Colorsound Vocalizer vero

[pinkjimiphoton]

ok,
thanks to paulyy (you rock bro)

i've replaced the pot, and it indeed DOES  now work....no glitches, no weirdness.

but just for sh*ts and giggles, i put the white wire on pot two on terminal 1 instead of 3...

and it sweeps the formants AGAINST each other...cross modulates, or whatever.

not as cool as the right way, but weirdly usable...so if anyone is so inclined, simply run the white wire to the center of a spdt switch, and term 1 and 3 to both poles for
yet another (imho) cool and useable sound!

i am psyched this thing is finally working right...beware of them cheezy plastic pots. if they get too hot, they WILL break down inside...they'll work, but be glitchy.

this thing's smooth as silk now.

peace, and happy new years!!!!!!!!!

[pinkjimiphoton]

oh yah, the ca3080e that took 7 months to arrive?

i decided to try it...

and every pin was bent, and most snapped off.

way to go, chinese dude...

[DavenPaget]

oh yah, the ca3080e that took 7 months to arrive?

i decided to try it...

and every pin was bent, and most snapped off.

way to go, chinese dude...

Oh dear ... No wonder i have fear of ordering via ebay from HK

[pinkjimiphoton]

i've had a lotta GOOD luck in general, but this was lame, lame, lame.

[paulyy]

ok,
thanks to paulyy (you rock bro)

i've replaced the pot, and it indeed DOES  now work....no glitches, no weirdness.

but just for sh*ts and giggles, i put the white wire on pot two on terminal 1 instead of 3...

and it sweeps the formants AGAINST each other...cross modulates, or whatever.

not as cool as the right way, but weirdly usable...so if anyone is so inclined, simply run the white wire to the center of a spdt switch, and term 1 and 3 to both poles for
yet another (imho) cool and useable sound!

i am psyched this thing is finally working right...beware of them cheezy plastic pots. if they get too hot, they WILL break down inside...they'll work, but be glitchy.

this thing's smooth as silk now.

peace, and happy new years!!!!!!!!!

Glad I could help. If I cant get mine to work. I might as well help some else with theres to work

[pinkjimiphoton]

as soon as i cab afford another hard drive for the comp with the webcam, i'll up another installment of "stupid pedal tricks."

thanks again!!

[digi2t]

@ Jimi - It sucks about the chip, but I must admit, I haven't had a bad rap yet from the Hong Kong suppliers yet. I refuse to buy from China though. Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapour have been fine for me. I get the feeling that there must be bad blood between them and the Chinese, so they go the extra mile to keep their clients happy. I ordered a bunch of rotary switches from a Hong Kong supplier, from who I've ordered stuff in the past, but they arrived without the washers and nuts. I fired off an email, and they replied right away, and I had the washers and nut a week later.

I'll take a look at my purchases, and who I've bought from over there. I'll put together a list, and post it. Maybe we should start spreading the news about who is reliable, and who isn't. I don't think we should be throwing the baby out with the bath water, if we can just stick to reliable suppliers from over there. After all, if we take care of the pennies, then the dollars will take care of themselves.

@Paulyy -  Geez man! I've looked at that board you made, time and again. I just don't get why it doesn't work (scratching head with both hands). You've tried different chips too, right? I don't get it, everything seems kosher. I even used that board to verify my vero against, so I don't see it being the problem. I've even done side-by-side views of the yours vs. the original, and I don't see anything out of whack.

Just too weird man  .

[DavenPaget]

@ Jimi - It sucks about the chip, but I must admit, I haven't had a bad rap yet from the Hong Kong suppliers yet. I refuse to buy from China though. Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapour have been fine for me. I get the feeling that there must be bad blood between them and the Chinese, so they go the extra mile to keep their clients happy. I ordered a bunch of rotary switches from a Hong Kong supplier, from who I've ordered stuff in the past, but they arrived without the washers and nuts. I fired off an email, and they replied right away, and I had the washers and nut a week later.

I'll take a look at my purchases, and who I've bought from over there. I'll put together a list, and post it. Maybe we should start spreading the news about who is reliable, and who isn't. I don't think we should be throwing the baby out with the bath water, if we can just stick to reliable suppliers from over there. After all, if we take care of the pennies, then the dollars will take care of themselves.

@Paulyy -  Geez man! I've looked at that board you made, time and again. I just don't get why it doesn't work (scratching head with both hands). You've tried different chips too, right? I don't get it, everything seems kosher. I even used that board to verify my vero against, so I don't see it being the problem. I've even done side-by-side views of the yours vs. the original, and I don't see anything out of whack.

