Ring modulater....what is it?

[BillyJ]

Is there any sound clips of one of these around, or can someone explain what it sounds like or song examples?
I 'think' I want one.  :wink:
Thanks for any clues.

[Parade]

Hey there Billy J,
Well a ring Modulator is a strange sounding effect. I would only use it for weird noise sounding stuff. It's not for those tone freaks.

You can go to
http://www.gaspedal.com/moog.htm#mf102
and scroll down for the pedal.
If you have Real Player then you should be able to listen to the effect.
I personally would want one. But I already have to many "normal" effects, like I said noise sounding stuff.

I believe I heard somewhere what it does is take your input frequency and Multiply's and divides it by differeny numbers to come out with the strange gargle junk.

But definitly check it out and see if you like it. Hopfully someone else can help you with the actual explanation.

[petemoore59]

Runoff Groove in links ..Im pretty sure there's a sound clip of the Green Ringer there.
 Gets harmonics and maybe a little octave type effect unique less 'hairy' than a regular octave effect...mine worked best when pushed by a Fuzz and was a little less than unity...I thought it pretty cool for those moody leads stuff...as I recall pretty splatty for chords etc.

[ExpAnonColin]

A ring modulator and a balance modulator are the same thing, I prefer to say balance because it makes more technical sense and makes me sound smarter.    A ring modulator by definition takes the sum and difference of 2 electronic signals and outputs them.  The first input on a guitar pedal is obviously your guitar, and the other is an inner tone generator (hence the "frequency" knob on the boxes).  Knowing that, I'm sure you know exactly how it sounds

There is a soundclip of the guitarist of Mogwai using an EHX frequency analyzer (very good barebones ring mod) here: http://www.ehx.com/ehx2/Default.asp?q=p&p=%2FCatalog%2F24%5FSynthesis%2F14%5FFrequency%5FAnalyzer%2F14%5FMogwai

[Paul Perry (Frostwave)]

http://www.frostwave.com/blueringerv2

has some info & samples of the Frostwvae Blue Ringer that I make.
(The www.frostwave.com site isn't mine, it's run by a retailer warmcola.)

[Marcos - Munky]

Where I can find some Ring Modulator schematics?

[BillyJ]

DAMN YOU PAUL!!!! You make the sickest sounding stuff I have ever heard. I mean that in a really really good way.
BTW everyone thanks for the awesome input.
That Mogawi clip is cool as heck. Sounds like a dij at times. Definetly the kind of stuff i like.
Now anyone have any schematic for anything other than the Meastro?
Gonkulator or EH Frequency analizer?.....Anything at all?
Thanks everyone been a big help!

[Hal]

its wak, yo

can you change the "base frequency" to make everything sound in key - that is, set the frequency base to 440 when playing in A, so you don't get really bad notes?

[Rodgre]

You can tune the frequency to a particular note and when you play in that key, or a fifth.... you will get slightly more harmonious results. I will set a ring modulator to work with a particular key, and play a line using that note and an octave and a fifth and make some interesting results that aren't as unmusical as you usually expect.

i love ring modulators in any event. Blending just a touch of it on tracks when recording can make all sorts of interesting textures.

Roger

[Mark Hammer]

Ring modulators produce sounds by modulating the amplitude of a "carrier" signal at audio frequencies.  So, if you set your tremolo to about 4hz it sounds "wiggly" as it modulates the volume up and down.  If you increase the modulation frequency to 20hz or more, it starts to sound "boingy" as the modulation frequency increases.  The audio frequency modulation produces varying amounts of sum and difference signals depending on how the modulation is done.  "True" ring modulators produce only sum and difference signals, where other devices leave some carrier signal in.  

If you want a preview of what a ring modulator sounds like or how it would affect your playing, simply replace the LFO-range cap in any modulated device you have with something about 1/4 to 1/10 that value.  In the John Hollis "Frobnicator" pedal design (available at www.geofex.com) that step is already done for you, but you can also do it to any chorus, flanger, tremolo, vibrato, phaser, etc.,, as long as there is an LFO somewhere in the circuit.

Since the output contains the sum and difference of the carrier and modulating frequencies, and since the modulating frequency is usually a pure tone of some type while the carrier is whatever your guitar, fingers, and other pedals in the chain produce for that note, there are a few things to be mindful of.  First, the cleaner the guitar signal and the less treble, the more"tame" and predictable the RM effect produced.  Bear in mind that RM's were originally developed with oscillator circuits in mind not harmonic-content varying guitar signals.  So, rolling off your guitar tone control or trimming the treble in the RM pedal itself is probably a smart thing to do.  

Second, the lower the pitch of the modulating frequency, the closer to sounding pitched  the output will be.  If the modulating frequency is 200hz, a note of 440hz will give you 240hz and 640hz, a difference of about an octave and a half.  Make that note 600hz and the output will be 400hz and 800hz, which is a smaller interval but still far apart.  Make the modulating frequency 30hz and the outputs under these circumstances would be 410 and 470hz, and 570 and 630hz.  It still sounds like a "rubber band" but tracks the pitch of your playing decently enough that it can sound something like your intended melody, but with a rubber-band tone.  As the modulating frequency gets higher and the pitch-spread between sum and difference gets wider, what you produce gets increasingly unpredictable and unrelated to what you intended to play.  That may be good and what you want, or bad and not what you want.  Tinkering with modulation frequency is how to control it.

[BillyJ]

Mark (see I didn't call you Mr. Hammer) that was a great post thank you so much. The great thing is that I understood enough of that to say I learned something. This one goes in cu6t and paste folder.
Thank you for the very cool info!!!!

[BillyJ]

Mark (see I didn't call you Mr. Hammer) that was a great post thank you so much. The great thing is that I understood enough of that to say I learned something. This one goes in cu6t and paste folder.
Thank you for the very cool info!!!!

[brett]

First, design.  One of the best things to do with a ring modulator is to modulate your guitar signal with itself.  This gives lots more "in-tune" harmonics.  Funny thing is that this isn't a particularly common option in the ones I've seen.  Whoever posted the idea about using the root frequency for the song (eg 440Hz for anything in "A") is onto the same kinda thing.  

In practice, the ring frobnicator isn't real good.  There's too much breakthough of the modulation frequency.  There's also a ring modulator in RA Penfold's book, but I suspect that it's also noisey, as he recommends using it with a noise gate.

One interesting and quiet design is my very own Dalekator.  I've been fooling around with it lately, so it's NOT currently up on my web site (http://www.members.optusnet.com.au/~jethro.dog/gallery.html).  (BUT NOW IT IS!  :shock:    - 09/03/03 MM/DD/YY).  But if I have time later today I'll get the most recent version of it back up.  Although it's a messy, home-grown design, it is better than most that I've seen or tried.

[troubledtom]

brett, cool idea!!!!!
     peace,
        - tom :twisted: