Passinwind

On to v4 of my open source hybrid filter preamp pedal:

It's actually meant for desktop duty rather than being an on the floor pedal, and the HPF function is always-on with the rest being bypassable via switch. The next one will use the switch for muting the whole pedal instead.

On 29/12/2022 at 15:40, tauzero said:

 

Are there no DIP equivalents? I'm incompetent enough at soldering .1" spacing (I probably bridge strips 10% of the time), I'd have no chance with spacing half that.

As a followup, out of the blue I found someone who's keen on doing through-hole PCB layouts for some of my designs and sharing them freely. I've built up five different standalone HPF versions recently and am just waiting on some new PCBs to show up in the next day or two to try a few more design swerves.

Meanwhile, feature creep never sleeps:

9 hours ago, KingBollock said:

I like to socket ICs, so I had a quick look to see if it is possible to socket SMD ICs, and it is. It’s possible to convert SMD to DIP. I was kind of hoping that there was a way of making using SMD ICs easier, maybe some kind of clamp system, or something. I don’t know. I have never used SMD stuff before, I don’t think. But, anyway, at least it appears that I can use SMD ICs (I don’t know about other components, I didn’t look) on vero-board.

 

I have narrow soldering iron tips. One comes to a 1mm wide flat tip and another comes to a point. So I should be alright there.

 

I’m a bit of a dinosaur with this stuff. Most of my electronics experience comes from college (including work placements) from 1991 to 1993. And I’ve forgotten most of it.

As with so many things, it just takes a bit of practice and technique refinement and then the larger format SMT parts are not that big of a deal, IMO and IME. I've gotten my own SO-8 to Dip converter boards made up but thankfully I rarely need to use them these days. There are perfectly decent DIP opamps readily available, and if "close enough" is one's style that's that. I find no joy there, but I've been at this a very very long time and need a progressively bigger hit to justify even bothering by now. 😉

4 hours ago, tauzero said:

 

Are there no DIP equivalents? 

Nope, not really, and DIP format opamps are already mostly a legacy thing by now. But there are still decent enough DIP alternatives, just not true equivalents as I see it. I went with the biggest practical SMD resistor size, 1206, and the biggest of the common SMD opamp sizes, SOIC-8. The DIP-8 opamps I'd typically recommend are crazy expensive, and as with many others have pretty much gone missing for the last few years.

Lots of people just blob solder SMD opamps and fix the bridging with solder braid, IME the main thing is just to use a small enough soldering iron tip. I'm nearly 70 and I can still do this stuff without using a magnifier,  but I can certainly stil relate to wanting to keep it simple!

But in any case, it's an open source design and I'd be more than happy to see someone take on a stripboard layout, it just won't be me. 😉

1 hour ago, disssa said:

I traced a lot of Broughton Pedals. I noticed that well-known circuits have been modified a little bit. Not more. I traced also a lot of other pedals. Most pedals are based on well-known circuits. I build the pedals for myself. I also don't publish schematics from traced pedals. At most from pedals that are only a 1:1 copy themselves.

Yeah, although I very rarely trace anything or do overt clones I still find I end up reinventing the wheel with standard issue cookbook circuits quite a bit of the time.

23 hours ago, KingBollock said:

I am very interested in this. I’ve been wanting to build a HPF for ages. I have put together some pedals, but I am not part of a community, so I don’t know if it’s proper to ask this, but… Will there be a circuit diagram or, even better, a diagram for building it on strip-board?

 

I prefer using strip-board. I don’t know why but it feels like using a PCB is like a Lego kit compared to a strip-board Airfix kit (point to point would be like scratch-building, I suppose). And I don’t mean that in anyway derogatorily, it’s more that Lego kits cost more. I’ve seen some very cool Lego kits but I have also seen the prices!

Yes, all my open source projects provide a schematic and an easy way to buy printed circuit boards from a premier US vendor. In this case three boards would cost about $10 USD with shipping included to virtually anywhere in the world. I have no commercial involvement with that, I just share the PCB layout to the vendor's extensive free share list, the end user clicks "buy", and the boards ship about ten days later, typically. There's also a bill of materials on share at Mouser.com, again meant to speed up the ordering process considerably. I have friends in the UK and various other countries who may be able to help with parts sourcing over there, but this is just too much for me to take on myself at this point.

