SOLVED El Sol Fuzzy/Unintentional Gating Issue

[VanWhy]

I finished the El Sol Distortion and I am getting this gated thing going. Everything works, LED, bypass. Thing cranks. But, when I hit a note, it gives this fuzzy gated thing for a second or 2 then stops. It's actually kind of cool but not what I was looking to achieve. Could this be something with one of the IC's? Only thing I can think of is I bent one of the IC leads a little putting it in so I had to finesse it in the socket.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Coda]

Any substituted parts?…

 

[VanWhy]

Any substituted parts?…

Nah, I tried to stay close as I could to the values in the build doc.

 

[jhaneyzz]

Jeez... not a lot of potential culprits on that board. Kind of comically low part count... do yo have spare ICs to swap in?

 

[KR Sound]

I’d check for some frayed wires underneath that may be touching.

 

[jhaneyzz]

Do you have an audio probe?

 

[VanWhy]

Jeez... not a lot of potential culprits on that board. Kind of comically low part count... do yo have spare ICs to swap in?

I do. I'm leaning towards that anyway so that is good advise. I will do some swapping there and follow back up. Thanks

 

[VanWhy]

Do you have an audio probe?

I don't but I'm guessing I should get one. I'm going to have to do some Googling on what to get there.

 

[DGWVI]

Do you have any other LM386s- particularly of the N3 variety?

Or, JRC386s?

It's been a while since I've built an Acapulco, but I do recall it being somewhat sensitive to the particular flavor of 386 used

 

[jhaneyzz]

I don't but I'm guessing I should get one. I'm going to have to do some Googling on what to get there.

You can easily make one. That's what I did.

Build an Audio Probe - Diagnose Problems

Audio Probe This is very simple yet very useful tool for debugging new pedals. You need one 1/4″ mono plug, one 100nF capacitor, all...

guitarpedalbuilders.blogspot.com

 

[VanWhy]

Well, 6 months later I finally swapped one of the IC's and it's working perfect now. Finally dug it out after I got a bunch of LM386-1's in. Loud and proud