What’s on *YOUR* workbench?

Big Monk said:
Best thing I ever did, in my opinion, was finally getting rid of offboard wiring.

I love putting pedals together so much more now.

I think I procrastinated on putting batches together because I’d always get to a point where I needed to do 20 batches of wires prep and my head would explode.
Click to expand...
I feel like board mounted jacks and stomp switches are such an easy point of failure from the stress. Might just be me over thinking it.
 
Big Monk said:
Is your concern over replacement?

I personally use utility boards. Jacks are on their own board, header mounted. Same with the stomp switch.
Click to expand...
I think over time the movement could wreak havic on solder joints. Like is commonly seen with fender jacks on the blues jrs etc.

On their own board is good. I feel like a hand wired jack could last forever. But perhaps its like the engine that can go for 1 million miles, everytjing else has crumbled on the vehicle by then so does it matter?
 
Locrian99 said:
I feel like board mounted jacks and stomp switches are such an easy point of failure from the stress. Might just be me over thinking it.
Click to expand...
With dual-layer (or more) boards with plated through holes, this is much less of a concern than back in the days of single layer, "easy-peel" boards. Like the ones on many Fender amps ^
 
Big Monk said:
What movement? The joints are at headers and flexible. They are not board mounted directly.

Here’s a picture of what I do:

View attachment 76791
Click to expand...
I suppose if the board isnt secured it coukd just move with the jack. Nut gets a little loose, someone steps on a plug etc. In general i think wired would be sturdier. If the board is free to move though it wouldnt be thr same as the blues jr jacks.
 
JTEX said:
On a good dual layer PCB, the jack will break into pieces before you can yank it off the board. Been there, done that...
Click to expand...
I guess ive seen board mounted jacks go bad after 20 years of use and the fail is cracked solder joints. Jack is fine. And its still connected. When ive done cap jobs on blues jrs, hrds etc i always just put a wired jack in while ive got the board out. Yes these are on a cheap blues jr pcb but always made me wary of the idea.
 
I finished up installing those bias and power supply circuit boards in that old shop amp. Next step is swapping out the OT to a Deluxe Reverb type. This is a trainwreck Liverpool preamp fed to a Plexi 6V6 power amp. It needs a little tone shaping, but I like it.

Here’s a little testing after the replacements.

 
Finally boxed up this Doomstick II. The used a different cloth covered wire than I have previously and it frays something terrible. It all works though.

Tried vinyl stickers for the first time. I need to round the corners next time, but they are a PITA to apply. Cool color, but suck to apply and every defect in the enclosure shows up.

Mine uses some lower gain transistors. I tried 2N3904’s and the ones I have in it and didn’t hear much difference. I hit unity gain at noon on the knob and it really doesn’t get too much louder (2-3dB). I’m sure I probably have something wired wrong as I expected it to be really loud, but it still sounds cool, cleans up nicely, and I ain’t tearing it apart to fix anything.

IMG_4389.jpeg IMG_4390.jpeg
 
Last edited:
Decided I would be more effective and finish up two pedals at once (I've noticed populating multiple boards at once gets it done faster per board). Everything went otherwise ok, but since I didn't realize it's also something I need to pay attention to, I boxed them in the wrong enclosures at first. Had to desolder the DC jacks to fix it, and take everything off, but it wasn't a huge hassle, thankfully.

As for the pedals themselves, at first try I really love the Blue Sheep! I think I see what the hype is for the BD-2, although this is obviously slightly different from that. As for the Antithesis, I wasn't blown away yet, but I have to experiment with the clipping diode a little too before I can say
anything definite.
DSC_3315.JPG

Edit: Right, the silicon version doesn't have the extra clipping diode so it is as it should be right now. Maybe I'll just need to delve in deeper - or maybe I just don't like Catalinbread pedals that much personally, I'm also sorta mixed on the Katzenkönig clone I built. I would even maybe add the Carcosa to that lot, although it's by a different pedal company - but it sort of feels similar to me, sound and noise wise? There must be something I'm not getting about them, either that or they're just not for me.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top