Buying a kit or hand selecting parts? [Deep Blue Delay build]

[khm9]

Hi all,

I'm looking at this Mad Professor Deep Blue Delay from http://tagboardeffects.blogspot.ba/2012/02/mad-professor-deep-blue-delay.html
It looks great, it's verified and reviews are all good.

So down below they offered a kit: http://mklec.com/project-kits/guitar-effects-kits/deep-blue-delay-effects-kit

which is $30 + $13 shipping (which I don't think is worth?)

All those parts (resistors x10; ceramic caps x10) can be ordered from Tadya for about $9 + $2 shipping (exluding vero board).

So my questions would be:

1) Are there any benefits from buying this kit (or any kit at all) rather than hand selecting parts from taydaelectronics.com ?
2) Is taydaelectronics.com a good enough quality supplier?
3) That kit includes some kind of golden caps?? So question would be gold vs standard electrolytic caps?

[Jdansti]

1) The only benefit of this kit is they've bundled the parts for you.

2) You'll be fine with Tayda for the components in this build. For $30 I would have expected a PCB, not plain Vero board.

3) There's nothing special about their caps. If you want gold caps, paint the ones you get from Tayda.

"This kit is comprised of high-quality components that have been carefully chosen to give you the best performance and sound quality from your build." This is marketing BS.

[Kevin Mitchell]

1) The only benefit of this kit is they've bundled the parts for you.

2) You'll be fine with Tayda for the components in this build. For $30 I would have expected a PCB, not plain Vero board.

3) There's nothing special about their caps. If you want gold caps, paint the ones you get from Tayda.

Actually the ceramic caps in that kit seem to be of higher quality. Better than ceramic disc caps. Which makes sense for the circuit it's accommodating.

Kits are for convenience for beginners and for anyone who's a sucker.

I've recently placed my first order on tayda. Best prices I've seen so far.

[khm9]

1) The only benefit of this kit is they've bundled the parts for you.

2) You'll be fine with Tayda for the components in this build. For $30 I would have expected a PCB, not plain Vero board.

3) There's nothing special about their caps. If you want gold caps, paint the ones you get from Tayda.

"This kit is comprised of high-quality components that have been carefully chosen to give you the best performance and sound quality from your build." This is marketing BS.

Thanks for answering my questions!

I dont like kits anyway. They feel like you get everything served on a plate, and that is not as rewarding as when you would pick components yourself.

But I must admit, I almost fell for those golden caps

[Jdansti]

1) The only benefit of this kit is they've bundled the parts for you.

2) You'll be fine with Tayda for the components in this build. For $30 I would have expected a PCB, not plain Vero board.

3) There's nothing special about their caps. If you want gold caps, paint the ones you get from Tayda.

Actually the ceramic caps in that kit seem to be of higher quality. Better than ceramic disc caps. Which makes sense for the circuit it's accommodating.

Kits are for convenience for beginners and for anyone who's a sucker.

I've recently placed my first order on tayda. Best prices I've seen so far.

My preference is to use poly box caps for the lower values instead of ceramic.

[khm9]

1) The only benefit of this kit is they've bundled the parts for you.

2) You'll be fine with Tayda for the components in this build. For $30 I would have expected a PCB, not plain Vero board.

3) There's nothing special about their caps. If you want gold caps, paint the ones you get from Tayda.

Actually the ceramic caps in that kit seem to be of higher quality. Better than ceramic disc caps. Which makes sense for the circuit it's accommodating.

Kits are for convenience for beginners and for anyone who's a sucker.

I've recently placed my first order on tayda. Best prices I've seen so far.

On tadya I've only seen ceramic disk caps, will they affect the sound?

Btw. I've placed my first order from tayda as well recently. Very happy with the prices.

[Jdansti]

Our delay guru, Deadastronaut, uses ceramics and he reports no noise issues. I use these from Tayda:

http://www.taydaelectronics.com/capacitors/polyester-film-box-type-capacitors/1-2nf-0-0012uf-100v-5-polyester-film-box-type-capacitor.html

I thought the link would show all values. Just click on "Polyester Film BoxType Capacitors" on the capacitor page.

[khm9]

Our delay guru, Deadastronaut, uses ceramics and he reports no noise issues. I use these from Tayda:

http://www.taydaelectronics.com/capacitors/polyester-film-box-type-capacitors/1-2nf-0-0012uf-100v-5-polyester-film-box-type-capacitor.html

So you can see here there are these red caps and ceramic brown caps. Now here you'd not use ceramic at all? There are same cap values here and a few different.

p.s. this is my first a bit complicated build

[garcho]

labor costs life. just like you don't want to do something for someone else for free, people with businesses don't either. maybe you're broke, live in a poor country, don't care enough to sink money into this, have a work ethic that forbids you form paying for what you can do yourself    but whoever runs that business wants to be paid for taking the time to order the right parts and provide everything in one package regardless.

that being said, why would you use an OP275 with a PT2399? even if it wasn't a lo-fi delay IC, it's supposed to be a "tape delay", maybe they should've include a 741 
also, it seems a little silly to not include fairly important things like the enclosure or jacks, yet they've taken the time to type that there's a 'parts list' included with the kit. whatever

don't worry about the small value caps, once you build a bunch of stuff, then worry. use the right value (0.1µ, 100N, etc.) but ceramic, film, etc. doesn't matter for you right now. you only need to know when it's electrolytic or not.
you'll probably have a lot more problems with your soldering or wiring than capacitor type affecting the signal.

