Wyllie Moonrock

[soggybag]

Great, thanks for the help. This is getting pretty close. I have to work today but, I might have some time to work on this tonight.

[soggybag]

Arph, you were pretty close, you even got the D8 in the right direction.

[soggybag]

After some tinkering I have this working, sort of.

Basically following the schematic posted. I'm getting a pretty good overdrive/distortion. I left the last set of clipping diodes off, D11, 12. I figure these are probably not effecting the sound in a major way.

The 1M is not doing what it should. There is distorted guitar at either end. In the. Middle the sound dies out. It seems there should be some soft attack fuzz happening somewhere along the travel.

This 1M pot is tied to the inductor. This part of the circuit is a mystery to me. I have no idea what the inductor is supposed to be doing here. I am using a TL0418 rather than the TL0412 inductor. There was a report that some units had this part. Those units may also have use other part values.

[pinkjimiphoton]

After some tinkering I have this working, sort of.

Basically following the schematic posted. I'm getting a pretty good overdrive/distortion. I left the last set of clipping diodes off, D11, 12. I figure these are probably not effecting the sound in a major way.

The 1M is not doing what it should. There is distorted guitar at either end. In the. Middle the sound dies out. It seems there should be some soft attack fuzz happening somewhere along the travel.

This 1M pot is tied to the inductor. This part of the circuit is a mystery to me. I have no idea what the inductor is supposed to be doing here. I am using a TL0418 rather than the TL0412 inductor. There was a report that some units had this part. Those units may also have use other part values.

sounds like maybe the wires to the pot are wrong? i've had stuff like that happen. sounds like maybe the center wire should be on one end, and the other two wires may need switching. OR...

if the bias is way off in a fuzz, that can happen too. there's actually a few ranges where a transistor will work, and not all of them are linear.
i discovered that recently with a fuzz i'd built that just didn't sound right... turned out i had the wires reversed on the fuzz pot, and to get it to work i had to bias it some crazy way where it only worked with the trimmers in one position... no range. once i reversed it, suddenly the whole circuit came to life.

not saying you made such a mistake... just saying i've done it. a few times. hell, many, even.

[soggybag]

Thanks for the interest in this thread. I'm getting pretty good fuzz. Not super hairy, more smooth overdrivey fuzz. Here's a video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHLOrqy-DVg

It's getting into the Moonrock ballpark. But it's not getting the full on Moonrock sound. The Moonrock does this great octave fuzz, with soft attack as you turn up the 1M pot. Right now I'm getting fuzz at one end of the pot, and hint of octave at the other, in the middle the sound fades out. Check out the sounds of the real thing here: http://tonefrenzy.com/products/moonrock-gs-wylie

[Cozybuilder]

Sorry to dredge up this old topic, but it seems no one has posted a viable schematic yet.

Anyhow, I was interested in building a clone of this pedal, so decided to see if I could get it to work. Starting with a new diagram drawn from the photos above, I drew a schematic from it. Mine was about the same as the PCB and schematics posted above and they looked mostly right, so it led me to look closer at the PC board, and I believe its been modified in a few significant areas. If that is the case, then the question became how should it have been wired. Since this thread is the only resource I have, my best guess is the following:

The section around the power lead has several suspect areas. There are other areas that are likewise suspect. If rewired as below, this circuit makes more sense (and sounds like the Moonrock video clip above in posting #24).

Pad numbers (holes) refer to the PC board drawn above (reply #8) and uses their numbers. Anyhow, these are the changes that I believe would restore the PCB to what was intended.

  1- Remove the 100uF cap (holes 41 & 36), it should be relocated to holes 55 & 56.
  2- The 10uF cap now at 55 & 56 should be moved to 43 (+ lead) and the ground tab close by.
  3- The 9V power lead should be relocated to pad 41
  4- The LED+ lead should be moved to pad 80
  5- The 47uF lead should be repositioned from pads 80 & 88 to +lead on hole 88 and - to ground (next to pad 81)
  6- The 130K resistor in holes 83 & 87 should be from 83 to ground by pad 81
  7- The circuit works better when the diode pair at pads 17-18 and 21-22 are oriented as full wave clippers (as drawn on the PCB diagram reply#8), not in parallel.

