Boss DD-5

ESPm2M · August 30, 2004, 05:31:40 AM

Has anyone come up with any interesting mods for this unit?

TheBigMan · August 30, 2004, 06:17:28 AM

The two main ones are the hicut mod and "reverse kill" mod. The first of these installs a 1uF NP cap across lugs 1 and 3 of the effect level pot and rolls of some of the treble, making the delay repeats darker in sound and a little more like an analog delay.

The "reverse kill" mod lifts C9 so that there is no dry signal present in reverse mode, which by all accounts sounds much better. Be advised that there is then no dry signal at all, so switching the pedal off will result in no sound.

ESPm2M · August 30, 2004, 06:23:57 AM

Thanks TBM!

Is there a schemo floating around? I'll do a search, but feel free to point me in the right direction.

TheBigMan · August 30, 2004, 07:35:16 AM

The only one I know of is/was hosted by Nicholas of Catalinbread (IIRC) and the page is down due to lack of hits, so I've posted it on my own site.

http://www.cruachan-audio.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/schems/dd5.jpg

jimbob · August 30, 2004, 04:14:32 PM

Id play it safe and send it to analogman...those things dd-5/dd-6 pricey...I have a price limit as to what im willing to experimnt with and possibly mess up..

good luck either way!

analogmike · August 30, 2004, 04:29:36 PM

Quote from: TheBigManThe two main ones are the hicut mod and "reverse kill" mod. The first of these installs a 1uF NP cap across lugs 1 and 3 of the effect level pot and rolls of some of the treble, making the delay repeats darker in sound and a little more like an analog delay.

That will work on the DD2 or DD3 but not the DD5 or DD6. The pots on the DD5 and DD6 are just sending control voltages to a chip, they dont have audio on them. So the cap won't do anything on those.

Alex C · August 30, 2004, 09:25:20 PM

Hey there, I recently performed the "kill switch" mod to kill the dry signal when in reverse mode on my DD-5 (actually as others have said it kills all dry signal, but it's intended to be used in reverse mode) and I like it a lot. I found it to be a fairly simple mod, and I am by no means good at this stuff. The only drawback, as TheBigMan mentioned, it kills ALL dry signal, so it's not really practical for live situations. Overall, it's good. Do it!

Alex

TheBigMan · August 31, 2004, 07:08:26 PM

Quote from: analogmike
That will work on the DD2 or DD3 but not the DD5 or DD6. The pots on the DD5 and DD6 are just sending control voltages to a chip, they dont have audio on them. So the cap won't do anything on those.

Didn't know that, looking at the schem it looks like part of the audio path. Does it matter where you put the cap though? IIRC the pot just happens to be a convenient place to mount it, but in parallel with the wet signal should still work.

airhole · January 26, 2005, 11:45:45 AM

I tried the reverse mod by lifting C9 and putting a switch in between... while replacing the whole circuit back, I broke off the C9 and now I can't solder them back to the board.

Any ideas what value it is? I checked the schematic at
http://www.cruachan-audio.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/schems/dd5.jpg

C9 is located at the top right hand corner and states 3.3/10
what does that mean? I need to get the SMD cap for 3.3u for 10V?

the SMD has a marking of AN6 or something like that... too small.. damn.. what have i done! :oops:

Anyone? Thanks a bundle. would love to get this baby going again.

Cheers,
George

analogmike · January 26, 2005, 12:05:16 PM

Hi,

Look like a 3.3uF cap. Just use any electrolytic in that range
and mount it on the kill switch, and run a wire to the spots on the board.

We do a lot of mods on these pedals with surface mount devices and it's tricky. We usually find through-holes in the board and use them for attaching wires. Heat the holes up, stick a piece of resistor wire in the hole and you can run a wire to there.

Good luck!

airhole · January 26, 2005, 08:41:12 PM

Hi AnalogMike,

Thanks for helping!

Just wondering if there is a need to worry for polarity?

Thanks again!

Cheers,
George

donald stringer · January 27, 2005, 10:49:32 PM

I have been waiting for some info. on this pedal. I have had it apart for two weeks. You can do the hi-cut mod on the dd-5 on the back of the blend control. I thought 1uf was a little dark though,a .22 suited me but to have a choice in the matter and not have to drill any hole in the pedal I soldered the wires onto the back of the blend control and ran them out the output jack [file a tiny notch to accomadate the wires and I will mout an external switch to choose between the two. It works just fine.

airhole · January 28, 2005, 12:17:20 AM

ahh... good point! I love the 1uF sound and i have the 0.22uF as another option. I did all the mods, and they turned out rather nicely. Thanks to advice I searched in the forum and AnalogMike for the response as well.

Alas, I drilled a hole too near the edge and had to file the hole bigger... now my DD5 looks a bit of a wreck, but its gonna stay on my board, so no matter.

Would love to see the notch and switch from you, donald! Good ideas are always good to come by.

cheers,
George

donald stringer · January 29, 2005, 02:34:36 AM

While I have it like this and since I have no plans on selling it I think that I will run those wires to a 6p2t rotary switch and make the tone cut go from lets say nothing to dark. I will end up mounting dd-5 with tone adjustment/ tap tempo/ at the front of my chain. I have been experimenting with getting some of " The Edge" delay happening. This is a good tutorial on copping some U-2 delay setting "http://www.amnesta.net/edge_delay/ This is a pretty exhaustive document, he has it pretty close and I have already experimented with some of them. As soon as I can find the card for my digital camera I will post some pictures.

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