Lovetone BrownSource. Is the Schem legit? I built it and it doesnt work.

[R.G.]

i think im going to give up on this one untill someone comes up with a schem that sounds like the demos on lovetone.com

Just out of curiosity, how do we know the demos are from a Brownsource, or any other specific pedal for that matter?

[John Lyons]

I built a working Brown Source from the PDF document Nelson posted here.

Here are my thoughts:
The sound clip on lovetone is pretty wild, a lot of tone and many cool sounds. I do not think that the sounds there are from a brown source through a clean amp at all! Take away the wah and an already overdriven amp and you get what the BS really sounds like...
The sounds I get are pretty much mild overdrive and a somewhat flexible tone control with a rotary to switch caps...basically thin and thick sounds at the twist of a tone knob.
Through my blackface Fender twin reverb the Brown source sounds mediocre at best. Static/Fizzle on top of soft picked notes and not too much mojo at all. With a boost (micro amp)  in front of the BS it comes alive and sounds a lot better, or at least more "rock" and sustain.
This leads me to believe that the clips on lovetone were through a loud mildly distorted amp with some output tube distortions already going on.

I tried it through a tube marshal type amp I made with a little grit already going on and it sounded a lot better. Like the clips on lovetone?...not really! But it did sound nice... I was expecting something a lot better, kind of a bummer. You be the judge.

Here are a couple sound clips I made. www.mrdwab.com/john/soundclipspage.html

John

[burnt fingers]

I borrowed a cheese source a few months back to play with.  I wish I had taken the time to trace the board. 

I think the source is a good overdrive but by no means is it over the top by any definition.  The clip may have other things on it.

Oddly enough, i liked the source without any of the rotary positions.  Just bypassing it all together so maybe I'll build one without the rotary swithc and see if I'm successfull

Scott

[John Lyons]

Isn't the Big Cheese the same ( esentially) as the Great Cheddar at GEO or GGG?

I didn't think the clips of the Big Cheese were all that great compared to the Brown Source. But who knows...the BS seems to be verified as the per the original and is sounds unlike the clips on Lovetones site... Bah!!!!!!!!!!

John

[Gus]

FWIW My friend that had the cheese source also had a Klon.  The klon and the brown source only sounded good into certain amps and at certain volumes.  They were OK but both were sold.  It has been years but IIRC the klon and source sounded very good with a strat and old deluxe.  Now the big cheese is just crazy and fun use that with a meatball etc in or out of the effects loop.

I have seen and heard fixed(switches)a number of lovetone effects ring stinger, meatball, CS, doppelgänger, wobulator.
  They are all good BUT you need to learn how to set them up for the sound you want there are a lot of controls and a lot of interactions.

[scotsman]

I built a working Brown Source from the PDF document Nelson posted here.

Here are my thoughts:
The sound clip on lovetone is pretty wild, a lot of tone and many cool sounds. I do not think that the sounds there are from a brown source through a clean amp at all! Take away the wah and an already overdriven amp and you get what the BS really sounds like...
The sounds I get are pretty much mild overdrive and a somewhat flexible tone control with a rotary to switch caps...basically thin and thick sounds at the twist of a tone knob.
Through my blackface Fender twin reverb the Brown source sounds mediocre at best. Static/Fizzle on top of soft picked notes and not too much mojo at all. With a boost (micro amp)  in front of the BS it comes alive and sounds a lot better, or at least more "rock" and sustain.
This leads me to believe that the clips on lovetone were through a loud mildly distorted amp with some output tube distortions already going on.

I tried it through a tube marshal type amp I made with a little grit already going on and it sounded a lot better. Like the clips on lovetone?...not really! But it did sound nice... I was expecting something a lot better, kind of a bummer. You be the judge.

Here are a couple sound clips I made. www.mrdwab.com/john/soundclipspage.html

John

I've also built this up using Nelsons PDF layout.  I couldn't agree more with what you said.  Fizzy over the top of soft playing - not alot of gain at all.  It's a good pedal - not great!  A clean boost or my TS-9 in front of it and it becomes a different animal.  I also was underwhelmed by it.  Oh well - building one is a heck of alot cheaper then buying one!

[John Lyons]

I'm going to try a few different cliping arangements and see what I can come up with. Jfets, LEDS, Germaniums, Maybe a combo...
If I can get rid of the Fizz on top of the clean/soft played notes I'll be happy enough with this one.
It's nothing like the clips that made me want to build it but still a nice one.
Any other opinions on this circuit?