The circuit really woke up when I moved the 130K resistor at base of Q1 and reconnected the lead formerly on Q1 to ground.

This is the schematic that the above changes give, and it sounds good enough that I think it will get boxed:
I sure hope someone else tries breadboarding this and gives some comments.

[~arph]

Ah, blast from the past.. Interesting thing, I wonder if we can add even more diodes? 
Would be nice to have final verdict. The octave section is starting to make more sense now. I recognize the foxx tone machine rectifier section ( pretty heavily modified )

[Cozybuilder]

With the schematic above, the octave at one extreme was working great, and the fuzz is sounding like a fuzz throughout the pot turn, but the swell wasn't there at the other end. So had to play with it some more. Finally wound up with 10K and 1uF in series connected between Octave 3 and 2- that brought in a reliable swell and kept the other two effects, but this could use some tweaking though.

[Cozybuilder]

After a little more experimenting, I've changed the Octave/Fuzz pot from B1M to a dual B250K. Previously the Octave effect was only near the end of the pot travel, and the same with the swell at the other end. Most of the pot travel gave an essentially non-changing fuzz. This dual pot arrangement gives a lot more variance of the octave and swell effects than before, theres good range on both ends. With the wipers toward the octave end, there is max resistance to the inductor (500K) and essentially 0 resistance between the Q2 emitter diode and the 2 diodes feeding Q3 base. This results in a strong octave, and you don't get the swell effect (as before). As you turn the knob counter clockwise, the cap and resistor parallel increasing resistance in the first pot, cutting the octave effect, while the second pot resistance is decreasing, giving a reasonably smooth transition from octave to swell, with various flavors of fuzz with octave to fuzz with swell. At full counterclockwise, the R and C  are in series with the diode from Q2E, and inductor from Q3E, forming a resonant circuit that swells at about the same notes that you get the octave effect. At full CCW, you get pure swell with just a hint of octave, and some notes give totally crazy swells. Its a very different control than I've ever used before, lots of fun. I also replaced the 10K (described in the posting above) with 22K, keeping the 1uF, so the revised portion of the circuit now looks like the schematic snippet below:

The rest of the circuit on the breadboard is as drawn a few postings above. This circuit is versatile, and I'm about ready to box it.

[Kipper4]

I'm gonna need to hear/see this please Russ

[digi2t]

I threw this on the breadboard early in the week.

I managed to get a decent swell effect, much like the sound sample on the Wyllie site, but only by adding a 10K or 100K (I'm not in front of my board right now, can't remember which) trimmer between the collector of Q2, and the wiper of octave/fuzz pot. At the swell end of the pot, with the trimmer dialed somewhere near the middle, I get a really good swell. Trimming the collector (above the diode) also helps dial it in, but then it becomes a dance between the two trimmers.

The octave however, has yet to appear. I'll try with a smaller pot.

I'm using a TL019 by the way. The primary side.

The real problem I have with this whole project is that although there are some decent pictures, some important elements are based on hearsay. The swell/octave pot being one of them. It's stated that it's B1M, but I haven't seen a single picture to confirm this. Same goes for 2 of the 3 transistors (Q2/Q3).

Right now, the best fuzz (and swell) I've gotten is courtesy of 2N3700 in Q1/Q3, with a BC547C in Q2.

