Neovibe Bulb

[Jaicen_solo]

Just a quick question about bulbs for the Neovibe.
As R.G. says, the originals used 12v/40mA bulbs.  I have in mine a 12v/60mA bulb.
The problem I have is that I can't seem to trim the bulb to produce a satisfying sound at both low speed, and at high speed settings.
The bulb doesn't seem to go dark enough on the down swing when I turn up the brightness, and the tone becomes too thin. If the brighness is turned down, there's not enough swing at low speeds, but it sounds nice at higher speeds. Neither really gives me a wide enough swing.  Q13 gets very hot as well.

Now, I was wondering if it's a problem with the bulb that i'm using, or is that how it's supposed to work?
I'm using the standard 4k7/100k bias resistors. Is there any value in messing with this?

[R.G.]

Is there any value in messing with this?

Yes.

Each bulb will have its own unique thermal speed/lag. It's worth experimenting with.

How far we've come. A decade or more ago, Neovibe builders were worried about getting a bulb that would work at all. We now have the luxury to (a) know about sweep ranges being affected and (b) pick and choose the one we like.

It's a great world we're living in.

[Jaicen_solo]

It certainly is R.G.
I remember wanting to build a Neovibe way back in the early days of the original stompbox forum on Ampage. I never trusted my PCB skills enough, so I was so pleased to find your PCB back up for sale. I remember emailing you asking if you had any of the original GEO run left actually!  I think this might give you some insight into my neuroticism with regards to this pedal.

Does my description of the bulb sound like it's not quite where it should be in terms of the intensity of effect? This is what i'm expecting the bulb to be doing, it has a much greater range between  light/dark.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPIQg4Ls8os

Also, if I was to swap to a Radio Shack 12v/25mA bulb, would that stop my driver getting too warm?

By the way, it was Q12 that I managed to kill with the short, just swapped it out and it worked again.