Halp! How Do I Wire Up This 3PDT Board?

[Ginsly]

After spending the last couple months breadboarding, I have a bunch of projects on the docket - mostly pcbs, but some vero as well.

I'm starting with a Peppermint Fuzz, and I thought I had it sorted out pretty well- I had asked about the PNP/battery situation weeks back and that cleared some things up. I didn't really think about any changes to the footswitch wiring, though.

Can someone confirm how this would be wired up using a 3pdt pcb like the ones below? For one thing, there are two Ground connections in this Vero layout, which I'm not used to - one from the power supply area, and one from the Volume pot. I also won't be using a DC Jack, so I'm not exactly sure how the footswitch board works in that situation. I assume I'd still connect Ground+ and -9v from the vero's top left area to the 3pdt pcb, then connect the battery snap to one of the 3pdt board's DC Jack connections as well as the Input jack's ring (to cut off the battery). The Ground connection coming from the Volume pot would likely be connected to the Input or Output jack's sleeve... correct?

Seems like I could also add an LED and CLR on the fs board like I normally would for a vero build, but would need to swap the orientation if I was connecting (+) from the main board to Ground on the fs pcb and (-) from the main board to 9v on the fs pcb. In that case I'd also connect the black battery lead to 9v on the fs pcb's DC Jack area and connect the red lead to the Input jack's ring. Please let me know if this is all wrong!

I also have PPCB footswitch boards with I-Jack/In/Ground/SW/Out/O-Jack if anyone thinks that makes more sense - in that case I'd just leave the LED off. They're set up differently than the ones below, so I'd love to know how to connect those as well.

Thanks for any input - I'm likely overcomplicating this, but it's just different enough from my normal Vero builds (two grounds, reverse polarity, no DC Jack) that I wanted to double check the correct way to do it!

 

[andare]

I only see one ground connection on The board.

Anyway if you’re using a battery, just use - as 9v and + as ground. The number of ground connections doesn't matter, it all goes to the same place. Obviously the LED must still be wired with the anode going to positive and the cathode to negative.

Look up how to wire a battery so it disconnects when the input cable is not in. I would also suggest you add a small toggle switch there so you can leave the pedal plugged in and still disconnect the battery.

You might wanna consider building a voltage inverter board with Vero. That way you can wire the switch and led normally and you can also add a DC jack later on.

 

[DeadAirMD]

I love using those blue 3pdt boards and I have a ton of them. PPCB boards are very easy to hook up to PPCB boards, they blue boards make it a little easier to hook up to anything else.

Definitely recommend making a voltage inverter board.

 

[Ginsly]

I only see one ground connection on The board.

One comes from the power section on the Vero (top left) and one comes from the Volume pot.

Look up how to wire a battery so it disconnects when the input cable is not in.

Yep I use stereo Input jacks for that reason.

PPCB boards are very easy to hook up to PPCB boards, they blue boards make it a little easier to hook up to anything else.

This is kind of what I figured - thanks for clarifying! Those blue boards have been excellent - got em with some surprisingly good, relatively inexpensive 3PDT switches on Amazon, of all places. Wish I could get em by themselves.

Definitely recommend making a voltage inverter board.

I think this is a good idea and I'll certainly do it when possible, but there are some situations where I'm already cramming a lot into an enclosure (esp with a battery). One of those layouts uses an NE555 and the smaller one uses a typical 7660-type chip - other than space, any reason to choose one over the other?

So if I DID just keep this PNP, battery-only (with stereo input jack), and used the blue 3pdt daughterboard - how would the off-board wiring look?

 

[Stickman393]

Good questions.

On your blue Amazon boards, you will need to flip around the positive and negative terminals.

Your negative battery terminal will connect to your + blue PCB connection.

Your positive will be connected to the "ring" terminal on your stereo input jack.

Then you will run a wire from the sleeve of your input jack to a ground terminal on your blue PCB. You don't need to use the (-) connection for this: the ground input connection will work just fine.

Also, flip your LED around for this setup. Anode goes to -, cathode goes to to +.

Everything else is normal, with the understanding that the positives and negatives on the PCB are inverted.

The stereo jack will disconnect the "ground" point of your battery from the pedal when the input cable is disconnected when wired this way. This will save your batteries when not using the pedal.

Ground is...ah...well. Its a reference point. It's a "starting" point from which we measure a difference. That difference can be positive (holey) or negative (unholey). Doesn't really matter. Nothing about ground is inherently positive or negative: it's just a point.

Like...pressure. One PSI on a gauge is measured as one PSI *from atmospheric pressure* in the "positive" or "increasing pressure" direction. -1 PSI is also one PSI from atmospheric pressure, just in the negative direction.

Voltage is often described as being a kind of "electrical pressure", and the same concepts apply here. Batteries and power supplies are simply generators of a difference in "electrical pressure". If you tie the positive side to ground, it creates a voltage that is "negative" as compared to ground. If you connect the negative side to ground, vice versa.

 

[Ginsly]

On your blue Amazon boards, you will need to flip around the positive and negative terminals.

