So...what is everyone building?

by **astrovic** » Thu Sep 13, 2007 2:30 pm

Hey fellow DIYers

I've kinda dropped off the map here for a couple of months (too much time over at Melband, I'm afraid) and as always love to hear about what everybody's got brewing.

Recently my cash has been devoted to getting my guitars all sorted out and working like they should (lotsa little issues), which included building a Partsocaster, so on the electronics side I've simply been tinkering with a few stompboxes that have been bequeathed on to me. It's been great actually, being such simple circuits has helped me get my head around how they work, which is a darn sight more complicated than just building 'em.

I am having a bitch of a time sourcing suitable stompbox enclosures - the ones at Jaycar aren't quite deep enough (about 30mm deep) or too deep (about 65mm). Any suggestions??

I've also acquired the guts of an Epiphone Valve Junior that the previous owner dismantled for scientific purposes...my intention is to re-build it into a Champ clone of sorts.

I've also discovered the ecstacy and agony of wookworking :shock: Not convinced yet that's a good thing!

Look forward to hearing about what's on the go around the traps.

Cheers

by **JulienG** » Thu Sep 13, 2007 8:15 pm

Hmm, I have a few Telefunken and SSL modules that need to be racked up.

I have a Mackie HUI with a dead (switchmode) power supply that I'm halfway through frankensteining an old Neve AudioFile P/S in as a replacement.

I'm finishing moving house, and when that's done building an office with an eye to being usable for simple studio stuff.

by **OzDrum** » Thu Sep 13, 2007 9:54 pm

astrovic wrote:(too much time over at Melband, I'm afraid)

DOH!..

I'm actually building "Ausband" which will be a totally different version of where Melband has been for the past 9 years!
Australia wide - more structured forums (including seperate areas for "pro" audio and "home recording" stuff).. plus a lot more
user interaction - member profiles, blogs, media etc..
should be great!

as for building "toys" - nah I like to use pre-made ones.. same goes for cars for me!

cheers
Geoff Mison

by **astrovic** » Thu Sep 13, 2007 10:57 pm

yeah, by too much time I mean TOO much time, if you know what I mean :) Impressive forum you've got there Geoff, and I'll be definitely checking it out when Ausband takes off - good luck with it!

by **Barney Loveland** » Thu Sep 13, 2007 11:54 pm

On bench in no particular order G9 (85% done), ssl comp clone, (way over due but panel work my weakness), neve line eq channel strip (thanks to Aearth), GK 150 bass amp that keeps blowing up, Built a bunch of JLM BA's for friends. Have a rack of 4 BA's in an API 312 flavour waiting for op amps. recently racked some ADM pres.

http://www.turtlerockmastering.com/foru ... php?t=1113

And have been helping a friend with a troublesome MCI 428 desk. Also some other original gear that is in the works but takes lots of time to get it ready for the big wide world to see (there are a few prototypes around)

(thanks to a general interest and inspiration from Gav Pearce, Proharmonic, JLM et al i'm now studying EE part time)

by **toddd** » Fri Sep 14, 2007 1:46 am

just got my complete BA4 kit today... looked at it for a while scratching my head and thought 'biting off more than i can chew'. hehe..

hopefully in a bit i'll post some progress pictures, if and when i make some (progress that is).

wish me luck.

by **jkhuri44** » Fri Sep 14, 2007 2:30 am

just got my complete BA4 kit today... looked at it for a while scratching my head and thought 'biting off more than i can chew'. hehe..

thats not as bad as me buying some neve cards to build a line input buffer, and looking at them, thinking i just wasted my money, until i have enuff moolah to pay someone to do it for me!

hahahha :roll:

by **davemc** » Fri Sep 14, 2007 5:55 pm

OzDrum wrote:
astrovic wrote:(too much time over at Melband, I'm afraid)

DOH!..

I'm actually building "Ausband" which will be a totally different version of where Melband has been for the past 9 years!
Australia wide - more structured forums (including seperate areas for "pro" audio and "home recording" stuff).. plus a lot more
user interaction - member profiles, blogs, media etc..
should be great!

as for building "toys" - nah I like to use pre-made ones.. same goes for cars for me!

cheers
Geoff Mison

Hey Geoff, So hows things. Long time no here, teh new studio finished yet???

