Auto wah

[disabled_shredder]

I am wanting to build an auto wah either a Snow White or light wah. I'm not really sure what's out there and I haven't had much luck looking so if anyone has a schem and a board layout I would love to get ahold of it. Thanks for any help even if its just pointing me in the right direction! Oh and does dr q count as an auto wah?

[jimilee]

The Dr.Q does indeed. I like the swah that madbean has in the experimental portion of the website. It's called the autobahn. Sounds great. On the projects page, there is the kraken, I like that one also. Sounds a little more smooth and less knobs.

[disabled_shredder]

Could you please link to the PDFs? I am terrible with searches! I only have Internet on my phone and it would take me a week to find it. Thanks

[J0K3RX]

Could you please link to the PDFs? I am terrible with searches! I only have Internet on my phone and it would take me a week to find it. Thanks

http://www.madbeanpedals.com/forum/index.php?topic=7621.0

[disabled_shredder]

I found the kraken but not the Snow White/ autobahn.

[ch1naski]

Look at the forums....
http://www.madbeanpedals.com/forum/index.php?topic=7621.0

[disabled_shredder]

Found them all

[Buzz]

Is Nurse Quacky an improvement on Dr Q? or just a variation?

[disabled_shredder]

An inprovement. But I could be wrong. Will have to do research and get back to you!

[duck_arse]

someone who knows (orman?) recommends avoiding the dr Q and the nurse quacky and building his dr quack instead. seems there is problems with getting the others to work. and somewhere recently I read to use a relly low-gain transistor in the wah-ing section.

[Mark Hammer]

The Dr Q requires use of a 1458 dual op-amp to achieve proper sweep.  Any op-amp would work for the filter section, but not for the envelope follower part.  Jack Orman came up with a way to bias the envelope-follower part, and tacked on a FET buffer on the front end to load down the signal less.  This is what you'd find in the Dr. Quack (a useful layout of which exists on the geofex site).

The Nurse Quacky includes the biasing part, to free up your op-amp choices, but omits the FET buffer.  Given that it IS a filter, preserving top end does not immediately seem paramount.  However, if you run a second 10uf cap from the output of that FET to the "output" node, you can blend in some unfiltered signal with the filtered, which makes it more useful for bass.

[Kipper4]

heres My recent thread if it's any help

http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=101899.0

i really like the snow white and am currantly amassing bits to build one. The biggest problem so far has been getting perfboard big enough at a decent price.
I've also made a perfboard layout ready (as yet unverified) based on a pcb i saw on the web. I forget whos but i will give credit if I ever decide to post it here.
I have a bunch of stuff for the SWAW.
BTW the bass balls is a decent first time wah type pedal. I've built it with good results from Rutgarua Bob Layout.

[disabled_shredder]

I have owned 2 Russian bass balls still have one. I'm working on modding it but following the schem is tough to the actual board. I love my bass balls as well as my original mutron 3 divided octave but I want a genuine auto wah. One that can absolutely replace the wah all together. Don't get me wrong I have 3 or 4 wahs on my board usually at the same time but I'm stupid w controlling the wah during rhythm playing example: Ike turner's love gravy or buddy guys best damn fool! Don't get me wrong I can run the snot out of a wah but I'd like to not think so much and be able to get into the crowd a little more like when I used to run across bar tables at gigs in Germany! Man they loved it! Or taking a leak during a solo. That sets them wild! And kipper I can etch you a seas pcb for the cost of parts and shipping if you want I'm about to do one for myself also radio shack sells 6x8 sheets of perf I also have the same size pad per hole if you are interested. I'd be willing to trade for a case of some kind if it came out close.

[Mark Hammer]

The Russian Bass Balls will afford you all kinds of room for adding knobs and toggles.  I've posted more than I care to think about on that topic here.

[disabled_shredder]

I know mark it was my thread that you schooled me on! You gave me a wealth of knowledge. It's just following the schem to the actual board that's tuff. But i will get it eventually I'm gonna change the charge cap and resistor add the diodes to ground and I want to add a mix pot!

[Mark Hammer]

Well, the good news is that the relevant parts are easy to identify, and the Russian board tend to be spaced out more.  For instance, there are three 2k7 resistors on the board, but only tweo of them are connected together.  And so on.

[disabled_shredder]

So for the cap resistor mod where are they located and the diodes to ground etc. ill have to go over the mods I set the bass balls to the side to do other work!

[Mark Hammer]

"Other" work?  Wah the heck? Wah could be more important than this? 

[bluebunny]

FWIW, I built the Dr. Quack for a friend and I thought it was great.  Worked "out of the box", so to speak...



Built using the "Quack Machine" board from Poodle in the UK.

[induction]

I like the Snow White a lot. I designed a vero layout that is small enough to fit in a 1590B, though I put mine in a BB to leave room for a battery. A standard-sized vero board is more than big enough. To make it this small, I used SMD caps and resistors (size 1206) on the copper side in addition to the standard through-hole components on the top. (Using SMD on vero is actually very easy - no more difficult than through-hole.)

If anyone is interested, the layout and details are here.