Strip board is not a great option in this case because all the the preferred opamps are surface mount format. Additionally, I feel that if you want the DIY experience of using stripboard you might as well DIY the layout yourself too. And it would make more work on my side, because I don't use breadboards, stripboards, or anything else but PCBs very often at all, even for prototyping. But many of my friends in the DIY community want to build now, today.  Nothing at all wrong with that, and as long as people properly credit the design source I have no objections to anything they do non- or semi-commercially. 😉

For the moment I'm using Talkbass as the repository for this stuff, but when I retire in a few months and move on to other things I will probably put it on Github or somewhere similar where I won't need to babysit it. Here's the TB link: https://www.talkbass.com/wiki/pw3b-lpf-open-source-onboard-preamp/

The new HPF design will be going live any day now, I'm just vetting a few options for use with other instruments by this point. Pedals are kind of a new diversion for me, so I welcome any and all input into what I can do to better help DIYers. This is the current format of the HPF board, which is probably going to be more or less the final version:

BTW, I'm pretty sure there's at least one stripboard layout out there for the Fdeck v2, which is optimized more for upright bass and is "only" second order, but still works fine for bass guitar as well. Francis Deck posts schematics for many of his designs on his own website as well. Hope this helps!

18 minutes ago, LukeFRC said:

Oh I agree, but for every supportive collaborative open source friendly bit of the internet and forums, you also get the other side.

 

Certainly true, but Josh Broughton at least used to contribute a lot of DIY oriented content over there.

Always on fixed frequency 4th order high pass filter prototype:

Coming soon to my open source utility EFX library. Might have to reconfigure the PCB a little for a variable one in the 1590A box, but I'm sure that could be done.

Fdeck told me he has a spiffy new one coming out soon as well, which will also be fully open source.

16 hours ago, LukeFRC said:

Normally I get a notification of replies in this thread and equivalent on talkbass - so when the house of disssa posts something I see it twice 

this however, perhaps wisely given the fanaticism, has not appeared on TB

Making non commercial pedal clones for yourself shouldn't really matter a whit to anyone IMO. There's a huge DIY clone building culture these days, think a few heads would explode over this for instance: https://www.pedalpcb.com/product/pcb553/  ? 😉

1 hour ago, Mottlefeeder said:

The mini Vong may only be 12dB/octave but the HPF/LPF Vong has a 12dB/octave 30Hz filter followed by a 12dB/octave variable filter, bringing you closer to the thumpinator 36dB/octave.

There is also the FDeck HPF where the current generation are also 12dB fixed + 12dB variable. There is a tried and tested veroboard layout for this on a DIY pedals site.

 <http://guitar-fx-layouts.42897.x6.nabble.com/F-deck-HPF-Series-3-td44880.html

If you have a builder available that would be an option.

David

Fdeck has a very cool new one coming out "soon." He told me it'll be open source eventually, but he's a busy guy and I have no idea how long it'll take for that to eventuate. In the past he's avoided shipping to Europe, FWIW.

My new open source one is in final testing right now too, and I've been working on setting up a few builders in the UK and elsewhere across the pond to service those who can't or won't build their own. As usual, I have nothing to sell and no interest in going that direction myself. 😉

Also, I've seen postings in a few other forums saying Schallertechnik is no longer in business? Might want to grab the Vongs while they're still available...

I'd gladly pay at least $5K for the right upright -- if I had gigs lined up to pay that off in a year or less.

OTOH, I doubt I'd spend even $100 on a new bass guitar of any kind at this time.

9 minutes ago, Huge Hands said:

I have seen a few people say this over the years but I always found the stand on my NXT to be quite sturdy and often used to pivot it on one tripod leg while playing.  Not as free as a endpin on a DB, but enough to have fun with - then much easier and quicker when you want to put it down and pick up your bass guitar!

Interesting, I have have never seen that. Putting my BSX back in its stand takes about three seconds, it never was  an issue at all in my case where in the very rare cases where I doubled bass changes always happened on a set break.

7 hours ago, Happy Jack said:

Genuinely don't think that any NS will cut it at a country/americana gig. Not only is the sound almost guaranteed to be "too modern" but far more importantly the LOOK is all wrong. 