John

[scotsman]

I'm going to try a few different cliping arangements and see what I can come up with. Jfets, LEDS, Germaniums, Maybe a combo...
If I can get rid of the Fizz on top of the clean/soft played notes I'll be happy enough with this one.
It's nothing like the clips that made me want to build it but still a nice one.
Any other opinions on this circuit?

John

What about switching out the gain pot for a b50k? 

[MartyMart]

I did a lot of "hacking and tweaking" on the Brown Source, whilst trying to figure out the circuit
with Torchy a few months ago. ( kind of a "Franken-source" !! )
We got very close, then Nelson produced the PDF, so I got a "worker" out of two circuits.
IMO, it's an OK blend of OD/Fuzz, with the cap switching etc, NOT a world-beater though !.
A decent cap switched FF, or an RM Mongoose with cap switch would be much better .
I have since dismantled it and used the parts for other stuff .

MM.

[JHS]

The schem posted here is definitly wrong (output wiring on IC1b, w this wiring the unit sounds like piss).
Maybe the original last version had a mistake in the board layout, all earlier versions have the correct layout on IC1b.

On the earlier versions the output is connected to pin 7 of IC1b. With this wiring you get the sound from the sound samples.

JHS

[John Lyons]

JHS
The PDF Nelson made has the Output on pin 7.

I played through my BS build tonight after changing the Gain pot to 50K. With the rotary possitions 1-3 the circuit motorboats at a very low frequency until you turn down the gain (or turn the tone towards the thinner setting) on position 4 the motorboating isn't there. Sounds pretty good.

Any idea how to cut out the motorboating? Is it just a matter of lowering the 4.7uf cap? before the tone control?

John

[JHS]

Maybe Nelson made an update of his pdf, in my pdf (schem of V5-unit) the 4,7uF output cap is connected to the inverting input of IC U1B and the 3,9k.

I've noticed that the 4,7uF is connected to pin 2 in the board layout and I think it is wrong too, the 4,7uF must be connected to pin 1 for correct action and sound like in the V1-V4 units. IMHO, too wire the output to the inverting input of an opamp won't make much sense.

JHS

[markusw]

I'm pretty sure that Nelson's layout corresponds to 100% to the original V5 because some time ago I had a look at the pics Nelson was working from and every connection can be clearly seen. There is a minor bug in the schem that Nelson obviously didn't have the time to change (the part of the rotary switch that switches in the tone control is reversed. in position 1 the tone control is bypassed in the layout while in the schem it is in pos 4).
However, the layout is functionally identical to v5.
Since JHS mentioned that in previous versions v1-v4 the output cap is connected to the output of the opamp stage my question is: might it be possible that the dual opamp in v5 does not have standard pinout?? Don't know if this would make any sense.

[John Lyons]

Can anyone else back up JHS's claims here? It would make sense that the output should be taken from pin 1 of U1b...
Before I get out the dremel and cut traces I'd like to hear from someone else.

JHS if you are out there... Should pin 1 connect to the output cap and so on? What about the 22K between pins 1 and 2?

John

[puretube]

"search" is yer friend... 

[scotsman]

Can anyone else back up JHS's claims here? It would make sense that the output should be taken from pin 1 of U1b...
Before I get out the dremel and cut traces I'd like to hear from someone else.

JHS if you are out there... Should pin 1 connect to the output cap and so on? What about the 22K between pins 1 and 2?

John

I'm also interested in knowing this.  I've built this one also - and it just doesn't seem right.  I've used the search and it's turned up nada regarding this issue. 

[puretube]

OK - I searched FOR YOU...


btw: can anybody imagine, what non-linking to schemos,
and do-the-searching for others
costs others???



(p.s.: I won`t do the scrolling within a thread, for others...)

[puretube]

BTW: I never expected too much from this circuit, looking at the schemos,
and evaluating the components` values...

[JHS]

All in all rely on your own ears and decide yourself what sounds best.

Anubics posted a correct schem of the BS-V5 to the German forum a year ago (w the 4,7uF output cap connected to the out of U1B).
Every one in the German forum who built or breadboarded  the BS agreed that the 4,7uF must be connected to pin 7 or 1, depending on the used layout and I can confirm this.

One thing is unknown yet, the type and the manufacturer of the electrolytic caps. The quality of those coupling caps have a big influence on the sound. Good audio electrolytic w plain foil sounded best to my ears, w cheap rough foil types the BS sucked and sounded thin and liveless.

JHS

[markusw]

Anubics posted a correct schem of the BS-V5 to the German forum a year ago (w the 4,7uF output cap connected to the out of U1B).

Anubics' schem was also done from V5 pics (he was so kind to send me the pics). However, some of the connections were hidden by wires. Therefore, the wiring of the output opamp stage was done assuming a "normal" opamp stage.