Just too weird man  .

Singapore ? I didn't know people send things from here . Which shop is that ? I really want to get my hand on some CA3080E locally .
Taiwan had a long-standing feud with china , HK included . Taiwan had a long war with china too .

[pinkjimiphoton]

the chip came from hong kong, don't remember the vendor....
hang on, let me look...

i can probably mail ya one, daven, if ya wanna pm me your snail mail addie..

here's where i got the good ones, intersil 3080e's from a guy handled polida:

http://myworld.ebay.com/polida2008/&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2754

this is the one who took 7 months to send me a broken chip:

http://myworld.ebay.com/cwithk/&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2754

cwithk is his handle, and he's in hong kong

[digi2t]

@ Jimi - It sucks about the chip, but I must admit, I haven't had a bad rap yet from the Hong Kong suppliers yet. I refuse to buy from China though. Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapour have been fine for me. I get the feeling that there must be bad blood between them and the Chinese, so they go the extra mile to keep their clients happy. I ordered a bunch of rotary switches from a Hong Kong supplier, from who I've ordered stuff in the past, but they arrived without the washers and nuts. I fired off an email, and they replied right away, and I had the washers and nut a week later.

I'll take a look at my purchases, and who I've bought from over there. I'll put together a list, and post it. Maybe we should start spreading the news about who is reliable, and who isn't. I don't think we should be throwing the baby out with the bath water, if we can just stick to reliable suppliers from over there. After all, if we take care of the pennies, then the dollars will take care of themselves.

@Paulyy -  Geez man! I've looked at that board you made, time and again. I just don't get why it doesn't work (scratching head with both hands). You've tried different chips too, right? I don't get it, everything seems kosher. I even used that board to verify my vero against, so I don't see it being the problem. I've even done side-by-side views of the yours vs. the original, and I don't see anything out of whack.

Just too weird man  .

Singapore ? I didn't know people send things from here . Which shop is that ? I really want to get my hand on some CA3080E locally .
Taiwan had a long-standing feud with china , HK included . Taiwan had a long war with china too .

Here are some of the sellers I have delt with on Ebay lately, to date I haven't had a problem with yet;
- ele-parts
- eeedesigner
- tayda2009
- goodbuy711 (store is allpartspipe)

Much to my surprise, I did order from Polida (Chinese) as well, and had no issues. That one must have slipped under the radar  Since Jimi didn't have an issue either, I guess I keep that one.

I made an error in saying that I ordered from Singapour, upon checking, it's Thailand, from Tayda2009. My apologies.

Unfortunately, I can't go back further than 60 days on my Ebay history, but I know I've ordered stuff from other places as well. I'll try to keep track of that in the future. One thing I do check before I buy is the feedback percentage. If it's below 99.8%, then I don't buy from there.

[paulyy]

@Paulyy -  Geez man! I've looked at that board you made, time and again. I just don't get why it doesn't work (scratching head with both hands). You've tried different chips too, right? I don't get it, everything seems kosher. I even used that board to verify my vero against, so I don't see it being the problem. I've even done side-by-side views of the yours vs. the original, and I don't see anything out of whack.

Just too weird man  .

I've done some comparing as well and couldnt find anything wrong but doesnt mean I missed something. I dont get it either. I have tryed different chips but I only bought two of each from smallbear. Both do the samething. No change at all. Maybe I'll try different chips from someone else. I've got to the point where I dont know what else to do with it. I'll save it for a rainy day I guess.

[DavenPaget]

the chip came from hong kong, don't remember the vendor....
hang on, let me look...

i can probably mail ya one, daven, if ya wanna pm me your snail mail addie..

here's where i got the good ones, intersil 3080e's from a guy handled polida:

http://myworld.ebay.com/polida2008/&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2754

this is the one who took 7 months to send me a broken chip:

http://myworld.ebay.com/cwithk/&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2754

cwithk is his handle, and he's in hong kong

It's fine . I'm cool . 

[pinkjimiphoton]

paulyy, REAL dumb question, but did you use sand paper on the trace side of the board? it looks like there's a lot of fine sanding marks...
if you did, check continuity on each trace from point to point...i've had circuits fail over damn near imperceptable scratches across a trace.
all it takes is one, and everything's outta wack.

i've looked at the board, the schem and the layouts over and over, and you describe almost the same prob i was having at first...muddy wah and horrible blatty distortion. in my case, the caps were off by a factor of 1000...they were supposed to be picofarad, i used nanofarad...swapping them out brought the circuit back to life.

stumped, dude.

[paulyy]

paulyy, REAL dumb question, but did you use sand paper on the trace side of the board? it looks like there's a lot of fine sanding marks...
if you did, check continuity on each trace from point to point...i've had circuits fail over damn near imperceptable scratches across a trace.
all it takes is one, and everything's outta wack.

i've looked at the board, the schem and the layouts over and over, and you describe almost the same prob i was having at first...muddy wah and horrible blatty distortion. in my case, the caps were off by a factor of 1000...they were supposed to be picofarad, i used nanofarad...swapping them out brought the circuit back to life.

stumped, dude.

I used a S.O.S pad to clean off the black ink when it was done. Super fine grit. My componets seem to be fine as well. I hit the wall with this one but Dino offered to help so he asked if I could send him my board and take a look at it. If he cant figure it out then I dont know. 

[digi2t]

Nice little mod for the Vocalizer;

Take out the 3.9K resistor that sits between pins 2 and 6 on the CA3080, and replace it with a 10K linear pot.

You now have a sweep frequency control 

Enjoy,
Dino

[pinkjimiphoton]

sweet!!!   

[digi2t]

Another thing, you might want to check your Vref voltage. On the schematic, it states that it should be at 4.7v, after the zener. I initially used a 4.7v zener, which workes, but I did notice that due to some loss in the circuit, that my true voltage was sitting at around 4.3v. Studying the Dipthonizer schematic, I noticed that it has 5v Vref going to the CA3080. I did have some 5.1v zeners on hand, so out of curiousity, I swapped out the 4.7 for a 5.1. My Vref voltage now sits at 4.95v.

Performance-wise, it seems to have centered the sweep a bit more. Whereas I had the "o" in the "yoy" closer to the heel end, it seems to be a bit more balanced now, with the "o" more in the middle of the sweep. Is it because we're balancing better between the Vref, the forward voltage of the diode chain, and the performance of the transistor versus the resistance to ground? I'm not quite sure yet.

If you guys could try it, just to validate what I'm hearing, I'd appreciate it. 

[pinkjimiphoton]

i will try to get on it today or tomorrow bro...i gotta hit the parts store, but if i do the ol lady will freak.

"i thought that last project before the last 20 projects was the last one"...lol   

i just cleared everything out of her dining room...and then cluttered it again last nite!!

so...gotta be careful right now!! lol

[pinkjimiphoton]

dino,
what was the other mod you came up with to "smooth" the distortion?

i wanna do that, too..thanks bro!

off to rat shack...

[pinkjimiphoton]

ok, i played with the vocalizer this afternoon...

first on the agenda...the 1 meg  resistor for the distortion.

i had a couple 4 meg ones in parallel on mine, total resistance was almost 5m...got 'em outta there, went back to 1 meg.

discovered i don't like the cap across it...tried 10, 68,151, and 221 pf....none were worth keeping in my opinion.

in fact, the 1 meg resistor isn't necessary. it doesn't seem to DO anything at all!!

i soldered it in anyways, figuring what the heck. but while i had it out, i disconnected the 1n914 next to it and did get a humongous volume increase. it didn't sound all that great, tho, so i left it in...but i DID add a 1n34a ge in series with it to make the clipper asymetric, and that seemed to smooth out the distortion some. it's still pretty nasty sounding. again, tried it with and without the 1 meg resistor. didn't seem to matter.

also tried paralleling the clipping diodes with the aforementioned caps...no discernable difference.

so i took out the 3.9 k resistor, and tried a 10k trimmer. now THAT did work, but i found the yoy was a little ellusive...with the trimmer pegged, it was ALMOST getting there, but not enough.

i had some 30k trimmers, and popped one in. now i get 4 distinct harmonic shifts, and a very discernable "yoy"...and it definitely spread out the "sweet spot"...mega improvement, dino, big kudos bro!!

i still don't like the fuzz very much...but the wah part sounds a lot better.

i had added a dpdt to the connections on pot 2, switching the pot 2 connection of pin 1 to pin 3...this changes it to a more wah-ish sound (different, but useable) and the 30k trummer seemed to help that too.

didn't try the different diode yet...can't get to the part store today.

onwards and upwards, brothers...

gonna start building a dipthongizer...got the pcb in today from madbean.