Continuing Tchula woes

[iancoates]

Hi all, first time poster here.

I've been struggling to get pedals working for a while now so I'm going back to basics. I'm working on the Tchula pedal from http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-8yh0reSbQE4/WqfZvfh0SeI/AAAAAAAAF88/Sp8cHZw4cOUb0zetJFn_07vRh1_1VIzogCK4BGAYYCw/s1600/Screen%2BShot%2B2018-03-13%2Bat%2B9.57.59%2BAM.png but without the switch part.
I've not soldered, just twisted the wires and used crocodile clips for connecting to the battery and guitar cables.

With no battery you get a quiet signal but with the battery there is no sound.





The scheme looks simple enough and I'm reasonable confident I've wired it together right. Please could someone help.

Thanks
Ian

[ElectricDruid]

Hi Ian, and welcome!

I'd say you really need a breadboard. Then you can do experiments like this much more easily. Sorry to say, but debugging that board looks like a nightmare to me. Almost for sure there's something connected wrong or shorting somewhere.

I also think you need to plan more. Draw a diagram of the what the circuit will look like on the board, and what goes where. E.g. do the step where you go from schematic-to-layout on paper first. Once you're happy with the paper layout, then have a go doing it in reality. As far as possible, make the layout look like the schematic so it's easy to cross check.

[iancoates]

Hi, thanks for the reply. I forgot to mention that I have breadboarded it and it sounded great. I worried it was my soldering that messed it up in the past. How susceptible to heat are capacitors, resistors and transistors?

Also, is there any special tricks to grounding?

Sorry the images aren't that helpful.

[PRR]

> How susceptible to heat are capacitors, resistors and transistors?

If you use a 500 Watt Vulcan roofing-iron, they melt fast.

If you use a 6 Watt micro-princess, you will be on it long enough to cook.

The $13 iron sold at Canadian Tire, Radio Shack(?), etc, is just junk.

Plumbers solder and flux is BAD for electronics.

Any of the "proper" electronic irons and solders should not cook your parts. Transistors are incredibly tough: I have seen one run so hot it melted its own solder (it wobbled in its holes) yet was still working fine. Resistors too. Plastic caps not so tough, but with reasonable lead-length no problem. (Polystyrene is a special case but now very rare.)

[iancoates]

Thanks for the info, I use a cheap solder with flux too. Soldering iron is a budget Maplin one so perhaps not the best either.

[ElectricDruid]

I used a 25W Antex iron from Maplin for about thirty years and never had any problems from it. In that time it got through several new tips and one new element. The only original bit was the handle!

If you've had it working on the breadboard, that's a good start. I don't suppose you've got enough parts to build another on up on the breadboard as well? If you did, you could cross-check voltages between a working breadboarded one and the not-working wired-up one and see what you find.

[amptramp]

From the second picture it looks like you are just twisting wires together without soldering.  I doubt you can do any debugging without establishing good connections.  A soldering iron and lead-tin eutectic solder are what I would recommend although lead-based solder may not be available where you are anymore.

I would also go with Veroboard or a pre-patterned board but in your case, Vero would be OK.  I am not a fan of breadboards.  Some electrolytic capacitor leads are too large to fit and some leads may be too small and you always have to wonder whether a problem is a design issue, a build error or the breadboard not making connection.  A circuit board with multiple connections per row makes soldering easy.

[anotherjim]

Don't trust component legs to be clean enough to do that. Even new, they usually have gum on them from paper/card carrier strips they leave the factory in. Get a solderless breadboard if you want to try circuits before soldering.

My soldering station came from Maplin (their own brand) over 3 years ago. I was worried the tip might be crap so bought a bunch of spare tips with it - you must expect that when you need a new tip the type will be obsolete unobtainium. However, the original tip is still perfect, despite running it at 400c and only cleaning with the wet sponge. I'm still working through a reel of 60:40 lead-based rosin-core solder that's older than the iron.

For electronic work, I firmly believe the iron should be grounded at the AC socket. A cheap ungrounded one can induce stray voltage into your circuit and damage sensitive components.

[iancoates]

Thanks all for the input. The breadboard layout is different from the boards I use to solder. I'll look at some different layouts on vero to make sure my circuit is fine.

[diffeq]

Thanks all for the input. The breadboard layout is different from the boards I use to solder. I'll look at some different layouts on vero to make sure my circuit is fine.

Using DIYLC to create your own vero/perf layouts is a breeze. Also makes it easier to check if pinouts are right too.