Gotcha, thank you! So Ground+ from the Vero goes to "9v" at the top of the blue 3pdt board, and -9v goes to "Ground" in that area. Then the black battery lead goes to "9v" in the DC Jack section of the blue board and red battery lead goes to Input Jack ring. Excellent!

Then you will run a wire from the sleeve of your input jack to a ground terminal on your blue PCB. You don't need to use the (-) connection for this: the ground input connection will work just fine.

I always use the provided pads on the blue boards (top left and top right) for both tip and sleeve jack connections, so sounds like I should just connect those as usual.

I assume the best place to connect "Volume 1 To Ground" is the sleeve of either jack? Meaning that one jack will have TWO ground wires attached - one to Vol Lug 1 and one to a "Jack Sleeve" pad.

Also, flip your LED around for this setup. Anode goes to -, cathode goes to to +.

Thanks for clarifying that - I kinda figured if I was flipping everything on the 3pdt board then this would follow suit as well.

And thanks for the taking a sec to mention the whole concept of "Ground" within circuits - it can get a little confusing sometimes! For a while I just assumed anything marked "Ground" connected to Earth like a power supply... It's good to know that it's more of a "these things are all connected, but certainly not to power" situation sometimes.

Much appreciated, this really helps! And thanks to @andare and @DeadAirMD as well, it's good to know that inverters are pretty simple to integrate.

 

[Stickman393]

Gotcha, thank you! So Ground+ from the Vero goes to "9v" at the top of the blue 3pdt board, and -9v goes to "Ground" in that area. Then the black battery lead goes to "9v" in the DC Jack section of the blue board and red battery lead goes to Input Jack ring. Excellent!

The way I'm describing here, "ground+" from your Vero would be connected to "ground" or "-" on your blue board. "-9v" would be connected to "9v".

I wasnt super clear there. My bad.

Reason being: the blue board is labeled assuming the circuit you're using will be negative ground. This isn't the case here. Honestly, for this circuit, I would ignore any positive or negative marks on the blue board.

I always use the provided pads on the blue boards (top left and top right) for both tip and sleeve jack connections, so sounds like I should just connect those as usual.

I assume the best place to connect "Volume 1 To Ground" is the sleeve of either jack? Meaning that one jack will have TWO ground wires attached - one to Vol Lug 1 and one to a "Jack Sleeve" pad.

Ground from the volume pot can be attached at any ground point, be it on the vero, the jack, the board, etc. Just don't run two ground wires to different points. That's how you get a ground loop.

Thanks for clarifying that - I kinda figured if I was flipping everything on the 3pdt board then this would follow suit as well.

And thanks for the taking a sec to mention the whole concept of "Ground" within circuits - it can get a little confusing sometimes! For a while I just assumed anything marked "Ground" connected to Earth like a power supply... It's good to know that it's more of a "these things are all connected, but certainly not to power" situation sometimes.

Not all grounds are earth grounds. But all earth grounds are grounds. Sometimes you have a "floating" ground, often times you don't wanna connect discreet grounds between circuits. This is why we generally don't recommend using the same PSU for pedals that have positive and negative grounds.

Much appreciated, this really helps! And thanks to @andare and @DeadAirMD as well, it's good to know that inverters are pretty simple to integrate.

 

[Ginsly]

The way I'm describing here, "ground+" from your Vero would be connected to "ground" or "-" on your blue board. "-9v" would be connected to "9v".

Yeesh my bad - so between the main pcb and daughterboard, "Ground" still connects to "Ground" and 9v to 9v, which does indeed flip the polarity like you had indicated. Of course, doing this also counts on connecting the Black battery lead to "9v" in the power section of the daughterboard - I have to keep that in mind. Plus the LED flip.

Ground from the volume pot can be attached at any ground point, be it on the vero, the jack, the board, etc. Just don't run two ground wires to different points. That's how you get a ground loop.

Huh. So ground loops within a pedal are really a thing? I've read SO many conflicting things about this. It sounds like you're saying that a ground loop would only be a risk if I, for instance, ran two ground wires from Vol Lug 1 to both the Input and Output sleeves, or to one jack sleeve and a ground point on either pcb. I've never considered doing that, but it's really good to know that it could introduce noise!

 

[Stickman393]

Yeesh my bad - so between the main pcb and daughterboard, "Ground" still connects to "Ground" and 9v to 9v, which does indeed flip the polarity like you had indicated. Of course, doing this also counts on connecting the Black battery lead to "9v" in the power section of the daughterboard - I have to keep that in mind. Plus the LED flip.

Sounds good to me!

Huh. So ground loops within a pedal are really a thing? I've read SO many conflicting things about this. It sounds like you're saying that a ground loop would only be a risk if I, for instance, ran two ground wires from Vol Lug 1 to both the Input and Output sleeves, or to one jack sleeve and a ground point on either pcb. I've never considered doing that, but it's really good to know that it could introduce noise!

One can always introduce ground loops into a circuit. You just need to make multiple paths of differing resistance between the same points in the ground plane. Super easy to do by accident.