What's in the mailbox? 📬 📦

I have to thank Aion's board dump last week for making a Fuzz Dog purchase (Warp Sound).

These packages would be much cheaper if I had some sort of grasp on the insane amount of boards available and buy them in batches. Now I just end up with 4 or maybe 6 boards per purchase (not counting utility /tool boards), but soon enough there''ll another one that I wasn't aware of... 🙈

Never heard of Throbbing Gristle's pedal before! I felt ashamed and was in a hurry to get it! Another concentric build, for sure, with lots of switches!

The Warp Sounds are going to be boxed with two of PedalPCB's Mesmerizer (Catalinbread Pareidolia) for a hazy psychedelic dual-gang 6-knobber.

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This one is built about 30 minutes away from where I live!, It was created in 2014!
Arrived today, Cool sounding Germanium Clean Booster withe a toggle switch that gets you into a nice gritty sound!
This is a limited run with Black enclosure & a slightly hotter OC39 than their standard build.
Anarchy Audio Gold Class Overdrive:

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This one is built about 30 minutes away from where I live!, It was created in 2014!
Arrived today,
Cool sounding Germanium Clean Booster withe a toggle switch that gets you into a nice gritty sound!
This is a limited run with Black enclosure & a slightly hotter OC39 than their standard build.
Anarchy Audio Gold Class Overdrive:

View attachment 78535

A DECADE! 🙀

That's a LLLLLLLLONNNNNGGGGG time to wait for a pedal.
 
a big thanks to @hifitown for sending some sets of the now-notorious WE diodes as well as a selection of some really awesome looking WE transistors that I’m quite looking forward to trying out. Especially appreciate the effort put into giving the measurements for each one. I think a lot of y’all were a bit harsh on him, which is a shame— I, like most of you here, don’t buy into mojo or whatever else you want to call it, but I’m not opposed to trying things out in the sake of fun. I got to chat a bit with him, and he seems like a very friendly guy who’s just really eager to see what can be done with these cool old parts that he and his father spent years collecting. I’m looking forward to having some fun 🤩

Speaking of fun… spot the not-so-subtle hint as to what I’m thinking of pulling out of the backlog. Finalizing graphics and trying to find appropriately rad looking knobs (cheap ones hopefully- too many knobs! TOO MANY KNOBS!)
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I have no excuse for this behavior.
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I was perusing sites I haven't visited for a long time and found 169 memorex tapes for 2 bucks each.......

 
I was perusing sites I haven't visited for a long time and found 169 memorex tapes for 2 bucks each.......

Ooooh… that’s a good price! I’ll probably grab some of those. Thanks for the heads up!
 
A double header this time. Ordered a Parasit Theremin Fuzz kit (and some missing parts for the Barbarian Fuzz which are not in the photo) a little back - turns out just the PCB with shipping costs included didn't feel worthwhile compared to getting the kit from Musikding for me.
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Also, because AFAIK I should specify each different kind of component and part in the customs declaration (which is a huge fucking pain since the VAT is the same for all of them) if my Tayda orders go over 150€, I decided to order a bunch of knobs from Aliexpress to help me stay under the limit more easily. I picked a bunch of mostly the normal smooth shaft style knobs and some for the T18 knurled shaft - mostly depending on what I could find that was cheaper than Tayda. They ended up being mostly black, but that's fine.

I threw in a set of wire looping pliers which hopefully might be more gentle on the PCB when twisting the end of wires going to the PCB (I've sometimes ended up scraping the top layer of the PCB, and while it hasn't been an issue, it is worrying), and a knockoff of the highly recommended solder sucker. Obviously it's not going to be as good as the real one, but it was also roughly 1/8th of the price of the real one, so I felt like taking a gamble. It feels stronger than the one I currently use, at the very least. Oh, and desoldering wicker, just in case.
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I threw in a set of wire looping pliers


That's funny. I got those same link pliers in the mail 2 days ago.
Used them to make loops around jacks last night. Work great *except*, the milling on the flat face of the pliers is very sharp where it concaves in(middle part of the larger jaw). Using 22ga solid core, it snapped off the protruding end a couple of times.
I think I'll run a file over it as that could really screw you on an exact length measurement.
But they do make nice tidy loops.
 
a big thanks to @hifitown for sending some sets of the now-notorious WE diodes as well as a selection of some really awesome looking WE transistors that I’m quite looking forward to trying out. Especially appreciate the effort put into giving the measurements for each one. I think a lot of y’all were a bit harsh on him, which is a shame— I, like most of you here, don’t buy into mojo or whatever else you want to call it, but I’m not opposed to trying things out in the sake of fun. I got to chat a bit with him, and he seems like a very friendly guy who’s just really eager to see what can be done with these cool old parts that he and his father spent years collecting. I’m looking forward to having some fun 🤩
I got my WE diode package from him a few days ago, he threw in a few old used 5751 tubes too since my primary test case for the diodes is an old Hafler T-2 rack mount guitar preamp. The Hafler needed a major refurb anyway, which I hope to get started on this morning. I have two different LEDs in the clipper section right now, but I was using it mostly for bass in the past and may want to port things to electric guitar oriented now. In any case, I like using recycled parts and the graphs look interesting and not necessarily the same-old. Don't really care what others do or don't want to spend, I'll happily spend more for blue or red caps in many cases, for instance. :LOL:
 
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For the world's slowest 5f2a build, 10A100T from July 4th sale:

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Still reading and researching a lot before I dive in. I know it's a simple amp and all but something about proper planning preventing certain kinds of performances. Plus free time isn't available as much as I'd like.

I still haven't decided if I want to build it as a combo or head and cab.
 
For the world's slowest 5f2a build, 10A100T from July 4th sale:

View attachment 78815

Still reading and researching a lot before I dive in. I know it's a simple amp and all but something about proper planning preventing certain kinds of performances. Plus free time isn't available as much as I'd like.

I still haven't decided if I want to build it as a combo or head and cab.
If you’re open to votes, I’d say a front panel combo
 
a big thanks to @hifitown for sending some sets of the now-notorious WE diodes as well as a selection of some really awesome looking WE transistors that I’m quite looking forward to trying out. Especially appreciate the effort put into giving the measurements for each one.
@hifitown sent me curves for all the 5751 tubes he sent me too. Got a set of the diodes and two 50s vintage 5751s installed in the Hafler last night, and did a bunch of maintenance work while I was in there. It must have been nearly 20 years since I did the last mod set and I have no idea where the documentation (if any) would be by now. So I made up a Spice model of the most problematic section, the dreaded Presence control, which comes right after the tube stepdown transformer and the hard clipper diodes. I have a really good handle on some mod directions now, but it looks like just going to two 5751s and the WE germs has already made for much nicer waveforms:

Hafler_test1.jpg

I swapped out the wonky Presence pot with one from the rarely used clean side, which is all opamps and no tube path at all. No glitches seen on my scope now...yay! Hopefully I can sneak a quick audition this morning before the day gets away with another 100 degree blast furnace on tap.
 
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