B.o.S. builds a Gristleizer

[BetterOffShred]

Yeah I've read all 16 ( now 17) pages a bunch of times, and I posted there about my build problems already. I will be trying the pin 4 and 11 trick once I get it to actually strobe deeply. Right now it's not strobing Deep at all, Taylor responded and said he would check another JFET, which I did last night and that didn't help. I'll try a few different ones (Apparently it's not picky about which JFET as long as its N Channel) when I get home from work tonight to see if I can bring it up to the burly chop I'm expecting. Yeah I've been lusting after this bitch for years, plus I have a weird handicap where I can't let stuff go so I'll be messing with this till it works. Thanks for looking

[$harkToootth]

Hamburger Lady graphic? I had no idea this came from THROBBING GRISTLE. One of my favorites. It seems so "Duh" now but I had no idea until you posted that. Thanks!

[BetterOffShred]

Technically it came from Roy Gwinn, and it was featured in a magazine article, and then TG used it a bunch and it became pretty popular, and also as I mentioned in the first page achieved kind of legend status because of how hard it was to get working properly. The board I bought is highly documented and parts are super easy to get now, so these dudes doing it all themselves in the 70's and 80's is pretty respectable! Yeah I love it.

[$harkToootth]

I'm all about this. Great combo of 'things'. The Omni is one of my favorite synths regardless but the delay and gristleizer add a lot of character. The VCA component shares similarities (I think? From my deduction rather) with a Divine Hammer (marketed as a waveshaper and harmonic trem).
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyI0nkCJGmA[/youtube]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyI0nkCJGmA

[BetterOffShred]

I'm all about this. Great combo of 'things'. The Omni is one of my favorite synths regardless but the delay and gristleizer add a lot of character. The VCA component shares similarities (I think? From my deduction rather) with a Divine Hammer (marketed as a waveshaper and harmonic trem).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyI0nkCJGmA

Yeah it's a really unique effect, and I'm a big fan of tremolo's in general so I can't wait till mine is working 100%.. Speaking of which I made progress on it and figured out my 2N3819 Jfet's have a different pinout than advertised using my handy dandy Mega328 tester (which I've shamelessly plugged elsewhere on this forum) which lead me to bend the legs and plug it back in. Now it has serious chop, but there's some speed ramping issues that I can't figure out yet. I'm still troubleshooting it, but it definitely works in all modes now and has weird laser whoops and whistles when the VCA/VCF toggle is engaged. I ordered some J113 Jfets hoping that my 2N3819 are just cheap Chinese turds (Though I got them from a US seller, does not mean they are originals) and that the J113's will cure my problems.

That video is really nice. I'm not 100% sold on the "Need" for a filter in the Gristleizer, but since they put it in, it's not bad at all. As primariliy a guitar player I wouldn't find a whole lot of tweakability unless using a loop to layer something, but not really a whole lot on the fly right? It's just a cool circuit

[$harkToootth]

I think you'll find the filter useful/fun/door opening (or closing rather) once you have it. I love having filters on any effect at my disposal! The WMD Protostar was such a godsend in the stomp box world imo.

I have one more. This sounds great too, although the synth used here is 4x the price of the previous one. It sounds very similar to THE UNITS sound. Scott Ryser has said the basic combo was minimoog > echo > tube amp = Big synth punk sound. He may have thrown it threw a fuzz box too hence when this video sounds SOOOO similar.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ckuD3NopaGc[/youtube]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ckuD3NopaGc

EDIT: Scott did use fuzz. http://thequietus.com/articles/03318-th ... -francisco

"SR: No. At least not live. I played keyboards in a hair-metal band in high school. I knew how Hendrix, The Who, and Zepplin got their music to sound heavy. I applied the same processing to my synths as they did to their guitars to make it kick ass. Fuzz boxes, echoplexes, big tube amps… I’ve never heard a guitar that sounded any better than my live gear set up."

[BetterOffShred]

ooh I got moved..

