BYOC Octave Divider Odyssey

[Boxbie]

Then came diodez (silicone and germanium), capacitors in 3 flavours, electrolytics, transistors and then IC sockets.

Not the neatest soldering in the world, buy hey, it was tight.

I might point out this took all day.

[Boxbie]

I then added the pots leds and switches as instructed. Soldered it together. Sweet! Everything is going to plan, starting to rush a litte, fatigue is setting in.

Disaster! in my rush I put the pots the wrong way around! Arg! You DIY'rs might know how tricky it is to remove PCB mounted things with more than one leg.
A goldmines worth of solder wick later I remove the first pot, and then the second and blam!!! More disaster! As i pulled out the second pot, it ripped up the trace!!
Nooo!!

deadtrace.jpg (648.39 KiB) Viewed 1852 times

[smallsnd/bigsnd]

not the worst thing in the world. just solder in the pot with the two holes that are still good, then use one of your clipped leads or a short wire and connect that point directly to the pot leg.

[Boxbie]

not the worst thing in the world. just solder in the pot with the two holes that are still good, then use one of your clipped leads or a short wire and connect that point directly to the pot leg.

Thats what I ended up doing:

I then re soldered the pots, and installed it into the box. Time to try it out!!

[Boxbie]

Plugged in, lLights went on but no sound!!!!
I wasn't that surprised, just resigned to a heap of fuckery. I took it back to my desk to search for problems.
And I found them. Can you spot the problem ?

I plugged the ic's into the sockets, ran back to the amp and plugged it in. And it worked!

What a relief!

So now it's finishing time. I found a place that sells acid. To be continued...

[LaoWiz]

How's it sound?!?!

You etching the box?

[McSpunckle]

Hey! Your soldering is fine, but I thought I'd give you a tip.

When you're soldering, apply the solder directly between the iron and the pot your soldering to get it started, then feed in the solder from the other side of the part. The first bit gets the heat flowing, then feeding it from behind (har har) helps it flow evenly. You'll get more consistent joints that way.

If you're gonna be building lots of pedals, invest in a desoldering pump to prevent what happened to the pot. : D (sometimes it will still happen, though)

The build looks great!

[sylnau]

How's it sound?!?!

Are you able to post a YouTube demo?

[Boxbie]

Hey!
When you're soldering, apply the solder directly between the iron and the pot your soldering to get it started, then feed in the solder from the other side of the part. The first bit gets the heat flowing, then feeding it from behind (har har) helps it flow evenly. You'll get more consistent joints that way.

Thanks for the info!
Yeah Lao, I'm gonna give etching a try (when I'm feeling brave)

I've just recorded a dodgy clip. Its a tele into the Octave into a overdriveulator into a bandmaster.
I'm not convinced the bass only section is working properly, as it looses a lot of volume, and when I was recording the whole thing got louder
for no apparent reason.

Anyway, I havent edited this clip, it's just a bunch of shit. Thanks for your time!

[soundcloud]http://soundcloud.com/blacklionsound/dividede-octave-test[/soundcloud]

[tuffteef]

neil young toanz! woo!

[multi_s]

epic build!

[LaoWiz]

Man, sounds cool! THat is a huge build!

[Fuzz_Pi]

Wow, that sounds surprisingly awesome

[Moustache_Bash]

Dang, that looked rough. Good job, though. I don't know if it's just the laptop speakers, but the octave down sounded really quiet. Still sounds super good. Thanks for documenting this, and putting up a clip!

[Jwar]

I want to build one of these! Looks so cool man! Good job!