how can i get more volume from my blue breaker?

e_man_89

Member
volume dimed with the gain and tone at 11 o'clock sounds great to me! i am really diggin' it's clarity. i just wish it would jump out a little more when i step on it.
i can increase gain and it helps, but i like the edge of breakup sound it gives my les paul.

is there a component change i could make to increase the output?
 
You can do like the JHS Morning Glory and just stick an LPB-1 right before the Volume pot. It’s something like 4 components. Maybe you could rig something up?
 
If you like the Bluesbreaker you might want to try a Pro-10 Blue. It's Browne's take on the Bluesbreaker and I think they nailed it. It has more level, more grunt, more low end and even better clarity. I'm seriously impressed - I like it way better than the King of Tone or the Morning Glory. It uses a TL071 to add an extra stage of level it seems.

The Bluesbreaker is renowned for not having a lot of level to push your amp.
 
I know this isn’t what you are asking about exactly but I used to run my straight blues breaker clone with an EP booster after it (with an order switch) and it sounded awesome. Something to consider.

@HamishR - cool to hear this about the blue pro-10. I have had this PCB sitting around for ages and completely forgot about it. I’m looking forward to getting it built up.
 
I'm no genius but if you are just looking for a little bit "more", wouldn't tweaking R9 interact with the Volume control to eek out a few more percentage points of signal? Also, tweaking R8 might eek out some more signal as well.

Capture.PNG

In stock form, the voltage divider formed by R8/Tone and R9/Volume are already allowing a damn good amount of the input signal to get through. By my calculations, R8/Tone, with Tone at maximum bleeds of 4% or so of the input signal while R9/Volume lops off another 7% or so. Not a huge deal but if you just need a touch "more", they might do it.

For instance, if we assume Tone set at 50% or Noon, and Volume set to 60% or 1:00, R8/Tone is stealing about 7% of the input signal and R9/Volume is stealing around 11%.

Let's say we tweak R9 to 4.7k while keeping Volume at 60% or 1:00. That gets us back about 3% more signal at those settings. 3.9k gets us back another 1%. Now, that doesnt take into consideration any changes that would need to be made to C8 for any frequency based compensations but it's a start.

R8 is already a pretty small resistor so that may not be the ideal place to tweak.

Maybe a good idea would be to use a 1k limiting resistor, a PedalPCB "Trimit" board, and a 5k trimmer for R9. 1k would allow ~ 98% of signal flowing to R9 to pass while the trimmer up full is just below the 6.8k stock value.

I could be way off here, as i sometimes am when interpreting voltage dividers.
 
Thanks everyone for your recommendations. Big Monk, that was a pretty deep dive there dude, you just might be a genius...

I found some recommendations for modding a blues breaker circuit over at General Guitar Gadgets. To get "slightly more gain", gain they recommend increasing what I'm pretty sure is R7 on the Blue Breaker schematic, from 220k to 330k.

Does anyone have an opinion on that?
 
Thanks everyone for your recommendations. Big Monk, that was a pretty deep dive there dude, you just might be a genius...

I found some recommendations for modding a blues breaker circuit over at General Guitar Gadgets. To get "slightly more gain", gain they recommend increasing what I'm pretty sure is R7 on the Blue Breaker schematic, from 220k to 330k.

Does anyone have an opinion on that?

Are you looking to increase gain or volume?
 
Yeah I thought about that after I posted.

I really just want more volume. It's the clear, light break up sound that I'm liking.

With the gain @ 11 o'clock and the volume maxed it just does come up a little from unity when engaged.

I can get louder by turning up the gain, but I start moving away from the sound I'm after.

I guess gain isn't what I'm after.
 
I know this isn’t what you are asking about exactly but I used to run my straight blues breaker clone with an EP booster after it (with an order switch) and it sounded awesome. Something to consider.

@HamishR - cool to hear this about the blue pro-10. I have had this PCB sitting around for ages and completely forgot about it. I’m looking forward to getting it built up.
I just finished a simple LPB1 circuit on perf board today. That SOB is noisy as all get out when I run it In front of some of my other pedals.

Alone between my guitar and my amp, it's all quiet. I think I remember reading about some diy pedals not getting along with some pedals with buffers. Might be what it is.

I wonder if I could do something to help that trouble...
 
Yeah I thought about that after I posted.

I really just want more volume. It's the clear, light break up sound that I'm liking.

With the gain @ 11 o'clock and the volume maxed it just does come up a little from unity when engaged.

I can get louder by turning up the gain, but I start moving away from the sound I'm after.

I guess gain isn't what I'm after.

I think lowering R9 might help.

Although I’m surprised you have to put the volume up that much and barely get unity.
 
Perhaps swapping the clipping diodes for LEDs would give you a bit more output volume and let you up the gain knob a bit to get back to that same edge-of-breakup sweet spot?
 
I think lowering R9 might help.

Although I’m surprised you have to put the volume up that much and barely get unity.
Yeah, I was a little surprised too. May be I'm expecting a little much. I think running the gain as low as I am is the issue. I may just get used to it.

I really like the build. I was stuck in tube screamer land and needed something fresh.

This build your own stuff is great for me. Minimal cost (compared to buying new), and I get a lot of satisfaction from the build process. (Although my dream fuzz build has still got some bugs.)

I greatly appreciate the community here. You guys are kind and generous with your time and knowledge.

Thank you.
 
Perhaps swapping the clipping diodes for LEDs would give you a bit more output volume and let you up the gain knob a bit to get back to that same edge-of-breakup sweet spot?
I like the way you think mdc...

I got a bunch of led's. Do the colors have different values?
 
Yeah, I was a little surprised too. May be I'm expecting a little much. I think running the gain as low as I am is the issue. I may just get used to it.

I really like the build. I was stuck in tube screamer land and needed something fresh.

This build your own stuff is great for me. Minimal cost (compared to buying new), and I get a lot of satisfaction from the build process. (Although my dream fuzz build has still got some bugs.)

I greatly appreciate the community here. You guys are kind and generous with your time and knowledge.

Thank you.

If you like the Bluesbreaker, you’ll LOVE the Paragon Mini.
 
Cool idea spi, that can bring some good insight and experience to the discussion.

I will be VERY interested in the results.
 
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Joining in on a necrothread - I'm finding that every bluesbreaker variant that doesn't have some sort of post booster struggles to make unity unless it's fairly dimed. Built a couple of BBs from various vendors, and 5 paragon minis so far...
 
While I love LED-clipping, if you're after similar tone to stock, then I suggest doubling up on the stock diodes instead of switching to LEDs:


1703680458308.png Graphic from CODA Effects
 
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