mkstewartesq
Well-known member
So I’ve kind of been on a “transparent overdrive” kick of late. I think that, despite years of trying to convince myself otherwise, light overdrive is just my jam as far as my own personal playing style. So, while I’ve built a lot of higher gain stuff like the Carl Martin Panama, Kraken, Rat, Mayonnaise Fuzz and DS-1, I really use them only very rarely – and I keep most of my pedals that can go from low gain to higher gain (Paisley Drive, SD-1, TS) pretty much set in a low gain position. I recently built a Tim from a Vero layout posted here, and I loved it.
I’d never tried a Bluesbreaker circuit and, since I recently got into breadboarding for the purpose of testing out pedals I had never tried, I decided to build a Morning Glory (using the Glory Hole schematic) as my first real deep dive into breadboarding. To my (and everyone else’s) surprise, it fired right up and, to my even greater surprise, I actually liked the sound – once I dialed the gain back from maximum (I always start at maximum, I’m an uncouth animal) it reminded me a lot of of the Tim but maybe with a touch more dynamics. So when Robert had his most recent sale, I decided to pick up the board for the Glory Hole (as well as the Tommy III, because you can never have too many Timmies).
The build: the build was pretty straightforward. Because I didn’t have any LM833s, I used the same IC that I used when breadboarding - a NE5532 - as some people recommended that to be a suitable replacement. I also saw a post here comparing dual op amps and noted that the slew rate for the NE5532 was pretty close to that of the LM833 (look at me trying to act all smart – I have no fucking clue what a “slew rate” is, but one was 7v, the other was 9v, and that was the smallest difference in numbers between the LM833 and any other chip listed, so let’s gooooo).
The sound: jury is still out for me for a couple of reasons peculiar to me and my build. First of all, as noted, I used a different IC than stated in the BOM. Second, when I built this on breadboard, I was so stoked with adrenaline that my first attempt at a build that used an IC and clipping diodes actually worked (“I have invented FIRE!”), maybe that contributed to me thinking the sound of the pedal was glorious (no pun intended). Lastly, on the breadboard, I didn’t put any knobs on the pots so I really have no clue what I had them set to when I hit that sound that I loved so much.
But anyway. At a high level, it sounds like what I built on the breadboard (which it should, because it’s the same schematic) - I find the sound of the pedal without the hi-cut engaged to be a bit grating but I could see it working in front of a dark amp. With the hi-cut engaged, it’s a bit more manageable although that also seems to take away just a tiny bit of gain.
I think the most surprising thing to me – and again remembering that I didn’t have knobs on the pots on the breadboard to know where everything was set – is how low gain it is overall. I had believed that, to get the sound I liked, I probably had the gain knob set about halfway, but that’s obviously wrong because I need to set it to about 2 o’clock or 3 o’clock to get back in that neighborhood with the PCB build. (I don’t think I have much, if any, gain in the first half of the turn of the knob.) But I don’t think that means anything is wrong with the build – search this forum and other DIY forums and you’ll see lots of people talking about how to mod this pedal to increase the gain, and now I understand why. But I’m actually OK leaving it as it is because I wasn’t looking for a high gain pedal. I just wasn’t expecting to have to crank the gain so much to get to that low gain sweet spot.
Ditto on the tone knob – I thought that on my previous build I had it set at about noon to be pretty neutral. But I actually have to turn the tone knob to around 2 o’clock or more to get what I consider to be a neutral sound because the high cut definitely darkens up the sound more than I remembered.
Tl:dr-I still need to play around with it to dial in the exact sound I liked so much from my breadboard build.
The graphics: nothing special, just my normal film free decals. I wanted something pretty simple and minimalist and that’s basically what I ended up with. It’s kind of a mix of Art Deco and Art Nouveau (which, I have been told, you really aren’t supposed to mix ever, but I’m a rebel, Dottie).
Mike
I’d never tried a Bluesbreaker circuit and, since I recently got into breadboarding for the purpose of testing out pedals I had never tried, I decided to build a Morning Glory (using the Glory Hole schematic) as my first real deep dive into breadboarding. To my (and everyone else’s) surprise, it fired right up and, to my even greater surprise, I actually liked the sound – once I dialed the gain back from maximum (I always start at maximum, I’m an uncouth animal) it reminded me a lot of of the Tim but maybe with a touch more dynamics. So when Robert had his most recent sale, I decided to pick up the board for the Glory Hole (as well as the Tommy III, because you can never have too many Timmies).
The build: the build was pretty straightforward. Because I didn’t have any LM833s, I used the same IC that I used when breadboarding - a NE5532 - as some people recommended that to be a suitable replacement. I also saw a post here comparing dual op amps and noted that the slew rate for the NE5532 was pretty close to that of the LM833 (look at me trying to act all smart – I have no fucking clue what a “slew rate” is, but one was 7v, the other was 9v, and that was the smallest difference in numbers between the LM833 and any other chip listed, so let’s gooooo).
The sound: jury is still out for me for a couple of reasons peculiar to me and my build. First of all, as noted, I used a different IC than stated in the BOM. Second, when I built this on breadboard, I was so stoked with adrenaline that my first attempt at a build that used an IC and clipping diodes actually worked (“I have invented FIRE!”), maybe that contributed to me thinking the sound of the pedal was glorious (no pun intended). Lastly, on the breadboard, I didn’t put any knobs on the pots so I really have no clue what I had them set to when I hit that sound that I loved so much.
But anyway. At a high level, it sounds like what I built on the breadboard (which it should, because it’s the same schematic) - I find the sound of the pedal without the hi-cut engaged to be a bit grating but I could see it working in front of a dark amp. With the hi-cut engaged, it’s a bit more manageable although that also seems to take away just a tiny bit of gain.
I think the most surprising thing to me – and again remembering that I didn’t have knobs on the pots on the breadboard to know where everything was set – is how low gain it is overall. I had believed that, to get the sound I liked, I probably had the gain knob set about halfway, but that’s obviously wrong because I need to set it to about 2 o’clock or 3 o’clock to get back in that neighborhood with the PCB build. (I don’t think I have much, if any, gain in the first half of the turn of the knob.) But I don’t think that means anything is wrong with the build – search this forum and other DIY forums and you’ll see lots of people talking about how to mod this pedal to increase the gain, and now I understand why. But I’m actually OK leaving it as it is because I wasn’t looking for a high gain pedal. I just wasn’t expecting to have to crank the gain so much to get to that low gain sweet spot.
Ditto on the tone knob – I thought that on my previous build I had it set at about noon to be pretty neutral. But I actually have to turn the tone knob to around 2 o’clock or more to get what I consider to be a neutral sound because the high cut definitely darkens up the sound more than I remembered.
Tl:dr-I still need to play around with it to dial in the exact sound I liked so much from my breadboard build.
The graphics: nothing special, just my normal film free decals. I wanted something pretty simple and minimalist and that’s basically what I ended up with. It’s kind of a mix of Art Deco and Art Nouveau (which, I have been told, you really aren’t supposed to mix ever, but I’m a rebel, Dottie).
Mike
Last edited:
