Building the Uglyface PCB

[pinkjimiphoton]

my virgin ears!!!!

lol....well done, mate, knew you'd sort it out!!!

[bcalla]

OK, funny story.  I finished my Uglyface last night around 1am.  I was sure I assembled and wired it correctly, so I decided to test it out through headphones.  I plugged it in, and my guitar sounded normal until I stepped on the bypass switch to engage the pedal.  I got a god-awful howl.  Disappointed, I knew I was too tired to troubleshoot so I waited until today to check this discussion thread for ideas to locate the problem.  Then I played jwar's demo.  I went back and started fiddling with the knobs and discovered that it was supposed to howl!!!  Anyhow it works fine, and I am really happy with how it came out.

[hench4life]

Just built my uglyface up and it is a go. I had a drilled 5 knob enclosure from an aborted project so I shoved it in there and added a voltage starve knob. Things with ICs don't always starve well, but this one does. This is a HIGHLY recommended mod. And it can be easily added to finished pedals. Just add a 5k pot wired as a variable resistor on the 9v+ wire to the board. Some of the things it does: if the pedal is in an oscillation mode, you can starve the squeal out but keep the tone and "reaction" to the oscillation. You can tune and alter oscillations, with the sensitivity cranked and the pedal fully starved you get a cool sub octave synth. with the freq knob cranked the starve knob will do acid drops when turned. It also provides another field of control when playing it like a standalone instrument. anyway, if you want even more out of this thing, go for it, you won't be disappointed.

[Taylor]

Cool mod idea. 

[rainbowdoom]

Anyone know if there would be a problem if I just leave the LED+ lug empty when not using an LED in my build?

[Taylor]

That's fine.

[belyheart]

I've heard different builds of this schematic before and some sound more lasery then others.  The envelope is different in some...not necessarily this board, but I'm curious which parts and values would I change to mess with that aspect of the box.

[9aul]

Hi,

I've just built the ugly face but when I tested it i don't get any signal coming through. Could anyone help me here? When plugged in no signal from the guitar gets through, not a peep. However you can use the frequency knob to make a tone. the volume knob works on this tone, but the other controls do nothing. Im thinking I must have mucked up the wiring on the input or output. I've drawn a diagram of how ive wired it up, but  dont know how to attach images to this post if its not a web address . if someone could let me know how, i'll attach the pic.
I haven't used any substitutions for components although in the pics ive seen everyone seems to have their film caps in a box format, mine are those green ones (i can attach a pic) but are still film. Also I accidently bought a resistor that was a lot bigger than the others for the 1M. I think it can  take a higher voltage or something, but its the same value so I popped it in anyway. That should be OK shouldn't it?? Again I can attached a pic of the type of resistor. I can also take some readings from the legs of the chips if that would help. It would be great if someone could help me fault find with this, I really want to get this crazy little pedal working.


Thanks
Paul

[Taylor]

Your substitutions should be fine. T find your problem, check the debugging links at the top of this page and at the top of the 'building your own stompbox' forum. Build the audio probe from there and probe through the circuit to find where your input stops.

[belyheart]

Finished.  The LM is more sensitive than the JRC386.  I wonder what different 555s would create.  Almost got it first try, but soldered to the wrong 9v terminal.  Only error so I'm happy.  I think I have enough parts to breadboard so I may try some different values and add a LFO. Does anyone know how to kill the osc bleed?

[slacker]

If you mean bleed when the pedal is bypassed then you can use the stomp switch to ground the wiper of the threshold pot in bypass, this will shut it up.

To do this on yours remove the solid jumper wire on the stomp and instead connect a wire from the bottom middle lug to the wiper of the threshold pot.

[4floorsofwhores]

Hi Taylor. Just finished the uglyface. Great pcb as usual.  :)Added the starve pot
Where can i find the lfo wiring diagram?

Cheers, Matt

[Taylor]

http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=95172.0

Couldn't find a schematic but there are some diagrams in that thread.

[4floorsofwhores]

Fantastic. Thankyou

[4floorsofwhores]

I love this pedal.  Taylor please hurry making some more pcbs (drone synth etc)
Just ordered my second uglyface

[petey twofinger]

just did one of these pcbs this weekend . it was a breeze , thanks for the great pcbs !

[Taylor]

Thanks guys, glad you had fun with it!

[4floorsofwhores]

Just in the middle of building my 5th uglyface from taylor. I love it so much but somehow end up giving them away to friends :/
I've done the starve mod and added lfo. Does anyone have any ideas for more cool mods? i want this one to be a monster

[Puguglybonehead]

After having shelved this one for over a year, I finally finished it. Upon switching it on, I had the same reaction as many. I heard a loud howl and hum and thought, "Man! Another one for the scrapheap." Then I played a couple of notes through it, adjusted a few of the knobs, and realized, "Hey! It's actually working!"

Thanks, Taylor! Great PCB. Fun build and very happy with the results. My first successful pedal build in a while.

Actually, I couldn't unplug this thing for at least 45 minutes after plugging it in, Too much fun! Still need to box it up. Don't know if I've got the guts to do anything as complicated as the Gristleizer  yet, (hell, when I reach that point I'll be able to handle the Sub-Commander) but this thing makes sounds that definitely get you into Throbbing Gristle territory. I'm curious about the Christine now. Any similarity to the Uglyface? I like my discordant noise.

Cheers and thanks for such a nice PCB Taylor!

[Taylor]

Glad you had fun. Gotta give credit to Tim Escobedo for the circuit.

The Christine is pretty different. If you like far out stuff you'll love t, nd there's not much overlap with the Uglyface so it wouldn't be redundant to have both. Never thought of cascading them...