".




EDIT: Monolithic are a type or ceramic capacitor that were developed so that they could make high value caps in SMD packages. They typically look something like this:



And can get up to 4.7uF or even higher sometimes in a package that is smaller then a resistor! They are nice for their size and they perform as well as any. I like to get them for values between 0.1uF to 4.7uF, only cause I have plenty of normal ceramic caps for values lower then that, and there is no equally nice substitute for 1-4.7uF caps in that size!

Tantalums I typically avoid - they are polarized, which limits their use. They can't be used as power bypass caps, because they can catastrophically fail used that way. Which is not to say you shouldn't use them, but I just don't prefer them.

[23]

makes sense.. you just see ever now and then on here someone wanting to know where a part can be had just because "where did you get those black bubble caps at" etc....
and I really dont buy into the mojo thing unless it involves transistors...

Ill admit tho, some of the parts that have came up here from time to time, do look cool --_>

[Kinetic]

mis-post, ignore me!

[darron]

My thoughts:
http://www.dazatronyx.com/support/quality/

[phector2004]

what's the deal on box caps?

i don't usually care much about what i order, but i need some for my echo base so they fit nicely in the PCB, and i dont think SB has them...

[stringsthings]

ok guys, Ive built a good many pedals and ordered almost all my stuff from the bear... what some of your opinions on the best parts...
like what caps, resistors, polarized caps, silver mica or ceramic, etc....
If you were spending money on a pedal and knew what you know now, what parts would make you go..."yeah thats it" I already know 1% metal are good reisistors.
oh yeah and im not talking about mojo parts from the 50's either

yeah I know wiring has alot to do with it too.... anyone know where OLC gets the wire for there kits, I like the feel of it.

what projects are you currently working on and what do you plan to build in the future?

[darron]

what's the deal on box caps?

i don't usually care much about what i order, but i need some for my echo base so they fit nicely in the PCB, and i dont think SB has them...

just  means  they come in a neat (but kind of ugly) package. they are film but can be made of anything, ie polystyrene, polypropylene. the spacing of the pins is always about 5mm.

to help, they often are marked in a matter that's a bit easier to read too! like '100n'.

[23]

Right now Im waiting on parts for a May Queen II and IM trying to stuff a LPB-2 into a 1590A enclosure....... next is a Landgraff MoD (pcb from bean). and last but not least is my own Overdrive......