Country and Americana mean really different things here by now, I almost never see a real upright in country bands. The Johhny Cash-alike guy I used to gig with for a year or two with had an Epiphone Flying V 5 string at his place and would have loved for me to play it at shows. No problem at all with my Travis Bean or BSX EUB, or bass solos on several tunes a night. The Bluegrass Mafia were and still are a very different story though! 😉

As far as the WAV, fixed stands are a complete deal breaker for me, I just can't be anchored in one playing postion like that for any length of time without serious discomfort.

8 hours ago, PaulWarning said:

the music we hear in our teens stays with us forever

I hear this quite often, but not so much in my case, and I am in my 70th orbit. The Beatles might have been in my top 20 or 30 favorites at age 15, but by 18 I had had enough already. 

26 minutes ago, Dad3353 said:

Maybe it's just me, but I really don't 'get' this stuff about what other folk think of X, Y or Z. We're all different, of differing ages, from different backgrounds, and have listened to, and liked or not, different stuff over the decades. What earthly point is there in this sort of comparing, or looking in the rear-view mirror..? Maybe it's just me. 

Not just you. I've gone for a decade never listening to any rock music on purpose at one point, grown tired of favorites in many genres, and then eventually reset to just randomly enjoying random randomness, except when I don't. 

On 21/11/2022 at 03:59, Bassman68 said:

How about amps with phantom power for pedals or active basses?
I seem to recall a manufacturer did this year’s ago but can’t remember who?

EBS, for one. Not phantom though IIRC, rather a dedicated third conductor.

On 16/11/2022 at 12:59, Jonesy said:

Anyone - release a decent unmarked fretless for about 600ish and don't make it a burst jazz with no scratch plate.

Right with you there on the rest, but no scratch plate or other plastic bits on anything ever please.

2 hours ago, Chienmortbb said:

A lot too high IMHO, but my friend @Passinwindmay disagree.

That would depend a good bit on how they spec their frequency response curves. Is 10K the peak, the 3dB down point, or the mid point at full boost? And what is the peaking frequency at 1/4 boost, the most many of us would probably use? And then the other end of the graph might be more important to many of us, where do we start hearing that control acting? I personally don't want to hear a lot of/any  1K just from boosting my treble control, but a +3dB point well below that is not uncommon in some popular designs.  I've built good sounding EQs for bass that peak at 30KHz and others that peak at 3K, as @Sparky Marksays the bandwidth matters a lot too. 😉

1 minute ago, BassmanPaul said:

Hey Charlie, always nice to hear from you.   I guess we all have our own preferences in amplification. The huge disappointment  I felt the first night I used the Bassman affected me for life. I couldn't get the amp back to the store fast enough. 

 

I replaced it with a Marshall 4x12 driven by a Leak TL50+ power amp and I built a single tube preamp that derived its power from the pre-amp socket on the leak. it was far far better.

I remember that story Paul. The old Fender cabs get no love from me, certrianly. And I've always loved tubes for guitar but rarely all that much for bass. That's just for my own playing though, not for others. I've heard all kinds of gear I don't like playing through work great for others, wouldn't have it any other way really. 😉

On 08/11/2022 at 10:04, BassmanPaul said:

I'll agree with you Bill. An Ampeg b15 is magical1 I always get a happy smile when I play through mine.  

 

Speaker wise I tried a JBL 2225 in mine that I happened to have. It was nice but the original square back driver the amp came with had something more. It's what's in there now.

My tastes are notoriously out there, but the B-15 is easily my least favorite bass amp ever, go figure. When I sold mine I ported to unamplified upright bass for as time because I thought all bass amps were that lame.  I'd take a Bassman 50 any day over that, at least it would be nice for guitar. But with the right mods and a modern speaker it could be a lot nicer for low volume bass for sure.

Most I've ever owned is right now, 4 basses and one guitar. Looking to cut that down though.

17 hours ago, Kiwi said:

Can you put it aside until the OP gets back to you?

 

Salem?

Other way, near Hood River OR on the WA side of the Columbia River.

33 minutes ago, Rich said:

I love the total and utter randomness of it  

It's a pretty wacky sounding widget as well, I definitely enjoyed mine.

16 hours ago, LukeFRC said:

Anyone bought anything from pedalpcb - have you got stung with import fees? 

Not an issue for me obviously, but there's a very good chance they'll be offering their own version of my latest design on their website sooner than later.

Dynamics

Dynamics

Dynamics