[Kevin Mitchell]

On tadya I've only seen ceramic disk caps, will they affect the sound?

Likely but I wouldn't know what the original circuit used. Considering how small the circuit it I think it should be okay. Perhaps someone with sufficient knowledge would chime on this question.

don't worry about the small value caps, once you build a bunch of stuff, then worry. use the right value (0.1µ, 100N, etc.) but ceramic, film, etc. doesn't matter for you right now. you only need to know when it's electrolytic or not.
you'll probably have a lot more problems with your soldering or wiring than capacitor type affecting the signal.

This is great advice!

[khm9]

labor costs life. just like you don't want to do something for someone else for free, people with businesses don't either. maybe you're broke, live in a poor country, don't care enough to sink money into this, have a work ethic that forbids you form paying for what you can do yourself    but whoever runs that business wants to be paid for taking the time to order the right parts and provide everything in one package regardless.

that being said, why would you use an OP275 with a PT2399? even if it wasn't a lo-fi delay IC, it's supposed to be a "tape delay", maybe they should've include a 741 
also, it seems a little silly to not include fairly important things like the enclosure or jacks, yet they've taken the time to type that there's a 'parts list' included with the kit. whatever

don't worry about the small value caps, once you build a bunch of stuff, then worry. use the right value (0.1µ, 100N, etc.) but ceramic, film, etc. doesn't matter for you right now. you only need to know when it's electrolytic or not.
you'll probably have a lot more problems with your soldering or wiring than capacitor type affecting the signal.

I'm quite handy with soldering iron. It's important to me to make this as close as to the original.

[armdnrdy]

Here's a good guide to capacitor types:

http://www.muzique.com/cap_faq.htm

In most of my builds..where it calls out for ceramic...I use MLCC.

Sensitive circuits such as clock timing caps, or VCOs I use MLCC COG/NPO and as of late, polystyrene where electrical characteristics really matter.

I have had ceramics (common inexpensive 50V) produce piezoelectric effects in higher gain circuits.

[garcho]

It's important to me to make this as close as to the original.

I'm quite handy with soldering iron.

it's a PT2399 based delay, and you're asking about a BYO clone kit. ma gavte la nata

[Jdansti]

I'll add that the box style caps cover three holes on the strip board (one empty hole between the two legs). There are a few caps shown on your layout that use adjacent holes (no empty hole between the legs). When I have that situation and I'm using box caps, I bend one leg 90 deg. toward the other and then bend it 90 deg. down so the legs are closer together and fit in adjacent holes. If you don't want to do that, just use small ceramics.





BTW- check the Tayda coupon thread in the Lounge or "like" Tayda on Facebook to get periodic discount codes.

[armdnrdy]

It's important to me to make this as close as to the original.

If making this as close to the original as possible is important to you....you should look to the original!

Looks like MLCCs, and film box caps.

[mklec]

It looks like I'm a little late to the conversation, but I came across it and wanted to give a reply.
A quick introduction: I am David and I am the owner of Mklec.  (well, me and my wife, but mostly me)

So the original poster wanted to know what the benefits are of the kit vs parting it out and that's a great question.  It was actually a customer that told me the best answer to it and that's "their time".  It's frustrating ordering parts for a layout, only to find out that you missed one and now have to wait longer and pay additional shipping (I've done it a few times myself).  Then there's simply the time it takes to make sure you got everything in the layout and didn't miss any parts.  But, as mentioned, you can save a few bucks by sourcing all of the parts yourself if you have time to spare.

There's nothing special about their caps. If you want gold caps, paint the ones you get from Tayda.

Actually, the "gold" caps are Nichicon Audio Grade electrolytic capacitors.  Nichicon is a Japanese company and the capacitors are engineered for sound quality.  Since guitar pedals and sound equipment are all about the best sound and tone quality, I chose these capacitors specifically due to their performance and application.  I'm sure generic Chinese caps will "work", but that isn't the standard I go by with our kits.  Cheap pickups will "work", but I'm not seeing people rush out to buy them.

"This kit is comprised of high-quality components that have been carefully chosen to give you the best performance and sound quality from your build." This is marketing BS.