That would be good if you can break them up Geoff, although I think you would need to add mod's and spend time policing it to try to get actually more Pro audio type chats. Too many Home recording guys who just fight with everyone that be!@#$%^& is Top End. A lot of know it alls who are either 15 or never used anything who pretend tehy are pros.. Ermz is big offender in this just repeating what he reads on the Andy Sneep forum. I was supprised with how little he knew when I met him in the flesh. Although he used to alwasy chime in and recomend that you should mic a guitar this way etc

Building stuff. well I want to start building some stuff now bubs is getting stable. Although I really want to get back into doing some mixing for stuff not my own again. Maybe some tracking a year since teh studio shutdown now so getting itchy.

by **astrovic** » Sun Sep 16, 2007 6:12 pm

Guys...I might keep nudging you all from time to time as the responses seem to suggest that a lot of ya have "plans" but no action. Sounds like there's some pretty tasty stuff in the pipeline ATM.

@ Toddd - the Baby Animal is a fantastic kit, and about as straightforward as they come. Once you get the first module finished, the rest will be a piece of cake. And they sound awesome! (My 1 channel of BA to date is my avatar here)

@ Dave - you could always do what I did, now that bubs is settling (I have a feeling ours are roughly the same age) - go for round 2 :)

by **davemc** » Sun Sep 16, 2007 6:40 pm

astrovic wrote:
@ Dave - you could always do what I did, now that bubs is settling (I have a feeling ours are roughly the same age) - go for round 2 :)

Well the new job I would get 3 months of paternity with the next one he he. Although prob wait a little while longer he is only 10 months now. As said rather get back into doing some more recoridng first. Would not mind makinga few more pres and maybe setup something mobile. Seems to be a few guys doing that now with just presonus/ 02's so something sounding a little better would be nice.

by **TimS** » Mon Sep 17, 2007 10:07 am

davemc wrote:
astrovic wrote:
@ Dave - you could always do what I did, now that bubs is settling (I have a feeling ours are roughly the same age) - go for round 2 :)

Well the new job I would get 3 months of paternity with the next one he he. Although prob wait a little while longer he is only 10 months now. As said rather get back into doing some more recoridng first. Would not mind makinga few more pres and maybe setup something mobile. Seems to be a few guys doing that now with just presonus/ 02's so something sounding a little better would be nice.

Seems like we have a few little ones that are around the same age - my son Cooper is almost 11 months old..
Maybe I should start building things too!! ;-)
However, one of Rob's re-racked mic pre's is first cab off the rank!!

by **Chris H** » Mon Sep 17, 2007 1:20 pm

Have nearly finished this desk from optro chanel strips....has taken ages, working through each strip etc. It has been working as individual recording pre's for a while using the direct outs.

by **Chris H** » Mon Sep 17, 2007 1:25 pm

Here is a pic of the module innards...The pre amp stage is discreet and the eq uses TL 071 op amps....i'v had to replace quite a few.

by **astrovic** » Mon Sep 17, 2007 4:04 pm

That is cool!!!

by **davemc** » Mon Sep 17, 2007 5:02 pm

Hey Astrovic,

yeah they are starting to do things now.
I might make a JLM kit. I am actually not bad at soldering just finding the time. as you know it now revolves aroun sleep and feed times. he he

by **chris p** » Mon Sep 17, 2007 7:05 pm

Chris H

I like it!

I'm kicking around a pair of Yamaha PM700 channel strips that look to be of similar vintage: nice transformer input, opamps (which I may yet replace with one of Joe's hybrids), 3 band inductor-based EQ - I've recapped them, added a JLM front end and JLM tranny outputs, now I just need to get them to work!

My main project at the moment is the redesigned Small Dial, followed by the germanium AWA preamp and limiter.

by **Chris H** » Mon Sep 17, 2007 7:58 pm

chris p wrote:

My main project at the moment is the redesigned Small Dial, followed by the germanium AWA preamp and limiter.

