CE-2 Chorus Ensemble **PICTURE!** SOUND SAMPLE!*

[coxy46]

Brilliant, I've been after a ce-2 for quite some time. Going to be on my build list when I have time. Just out of interest has anyone done a pcb layout or in the process of doing the Boss CE-1 yet? (i can't justify the cost of them on ebay) If not Im going to try designing it over the next few months.

[Coriolis]

Hmm... I now someone here built a Dimension D - in a rack case I think, with all sorts of mods too...

C

[Stompin Tom]

I'd be interested in either a CE-1 project or the dimension D... better yet, the small dimension C.

[Fp-www.Tonepad.com]

I just received 2 different builders that report that the layout works.

So, go ahead and build it. The ready to solder boards will be available some time next week!

Fp

[Fp-www.Tonepad.com]

Massimo Ceresa just emailed me a sound sample of his Tonepad Corrrrral Chorus and his original Boss CE-2.

Here's the text that goes along with the sample:

Hi Francisco take this sample i made last evening:

1)corral chorus,speed 10 o'clock,depth 10 o'clock
2)Boss CE2 same settings
3)corral chorus,speed 1 o'clock,depth max
4)Boss CE2 same settings.

pretty the same dont you believe?

Check it out here (in the SOUNDS area):
http://www.tonepad.com/project.asp?id=53

I also got another build report for the project. So I think it's VERIFIED now!

Fp

[Fp-www.Tonepad.com]

Thanks to Fabio Castro we now have a picture of a populated board.

Check out the project page:

http://www.tonepad.com/project.asp?id=53

Fp

[LP Hovercraft]

   Thanks Man!  I had a silver screw Japanese-made one that was stolen a while back...  I had the instant Andy Summers-esque sound plugging into my PT80 with it.  This is such a cool pedal!!  Does go well with the chicken.

[Fp-www.Tonepad.com]

Cool.

Fp

[PenPen]

Not to put a damper on anything here, but after listening to that sound sample, my ears detect some difference to the real CE-2. The Boss sounds fuller and richer. Don't get me wrong, the Tonepad version sounds great, but there's some differences that I could hear. Also, I could hear the click from the switch too. Maybe some adjustments are needed?

[markr04]

I just finished my build of this. It works soooo nicely.

I did the vibrato mod and effect level mod (I removed R22 entirely and got better results from this mod for some reason)

Thanks Tonepad!

[Fp-www.Tonepad.com]

Mark,

I was just about to bring this topic back to life!

The project has now been built by quite a few people, the ready to solder boards are now available:

http://www.tonepad.com/customPage.asp?id=2

I haven't built mine yet, no time! but I'm sure I'll get to it before the year ends 

Fp

[PharaohAmps]

FP, great job!  Layout looks good, and should be another typical Tonepad easy-build.  My fave chorus is the stereo CE-3, I find it does everything I need.  It even has a Chorus / Vibrato switch on it!  (Actually the stereo mode switch, but whatever.)  The CE-2 does sound more "classic" though.  Much more like a JC-120 than the CE-3 does.  They're both cool.

Matt Farrow

[Dave_B]

Regarding the Dimension C/D, would it be reasonable to build two of these and add a two-phase squarewave LFO in place of the onboard circuits?
It obviously wouldn't be a true DimC, but that's the first thing I thought of when Francisco introduced this project.

[Fp-www.Tonepad.com]

Thanks Matt, I always appreciate your comments! Drop me an email will ya?

I may do the CE3 some day.

Bellyflop, I'm not familiar with the Dimension C or D, a few years ago I saw the schematic and thought "no way I'm making a layout for that circuit"... but I may do that one in the future as well

Fp

[Dave_B]

I understand.  :-)  DiyFreaque did a beautiful verson on protoboards a while back, but I don't think I'm up for that:
http://mypeoplepc.com/members/scottnoanh/birthofasynth/id11.html

The Dimension C build report: http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=28014.0

[DiyFreaque]

I think it could be strip-boarded much smaller, and PCB would make it smaller yet.   But I wanted so many doo-hickeys, a rack was more conducive to what I wanted, so I was allowed to stretch out board-wise.  Still, that would be one challenging little guy to squeeze into a stompbox.  Or re-squeeze, I guess - B*ss did it the first go-round. 

I'd like to have been a fly on the wall when the poor design engineer read the original MRD "Squeeze the Dimension D into a stompbox" - probably would have learned some choice swear words in Japanese.

Cheers,
Scott

[Dave_B]

I think it could be strip-boarded much smaller, and PCB would make it smaller yet.   But I wanted so many doo-hickeys, a rack was more conducive to what I wanted, so I was allowed to stretch out board-wise.  Still, that would be one challenging little guy to squeeze into a stompbox.  Or re-squeeze, I guess - B*ss did it the first go-round. 

Did you have any issues with noise as you assembled it?  I was reading Craig Anderton's story of the Hyperflange and how the noise level was really high until he changed the layout a few times.

[DiyFreaque]

No, I never ran any noise problems other than when I first powered it up on my breadboard - there's a mistake on the schematic on the first NE570 that makes it sound *terrible* - it's just a matter of one pin being connected to the another that was easily rectified after Mike Irwin pointed it out to me.

B*ss built in a few things to make it a fairly quiet - filtering the supply feeds to the BBD's; things like that. 

And, I concentrated a lot on observing sound practices when laying it out - star power, ground and bias distribution and ensuring that 'noisy' ground and 'clean' ground stayed separate all the way up to the power entry ground point.  I separated the audio processing functions from the BBD functions and from the LFO/CV stuff by putting them on different boards.  I interconnected the audio going to and coming from the audio board to the BBD boards with coaxial cable, and did the same thing with front panel audio connections.  The coaxial cable had the shield grounded at one end only to prevent ground loops.  The audio was compressed before leaving the audio board to the BBD boards, delayed and filtered on the BBD boards, then expanded back on the audio board, which would help knock down any noise that could have been picked up 'making the jump'. 

For power, I use a 12V line lump, which is regulated down to 9V inside the unit.  From there I used the same power regulation, etc., as on the original design.

All in all, it's an extremely quiet unit. If one didn't know any better, one would be surprised there were two BBD's scraping against each other in the thing. Don't know if it's any more quiet than an actual Dimension C (never had one to play with).

Cheerio,
Scott

[rocker-D82]

I didn't find a TL022. How Can I replace it?

[Fp-www.Tonepad.com]

I'd say try any dual opamp, quite a few should work.

Fp