How to build and Use a Basic Testing Rig

[davent]

I've always boxed up before testing and it's always been with great trepidation and much delay before i'd fire it up and give it a try, fail, fail, fail... Already have lots of junk for breadboarding and testing,  bypass boxes etc. but no easy way to integrate an unboxed project to that stuff for auditioning. Taking off on Jacob's ideas and not needing another box (and being cheap) put this together so i can use bits i already have and give things a try before boxing.




dave

[jalmonsalmon]

I have been using something like this beavis layout and I cannot live without it 

I used a scrapped pedal enclosure that I screwed up but thought I would post this layout for the beavis board's enclosure

[goldfixe]

I have been using something like this beavis layout and I cannot live without it 

I used a scrapped pedal enclosure that I screwed up but thought I would post this layout for the beavis board's enclosure

This is exactly what I've been looking for.  Thanks so much!!!

[mrb1946]

I bought a 163-MJ21-EX DC Jack from Mouser (it's all metal) to use with this, and I'm getting a clicking sound (every second or so) when I plug in the DC cable to use it. Is it because of this kind of jack? Or do I have something wired wrong? Here's a pic.

[mmlee]

The power will have been wired Centre Negative so the sleeve of the DC jack will be positive.  The enclosure conducts that's why you have a problem.

You're going to need to either insulate the metal DC jack you have, use a plastic DC jack or reverse your positive and negative wires and have to get used to powering pedals Centre Positive.

I wouldn't recommend the 3rd option really, go get yourself a plastic DC jack.

[gjcamann]

That clicking sounds is a very bad sound. Due to the short described above, it is the re-settable protection on your PS tripping over and over.

[Diocide]

Well now you've all done it! Instead of just wanting to get cracking on my 4 builds I've got lined up, I now also really want to build a proper test rig.

THANKS A LOT GUYS

[Diocide]

Finished my test rig today. Can't wait to test it out. I plan on adding the test probe once I have a need for it.

[casssax]

I built one of these last night.

Red and Black are power and ground.
Yellow is input.
Green is output.
and the testing probe.

I repurposed an old 'confidence booster' pedal. One of the first I made.

Only thing I messed up was putting the input on the left side of the pedal and the output on the right.
I thought it wasn't working at first until I figured that out.

Once I had it plugged in correctly it works great.

I just finished building the Zero Point DD. I had tried to test it on a bread board but was getting weird static noises if I turned my guitar down from full volume. Once I tested it with this rig I have no problems at all. Sounds great.

I have a few questions about the DD but I'll make some recordings and start another post about that. (I've already seen there are some other mods people suggest that are not in the build specs.)

[thesameage]

Where do you guys get your probe tips? Cut off of an old multimeter, or can you buy them? Or make them?

[slacker775]

Where do you guys get your probe tips? Cut off of an old multimeter, or can you buy them? Or make them?

i used a lead from an old DMM.  I snagged a male end from Tayda so I could plug it in as needed.  Works great.

[alanp]

I put some heatshrink around the end of the shielded cable, so only 2mm of core wire was poking through, then reinforced that by tinning it.

[thesameage]

So any wire would basically work?

[davent]

This audio probe was made years ago, junked pen with 14awg wire for the conducting element. The inline jack has the cap in it.

[thesameage]

Power question: So I built my rig and it works well-- thanks again! And a great use for an old sparkle blue enclosure that I loved but was unusable due to some drill-related butchering of my own doing.

Anyway, if I wanted to test two circuits at the same time to see how they play together, how would I do it and how would I power them? Can I just clip wires from both 9V pads to my 1 9V alligator clip?

I'm guessing that as far as connecting the two circuits, I just clip out of circuit 1 to in of circuit 2.