Whats the AWA stuff? Is it a preamp and limiter in one unit or seperate boxes? I have one of the old 4 into one germanium broadcast amps. It works well but is easy to overload and needs inline attenuators as the output is too hot for most things.... they made em +8 for the ABC (thats what i've heard....someone who knows what they are talking about will correct me). It's on the to do list to try and get 4 seperate outs, possibly from the existing transformers.

by **chris p** » Tue Sep 18, 2007 12:25 pm

Chris H wrote:Whats the AWA stuff? Is it a preamp and limiter in one unit or seperate boxes?

Its a BAP mic preamp, discrete germanium with input and output trannies to die for - they both weight a ton. The limiter is from a Big1 broadcast compressor. I want to add in JLM EQ and optocomp cards when they become available for a kickass vocal channel. I've also got a lovely late 80's Russian meter (nod to Wez) that I'll use for VU and gain reduction metering if I can calibrate it correctly.

Its all in pieces at the moment, but I'll post it here once the project gets seriously underway.

Chris H wrote: I have one of the old 4 into one germanium broadcast amps.

Great fun. I've dismantled a pair of those old ABC distribution amps and have half finished racking them as a single pair. Good luck with it.[/i]

by **toddd** » Tue Sep 18, 2007 4:36 pm

chrisses p & h, your stuff looks and sounds really cool.

i'm going to start my own BA Build thread in the DIY forum with a few q's i currently have...

by **mfdu** » Wed Sep 19, 2007 1:44 pm

i've got a passive 4 channel rack of trannies - mainly to test them before i put them to use. a couple of 1:1, and a couple of 1:2 backing onto 2:1, as per Robs article in AT a couple of issues ago. reusing the case from the g-ssl mixbus compressor that just leaves me cold.

2 channels of LA2A pcb's, just awaiting power transformers and tube sockets.

2 channels of g-ssl 9K pre's (awaiting gain switches)

2 channels of BA's (planning to use some of these stomping old trannies i'm currently testing, and awaiting DOA's from Fabio over at Prodigy - i've got some 1731 melcors, but they're so crunchy!)

2 channels of forssel opto compressors (again, awaiting DOA's)

epiphone valve junior head - hi-gain, standby and tweed mods

fix ch. 3 of mNats 1176 rev g (dud transistor somewhere in circuit? power rails are ok)

get me a life.

chris
mfdu

by **astrovic** » Wed Sep 26, 2007 3:43 pm

G'day guys - a great list of activity going on there!

I got my Tubescreamers finished on the weekend - stompboxes aren't hard, but they are fiddly! I'll put up a pic for posterity soon.

Chris mfdu - that's a nice list you've got! We still need to arrange that get-together, right? Oh, re: G1176 - I have a handful of spare fets if you need them, but none of the other transistors. If your problem is fet-related and you're short up for parts, let me know.

Can you provide a link re: the VJ mods? I'd like to check them out (well, standby is obvious, but the other two). Have you thought about putting in an output attenuator? My VJ/Champ is my next project, with some variations to be decided on as I go (I'm sure I'll overdo it!)

by **mfdu** » Wed Sep 26, 2007 5:30 pm

hey astro. yeah yeah we gootta get together. stop saying it and make something happen! (although this weekend is chockers. shipspiano at the Fubar saturday night - my boys won battle of the bands, now they've got $1000 to spend on recording. but i think its with studio 52) and MSO chamber series on sunday at ABC southbank, then a gallery opening sunday arvo.

oh booy this is getting a long post already.

the valve junior head.
i've got an attenuator (J-pad) on the speaker cab, so i haven't worried about a master volume on the VJH, because i can just turn the cab down. it does generate a little heat though - i used the mono j-pad, but if i were doing it again i'd use a stereo unit and then wire it back to back (at present all attenuation iis in the last 1/4 of the rotation)

VJH mods - there's a whole VJH party goin on. for the faux DIYer's there's mod kits on ebay. there's also plenty of folks just getting straight into it - http://www.valvejunior.com/ for example (focussed on the v.1 model)

although i adore my valve junior (into 70's rola 12" 25w speaker) with SG (double humbuckers) and russian-built big muff, my lap steel sounded horrid (with single-coil pickup). i threw a seymour duncan hotrails humbucker into it, and it's better. but it still lacks any bottom end. fault of the guitar, not the amp. i think i'm going to rebuild the lap steel using a slab of redgum or something . . . something that can carry the low frequencies.

