SOLVED Blue Shoe debugging

[untamedfrontier]

Hey gang, I was looking to see if anyone could help troubleshoot this one for me, as I'm pulling my hair out trying to figure out where i've gone wrong.

So typical issue, it passes sound until engaged, then nothing. LED is wired the right way, and solder joints are decent. My biggest question is whether or not i'm even debugging this properly. I've hooked it up to a known good EHX 9v adapter and have my multimeter set to the 9v setting. With that I'm getting voltage to a good portion of the components. All IC's, diodes, and J201s are getting voltage.

I've Attached a screenshot of the circuit with this legend. Red means it's getting what I believe to be an acceptable amount of voltage (it's ranging from 4-15v on the multimeter), yellow is a voltage that looks suspect, and no marking means it's not getting any reading on the MM. (I did replace R1 with a tested 1M resistor, no change).

I did substitute some resistors, of which were:
2k2 for 2k7 (R17)
2k2 for 3k3 (R6, R10)
100k for 120k (R18)
10k for 12k (R21, R22)
I didn't figure these would have made that much of a difference, but without the schematic, I could be horribly wrong

Thanks in advance!!

 

[Nostradoomus]

Are your j201s from a reputable source? Did you bias them?

 

[Chuck D. Bones]

I'm gonna wait for a schematic to show up...

 

[untamedfrontier]

Are your j201s from a reputable source? Did you bias them?

These were from mouser, and I did not bias them (never have before/don't know how - is this madbean thread a good resource on how to? https://www.madbeanpedals.com/forum/index.php?topic=915.0 ).

 

[Barry]

These were from mouser, and I did not bias them (never have before/don't know how - is this madbean thread a good resource on how to? https://www.madbeanpedals.com/forum/index.php?topic=915.0 ).

That explains it pretty good

 

[Nostradoomus]

Yeah you may be looking for 9v on them if the 1044 is a voltage doubler as opposed to the usual 4.5v

 

[music6000]

These were from mouser, and I did not bias them (never have before/don't know how - is this madbean thread a good resource on how to? https://www.madbeanpedals.com/forum/index.php?topic=915.0 ).

As suggested above, If you see a Trimmer parked Under, Over to a Jfet Transistor with no Title ie Hi, Lo, Tone, you will need to adjust to get Sound out of it. With Black probe to Ground & Red probe to Drain, with this running @17 to 18v, Adjust trimmer to 8.5 To 9v, 8.75v Happy Medium!
Repeat again as one adjustment effects the others.
Hopefully, It should come alive!!!

 

[untamedfrontier]

Ok! Update time!

We have power! We have signal! It is a glorious day!

Biasing the JFET was definitely one of the things that helped me get to success, and the other one was that I was 100% wrong about my LED wiring. My ego didn't want me to admit it publicly that I messed up something so simple, but maybe others are having the same issue, and following this article really helped: PedalPCB - LED polarity

Thank you to everyone who chimed in to offer suggestions, I really appreciate it. My dark night of the soul is over.

 

[Chuck D. Bones]

If a board has trimpots, you had better know what they do if you want the pedal to work. Some pedal circuits require the trimpots to be set before the circuit will function properly.
It would be a good idea if the Build Docs provided guidance on setting the trimpots. Some do, but not the BSGP.
Read the Troubleshooting forum, the Backwards LED Club has a large membership.

 

[MightySmallElectrons]

It ain’t polite but “stick the long lead in the a-hole” is easy for me to remember.

 

[untamedfrontier]

It ain’t polite but “stick the long lead in the a-hole” is easy for me to remember.

Gonna be hard to forget that one! ?

 

[Ratimus]

It ain’t polite but “stick the long lead in the a-hole” is easy for me to remember.

Curious to hear how you remember the resistor color code...