[Cozybuilder]

digi2t- I'm happy you tried breadboarding this circuit. After reading your comment, I went back to verify what is on my breadboard. I had made a lot of changes during the testing, and am able to say that what I posted above is mostly accurate, the major differences are the power circuit uses reverse polarity protection & additional filtering, and I used a different inductor (TL002 secondary 2K coil, not TL012 secondary 5K coil). This was what I had in hand, and I plan to go back and try the 10K side again (haven't tried it since adding the resistor and cap). The schematic below is what is currently on the breadboard. I redrew it this morning to tie the postings above together. If you don't have a dual 250K pot, then use two singles and turn the knob the same on each for testing. Right now its good, but there's definitely room for improvement, and I plan to try your technique for introducing swell. Thank you.

For the octave, it works best with the neck pickup and the tone rolled off, upper portion of the neck from about fret 7 on, like most octaves (humbucker is good, single coil better). For the swell it works best using 2 humbuckers with neck tone rolled off, and bridge tone on full. If a 10K is subbed for the 22K (wiper) then single coils work fine. As usual, YMMV. I'm on the road again for the next couple of weeks, will play with this more when I return.

[digi2t]

Russ, the diode pair going to Q3 base (D7/D8 on the Soggybag trace), face the same way on the original. I've studied the original pics, from a couple of angles, and I can swear on a stack of bibles that both anodes face Q3 base.

I'm experimenting with original trace, which seems to follow what's laid out in the gut shots.

I'm still perplexed as to how it gets that kind of range without resorting to more parts. Maybe component selection is really critical.

[Cozybuilder]

I agree that the photos look like the diode pair is facing the same way. On the solder side, that is one of the areas that look suspect- I think this board was modified. I tried both orientations, and think these sound better back to back. I don't have a pedal to compare, just these photos. I'm not claiming this to be a clone, just trying to make it work and sound right. I really appreciate your feedback. Sure wish I could spend some time with it today, but I'm in a time crunch right now.

[digi2t]

OK, this is what I have on the breadboard right now, and I'm getting;

- Octave bloom at one end of the pot.
- Normal fuzz in the middle.
- Swell at almost the other end of the pot (there's some span there for sensitivity).
- A sort of plucking cut-off type effect at (almost) completely the end of the pot (past the swell section).

I received my TL018's, and it does make a big difference where the octave is concerned. It just pops a bit more over using a 019 primary side.



Now... the added red trace is not where I initially put it. Zooming the pictures, I can almost swear that there is a trace from the collector of Q2, to the anode side of the diode. I think it's mostly hidden underneath the 1M resistor jumper on the trace side. So, I threw a jumper on the breadboard to emulate, but it killed the sustain, and the pot did nothing. On a lark, I threw the jumper to the other side of the diode. All of a sudden, the above mentioned effects came through.

I've played around with a bunch of different transistors, but it seems to give the best results with really low gain transistors in Q1/Q3 (120 - 150), and a medium gain (250 - 350) in Q2.

I'll try to get a video out tomorrow, but I need to run it through speakers to really hear it right. At the moment, everything is through headphones, so that guitar/amp/speakers interaction isn't there.

[LightSoundGeometry]

hey, can one of you guys, or gals, quickly in layman terms tell me what swell and bloom are ?

[digi2t]

hey, can one of you guys, or gals, quickly in layman terms tell me what swell and bloom are ?

Sure...

Swell = Every note you pluck start at zero volume, and increases to full volume. Sort of like using the volume control on your guitar to go from 0 to 10 with every note played.

Bloom = Initial note is there, but turns into something else. The root note is played, but in the sustain, it blooms into an octave note. Rose bud blooms into a rose flower.

Now... I'm sure some English lit major is gonna cut in here and get all geeky on me. 

[duck_arse]

Now... the added red trace is not where I initially put it. Zooming the pictures, I can almost swear that there is a trace from the collector of Q2, to the anode side of the diode. .....  I threw the jumper to the other side of the diode. All of a sudden, the above mentioned effects came through.

I'm confused. where is the jumper now that it works? (also, english is not my strong suit.)

[digi2t]

The red jumper, just above R12 and D5.

[DougH]

For reference:

https://soundcloud.com/tonefrenzy/moonrock-variety