Riptide Real Spring Reverb

[Ripthorn]

I have completed a new project for this wonderful community. Riptide is a real spring reverb utilizing a blue Accutronics tank. The circuit is actually rather straightforward, but I haven't seen any fully documented DIY projects for one, so I figured I would make one. The decay time is something in the 2.3-2.4 second ballpark, if I remember correctly. The tank is cheaper than a brick or an FV-1 and you can do things like tank splash if you want to. You won't get the massive splashy sounds of a twin reverb or the like, but it will fit on a pedalboard easily and doesn't require any transformers, etc. Schematic is attached and full build documentation, board files, and schematics along with how it works can be found at https://scientificguitarist.wixsite.com/home/riptide-spring-reverb

[aron]

Sounds great! Nice project!!!!!
Also looks great!!!!

[Toy Sun]

+1
Sounds and looks great! I've been collecting ideas for this kind of pedal for a while, so very appreciative of your development and sharing. Do you think that there is enough current to drive one of the larger Accutronics springs, or I'm I just dreaming?

Thanks,
John

[Ripthorn]

I think the biggest problem with the larger tanks is the input impedance. Depending on what input impedance you can find, then you might be able to. If not, then you may have to look at transformer coupled.

[Toy Sun]

Understood. Listening again to the demo, the little tank sounds pretty great, and I'm going for it. I can't tell you how great it is that you've posted Gerbers. After a few years of building simple projects on perfboard and purchasing a lot of PCBs, I'm psyched to try submitting files to a fab house, likely OSHpark. Your documentation is great and another bonus is the BOM as a .csv file. I wish more of the pro guys would do this - I think that lots of us would like that.

The other projects on your site also look cool - I like your originality.

Best,
John

[eh la bas ma]

I can't wait to see a full kit available at musikding for this great project.

I noticed Dead Astronaut FX is there now :

https://www.musikding.de/index.php?k=441&lang=eng

I would build one but I don't know what to choose, there's no reviews yet...

Can't you do something together ? The Dead Tide FX spring reverb, or the Ripped Astronaut reverb ?

[Knobby]

A real spring reverb is one of the things on my to-do list, but I'd really be after that drippy surf sound. Anyone any idea on what size tank you'd need for that?

[Ripthorn]

My guess would be something in the 16" range, 3 spring (or 6, depending on how they specify it). Look at the surfy bear to see what that type of size you're looking at.

[Knobby]

Good call on the Surfy Bear reverbs. The tanks sold as replacements for the 1960s Fender amps and outboard units are usually the larger ones too, so that kind of answers the question.

[Toy Sun]

Hi Brian,
Putting one (two, actually) together now and I had a couple of questions, if you have a moment.

One cap isn't labeled. I'll figure it out by either tracing it or process of elimination, but you might want to fix that on V2. I circled it in the photo.

The two transistors are on the board as SMDs. Not sure if that was per plan? I doubt it. I see a lot of solutions to mount a SMD to through-hole, but not the other way. I think I can work a solution, but another heads up for V2.

Finally, I'm having trouble finding reasonably sized 1u box caps, didn't realize my latest batch was going be so herkin' big... Can I use ceramic for all the 1u? I assume so... See photo.

Thanks so much for offering this project to the community, I hope my feedback is helpful and contributes to the ongoing success of this device. I'm super excited about it!

John

[Ripthorn]

Hi John,  I'll have to look at the cap. As for the transistors, I purposely choose SMD as they are J201's which have been EOL'd in through hole and I have them in SMD. A ceramic 1u will work fine. I should make the footprint for it larger, as I just used what I was using for everything else. Thanks for the feedback!

[Toy Sun]

In a crazy turn of events (the world is upside down!) - I was able to get both the J201 and J112 in the TO-92 package - I think they are genuine. I actually would like to get into SMD but here is the irony, the world appears to be out of stock on those...  I'm going to build a little "reverse breakout board" with perfboard for the TO-92s and wires to the SMD pads, then I'll epoxy that perfboard onto the PCB. Hopefully I'll get it right 

[Ripthorn]

Well, I made an oopsie on the board layout for Rev 1.0.  The cap labeled C3 on the board is actually C9 and the "unlabeled" cap just above Q1 is C3. I have it fixed in my Eagle layout, but apparently not on the version that made it to Github. My deepest apologies to anyone who may be using board rev 1.0!

[Ripthorn]

Quick update: project in github has been updated with new layout that fixes the labeling mistake and has space for the 1uF audio capacitors. There is still on 1uF cap in there with the smaller footprint, but it is an optional part for the bypass with tails.

[Toy Sun]

Brian, you rock! New version looks great.

Update - I got some smaller ceramic caps for the board I have underway. Also located SMT components (had to use two different suppliers - crazy that both Mouser and DigiKey are out of stock). I'm going to be patient and wait for them, but I will post a photo of my kludge just for laughs.

Looking forward to hearing this thing...
John

[Ripthorn]

I expect it'll sound great! The ceramic caps will be fine, as that is what high end surface mount audio devices use.

[Toy Sun]

Here's the proposed kludge - but the SMDs are arriving on Friday so I'm going to be patient.
I didn't solder it, but you get the gist....



Brian, I want to balance feedback/improvement suggestions with not being "that guy" - let me know if you want a few more observations.

Thanks,
John

[Ripthorn]

Always happy to hear suggestions. Most all my projects are designed with no other feedback than the voices in my head 

[Toy Sun]

Ok, great - just two things I'm finding.
The new V2 still has one 1u cap at the smaller size, it's C9.
And the pots aren't quite evenly spaced. Not sure if that was by design or not. I am also getting some very strange pot spacing on my actual populated board, but that may be something I'm doing. But looking and measuring the file in a Gerber Viewer, I see the distance between the center of the pot shafts as varying from 36.7mm to 39.3mm. That said, my build will probably be a combination of the center two board-mounted pots to hold the PCB and the other two on flying leads for placement.
Thanks,
John

[Ripthorn]

C9 is not in the audio path and is only used for tails switching mode. It's documented in the build docs.

I'll take a look at the pot spacing. I'll be sending out for some new boards in the next few weeks, so thanks for the heads up.