Actually that isn't marketing BS.  When I first partnered with Mark at Tagboardeffects to start offering these kits, I made the decision that I would only use high-quality components, meaning that they cost more and only come from reputable manufacturers, but also means significantly smaller profit margins.  The reason for this decision was that I want my customers getting a great quality kit and the absolute best sound from it, even if it costs me more.  I figured their satisfaction with the end result would lead to repeat customers as to where a crappy sounding pedal would have the opposite effect.  When it comes to great tone, only high quality components will do, otherwise you're sacrificing sound quality to save a few bucks.  I've had customers tell me that they've used the "greenies" and other cheap polybox caps and they just don't sound as good as WIMA and other name brand components do.
I recently saw a review of cheap Chinese resistors and how several of them were outside of the 1% tolerance, which will of course affect the quality of the tone.  Again, I use high quality resistors (Xicon/KOA Speer/Yageo) in the kits that are always well within the tolerance range.  You can call it marketing BS if you want, but I'm not into peddling BS.
There's no marketing necessary when you sell quality products because the results speak for themselves.  If that wasn't enough, when we stock these kits, we individually label and package each part so you're not having to sort out resistors or capacitor values.  And our kits are backed with customer support that speaks for itself.  I've had a few customers get stuck on a build and I've walked them through troubleshooting it and finding the problem.  Since I really want people who are interested in building their own pedal to give it a try, I will guarantee their first kit within the US.  So if they completely get stuck and can't figure it out, they can box it back up, mail it to me, and I'll send them back a working kit at no extra charge.  My reason for this is because I had a customer that once got frustrated and felt like they had wasted their money and that bothered me.
I don't want any customer feeling like they've wasted their money, so I figured it's worth whatever it costs me to see to it that their money isn't wasted and to give them the assurance that they'll have a working pedal.  I'm not in the manufacturing business, so this is a one time offer per customer and I highly encourage them to do their best to troubleshoot and find the problem themselves, because that's a highly educational process and it's much more rewarding if they do it themselves.  But if they've reached the point in which they're ready to toss it in the trash, let me fix it so you don't waste your money.

Now if that's not worth the extra money for the kit, then there's nothing else to say.  But that's what you get by ordering a kit from mklec.

[EBK]

The value of kits is time saved, research predone, quicker start to rock time, less testing/debugging.  Basically, you get a higher fun-to-work ratio.  I don't use kits for many of my builds, but they are absolutely well worth the price, and they are not just for beginners!
Every time I source my own parts, I end up buying from 3 different vendors (sometimes 4 or 5) for 1 pedal, and I am often filtering through tons of specs to determine which specific parts I want/need.  There are plenty of people who value their time at $0/hr  and ignore this cost of building, but I sure don't (I have 2 small kids and a full time job)!

I've build a handful of kits from GGG (love just about everything but the wire they supply, and I always source my own enclosure).  Haven't given kits from other vendors a try yet, but I've purchased premade PCBs from all over the place.  I love supporting the good folks who support the hobby by making it more efficient and fun.  I'll definitely check out mklec next time I'm in the mood for a kit.   

[garcho]

When it comes to great tone, only high quality components will do, otherwise you're sacrificing sound quality to save a few bucks.

right, when you're using a PT2399, you need expensive caps for "great tone". 

[vigilante397]

When it comes to great tone, only high quality components will do, otherwise you're sacrificing sound quality to save a few bucks.

right, when you're using a PT2399, you need expensive caps for "great tone". 

Going to have to agree there. PT2399 is not a hi-fi delay, and it isn't meant to be. A lot of circuits will actually be negatively effected by "audio grade" caps because you lose a lot of the color that makes the original circuits sound like they do, getting something so clean it's the audio equivalent of sterile. If you're building audiophile equipment, absolutely use audio grade components. If you're building something that's going between a guitar and an amp, don't.

Just my opinion though

[khm9]

Hi David!
Thanks for replying.
Sure kits are more easier, but sometimes the easier way isn't the way to go.
I personally don't like having things served on a silver platter (unless it's the only way to go), just doesn't feel as rewarding as when you gather all the parts by yourself and put them together.

Apart from that, other thing that made me not go with mklec is the shipping, well at least for us that are not in the US, international shipping for 1 kit is ok $13 to Bosnia, but if I add one more kit in the shopping cart, $13 is added on the shipping price again, etc. Also the package would probably be charged with customs costs since the package is shipped internationally from the US. Considering all the additional costs involved I've decided not to go with mklec or any other similar sites that charge too much for the shipping. Suddenly, the shipping + additional costs are as expensive as the parts that have been ordered and the whole things becomes way too expensive.

Actually, the "gold" caps are Nichicon Audio Grade electrolytic capacitors.  Nichicon is a Japanese company and the capacitors are engineered for sound quality.  Since guitar pedals and sound equipment are all about the best sound and tone quality, I chose these capacitors specifically due to their performance and application.  I'm sure generic Chinese caps will "work", but that isn't the standard I go by with our kits.  Cheap pickups will "work", but I'm not seeing people rush out to buy them.

Recently I was in doubt, whether high quality caps make a difference in our circuits, but many people told me that circuits we work on aren't that sensitive to notice the difference between high quality parts and china made ones, so considering the complexity of getting all the high quality parts for example from mouser I went with Tayda, very cheap, shipping is almost free and no additional costs.
I don't know that's just me, I probably wont settle down unless I hear the difference myself.
So in the future I'll build two same pedals, one with hq parts and one with china made ones and see for myself if there is any difference.