All articles from the Bad Screamer series As usual, modelling germanium transistor circuits can only go this far, what you actually get in reality can be different from the simulation. Also, this is about putting components into their unusual modes of functioning: getting a pleasant to the ear distortion can’t…
Category: Audio
Audio projects – preamps, amplifiers, guitar pedals,…
Audio
Bad Screamer: more gain
All articles from the Bad Screamer series This one is very similar to the Bad Screamer: adding a mid-boost version, the difference being the gain stage has a Darlington pair, increasing maximum available gain (by a lot). I made this modification thinking ahead about using the same schematic but with…
Audio
Bad Screamer: adding a mid-boost
All articles from the Bad Screamer series Thinking about this a little bit, there’s a way to act on the frequency response using a little more complex emitter negative feedback circuit. Did a bit of play with the sim and various values, I can create a mid bump this way…
Audio
Bad Screamer: soft clipping overdrive (with transistors)
All articles from the Bad Screamer series Working on a new circuit at this moment, it’s inspired by some existing guitar overdrive pedals. The main gain and overdrive stage is basically one slightly enhanced Proco RAT gain stage but with more potential gain and volume (instead of the RAT’s multiple…
Audio
Servicing Sony Walkman TCS-30D
I’ve got this one for cheap, sold as “working” but we all know how much does in mean when you buy from ebay 😂 It wasn’t working very well, couldn’t fast forward and played only some cassettes, others it couldn’t advance at right speed. As always, this is its rubber…
Audio
4. Dead Kings bass effects pedal – EQ finalized
Happy New Year everybody! I wish everyone lots of good things and happiness! After many tests and modifications, I should admit that I wasn’t happy with the 3 band EQ results – it either sounded wrong or was unstable at some EQ settings. Turned out making a single Baxandal EQ…
Audio
3. Dead Kings bass effects pedal – EQ
This is the 3rd post in the Dead Kings preamp series. Now to design the EQ module! My initial idea was to create a circuit inspired from the classic tube bass amplifiers, like Ampeg Portaflex or SVT. I did some research and got somewhat carried away, so the circuit I…
Audio
2. Dead Kings bass effects pedal – clean boost
Continuing the Dead Kings preamp series The tests in real hardware have shown very close characteristics to what LTSpice have simulated, this means the models of the transistors I’ve been using are pretty accurate, that’s good news! i’ll be testing some slight modifications – reducing maximum gain and maximizing undistorted…
Audio
1. Dead Kings bass effects pedal – buffer, boost
I’m starting this new project on Github, heavily inspided by my recent discovery of the band Royal Blood https://www.royalbloodband.com/ This is the first post in the Dead Kings preamp series. This preamp / effects pedal isn’t supposed to emulate the sound of Mike Kerr, I’ve just got some ideas I…