So I think I have my problems traced to what is labeled "D2" on the board, but D1 on the schematic. I'm at work but when I get home I'm going to pull that out and see if the 1N34A is damaged or in backwards.. it looks like its oriented correctly from the pics I have and the schematic, though I cant see the traces on the backside of the board. I'm no electrical engineer, but if it's not working correctly then both sides of the cap can "charge" eventually which makes the difference between the two sides much smaller, aka higher speeds (Faster discharge). Which may account for why the "minimum" speed on mine increases as I leave it plugged in. Maybe I should get in the habit of testing any GE components before I solder them in.. The 47k, 56k, 10k and 470R around the location all check out as proper values, though I did not test them. If the diode does not solve the problem I'll have to look at them. Anyone like debugging from schematics?

[comesect2.0]

When its chopping your guitar feedback and you sweep the filter high, you'll see...filter is the best part, and the definitive TG sound. You can use the speed rate as a sound source/ osc into other gear and sweep that around. Are you having vol-bias-shape-offset-depth-speed all on board? Triangle and ramp down are the two shapes on mine I think sounds best and it's really funny when those sounds hit you in relation to the exact sound on an album you love.
Good luck! From what I've read else where this circuit gives bunch a people hard time in building

[crochambeau]

Careful about overheating Ge/point contact diodes.

You might be able to beep test the 1N34 in situ (I'm not looking at a schematic so I can't see pitfalls with that).

[BetterOffShred]

When its chopping your guitar feedback and you sweep the filter high, you'll see...filter is the best part, and the definitive TG sound. You can use the speed rate as a sound source/ osc into other gear and sweep that around. Are you having vol-bias-shape-offset-depth-speed all on board? Triangle and ramp down are the two shapes on mine I think sounds best and it's really funny when those sounds hit you in relation to the exact sound on an album you love.
Good luck! From what I've read else where this circuit gives bunch a people hard time in building

Yeah for sure man, It's chopping pretty good now that I got my JFET sorted out, but it's still not quite there, my minimum speed is way faster than its supposed to be, and it speeds up by itself as it stays plugged in, which I sort of addressed above.
I have Vol Bias Depth and Speed as pots, and offset and shape as trimmers.

Careful about overheating Ge/point contact diodes.

You might be able to beep test the 1N34 in situ (I'm not looking at a schematic so I can't see pitfalls with that).

I'm not confident in my equipment to test the diode attached to the board. I have a weller with a pretty fine tip, and I've been running it at about 600 deg F for this board. The 470N came out no problem, so I'm going to pull the diode and put in 2 sockets and then if I figure out it WAS the diode I'll audition a few

looking at the schematic, the speed network is really just a few components, so It's gotta be in there somewhere.

[Chankgeez]

… but what about this?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qEhDcidy2w0[/youtube]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qEhDcidy2w0

[Jwar]

Off topic but does anyone know why Musicpcb stopped carrying the Christine fuzz pcb? I wanted to get another one since I fucked the build up the first go around. UGH. It sounds so good to. I hope I can find one.

[BetterOffShred]

Off topic but does anyone know why Musicpcb stopped carrying the Christine fuzz pcb? I wanted to get another one since I fucked the build up the first go around. UGH. It sounds so good to. I hope I can find one.

I built a vero of it very recently. I didn't really like it a whole lot TBH. I tried a bunch of different shit here and there and eventually salvaged the parts i could and tossed the board. .. Sorry man. If have given it to you if I knew you back then.

[BetterOffShred]

Uhhhhh! Straight up G bitches!!

But seriously. Just what I suspected.

Slow as a mother fucker now. I'm going to go try it. It's

[BetterOffShred]

Yep. That was it. Everything works now. I managed to dial out the tick on all but a little on the triangle wave setting. I ordered some D9E diodes from Bulgaria a couple weeks ago to use in the Sputnik clone Dino made (which I bought a board from him for.. ) so they showed up today .. one is now happily taking the place of that broken 1n34A .. more to come!