i still gotta get the CEI preamps fixed, too. did i mention them in my list? i gotta chase the power rails to post-rectification and figure out what DC i need to supply them. i think 36VDC, or else i feed them 41VAC pre-rectification . . .

my 1176 problems are oscillation / zipper-noise - the voltages are down across the transistor collector legs, so it's just a case of scratch and sniff. don't know what i need yet.

and hey remember - if you're going to do it, it's always worth over-doing it.

by **astrovic** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 8:54 am

Thought I'd post a pic o' my pedals for posterity (oh, the alliteration!)

Nothing spesh, but glad to have finally completed them. :lol: Please excuse the Hosa cables - I've finished de-behringering my home studio and will be starting the de-Hosa'ing shortly :)

Next up - the Valve Jnr, then a 2nd channel of Baby Animal, then a real baby - that's enough DIY for now!

by **Ausrock** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 11:28 am

Pedals look cool, how do they sound?

astrovic wrote: Please excuse the Hosa cables - I've finished de-behringering my home studio and will be starting the de-Hosa'ing shortly :)

Considering the "brand name whoreishness" of some people I won't say anything......................except, if you happen to be replacing any snakes over 3 metres long, I may be interested.

by **astrovic** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 1:17 pm

The 'screamer on the left sounds fantastic, don't know why I didn't get one of these years ago. The 'screamer in the middle has a different layout on the PCB but same parts, and sounds quite different - I don't like it as much. I'm suspecting a wrong something in there somewhere, but I'm over fiddling with these things for now. The Blue Clipper sounds like sludge - real dark n murky. Love it :)

Re: Hosa etc, I'm not overly snobby when it comes to sound (tone is in the hands, right?), but when I think about all the gear that has died on me over the years, the names be!@#$%^& and hosa keep repeating on me. When I was gigging the hosa cables would die regularly, the others would keep on keeping on. You'd think I'd figure it out after a while...

Oh, and sorry, I'm just a home studio guy, I'm afraid...no snakes to be seen.

by **Ausrock** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 1:40 pm

Sludge sounds like fun :-))

I agree with you about cheap cables in a live situation where they're "constantly" moved, etc.............I've done enough live sound in the past :-).

Our "studio" is not a commercial concern but running a 24 channel desk to both 16 trk h/disk and R2R recorders along with outboard gear kinda makes snakes a necessity.

ChrisO :-)

by **astrovic** » Wed Mar 04, 2009 12:10 pm

I thought I'd bump this thread, as I always love seeing what others have been up to with their drill presses and soldering irons and whatnot.

A couple of months ago I started a DIY thread over at Melband, to get some lurve for hand built chicanery:

http://www.ausband.com.au/modules.php?n ... hlight=diy

At the moment I'm trying to get all my projects to a state of completion before starting any new ones - e.g getting front panels done and looking purdy, and applying what I've learned especially regarding safe wiring practices to stuff that I built before I knew better.

I have to say, I find the satisfaction of building gear equal to or greater than playing music. Maybe I missed my calling?

Anyways, keen as always to see what has been keeping the workshops of Turtlerockers occupied...

by **Milo** » Wed Mar 04, 2009 3:05 pm

Never-ending projects:

Just finished an ISA110 strip - sounds delicious, and that eq is "verstile", to say the least.
"Almost" done: 1073 clone with full eq: that amounts to $250 worth of poly caps - good ole WES
Racking some AWA TG modules
Fixing a Soundfield MkIV mic & controller for the ABC - this one has only taken me a year and a half so far, but that's still small cheese for some projects, as you know

by **Futureman** » Wed Mar 04, 2009 6:40 pm

This is nearly finished, just gotta do some timber work on the sides & next to & under the keys.

by **adamcal** » Thu Mar 05, 2009 10:02 pm

I have been building these, the first one was fun, now its just hard work

http://gallery.me.com/adamcal2/100021/DSC01600

So...what is everyone building?

So...what is everyone building?

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