Beginner vs. Dirtbaby

[knifedawg]

Ok so I lost round one with this pedal but I think I can win this battle.

So let me preface this with this: this is my first Madbean build and I'm super excited about this process. I've built a couple of BYOCs to get comfortable with the process before I tackled this project. I'm not super proficient in terms of troubleshooting so I was hoping you folks could help me out.

My readings on my ICs are truly all over the place

IC1

1- 7.56 (woah!)
2- 5.85
3- 0
4- 0
5- 4.34
6- 4.34
7- 4.34
8- 8.24

IC2

1- 4.05
2- 2.01
3- 0
4- 0
5- 2.20
6- 2.02
7- 0.10
8- 0.68
9- 2.02
10- 2.02
11- 2.02
12- 2.02
13- 2.02
14- 2.02
15- 2.02
16- 2.02

IC3

1- 5.92
2- 3.10
3- 5.82
4- 0
5- 3.10
6- 5.79
7- 6.50
8- 6.50

IC4

1- 4.37
2- 4.37
3- 2.15
4- 0
5- 4.24
6- 4.37
7- 4.37
8- 8.25

So I've obviously done something wrong along the way. I can post pictures of my build later on if it helps.

[blearyeyes]

First off welcome to Madbean's Forum!
if you could tell us what your circuit is doing, if anything, and clear pictures of top and bottom of the board are very helpful.

The usual culprits are solder bridges, cold solder joints, and getting the wrong part in there, we all do that, well I do that. The easiest parts to mix up are resistors that are in Ohms like 240R with Kilo ohms 240K and capacitors which are pretty confusing at first.. So a picture of the component side helps to check that out.  Double check that you don't have an I.C. in backwards.

Here's a few guidelines for trouble shooting:

http://www.madbeanpedals.com/forum/index.php?topic=902.0

[blearyeyes]

Here is a download you should get if you have a Windows computer.

Electronics Assistant. It has all the resistor color codes and everything you could need

www.electronics2000.co.uk


Still waiting on the pictures and description of your issues..

[Luke51411]

Your voltages look kind of odd around ic 1. I don't think pin 3 should be at ground. I would start by looking for solder bridges or shorts in that area. It looks like there may be more issues as well but get that corrected first. Read the troubleshooting tips thread and post pictures!

[blearyeyes]

Your voltages look kind of odd around ic 1. I don't think pin 3 should be at ground. I would start by looking for solder bridges or shorts in that area. It looks like there may be more issues as well but get that corrected first. Read the troubleshooting tips thread and post pictures!

[knifedawg]

Ok guys, I took a little break because I got a little frustrated with this. Also I broke rule A#1 and taking it apart seemed like a chore.

The only function when powered seems to be the level control. The delay seems to "click" a little but it doesn't seem like signal is getting to it.

I checked my component values and they seem to be correct and I might be a huge doofus and missed one or something.

I'm gonna check the solder pads around IC1 and clean up the board using some alcohol.




Edit: yep, there was messy joint between pin 4 of IC1 and R10. Also I missed a pad on IC2 and a there was a gross joint in there too.

What's that old saying? "it's your soldering, kid..."

[Luke51411]

It may be helpful check voltages again and post them. Also I would recommend building an audio probe and following the signal path to see where it stops. Are you getting dry signal but no delay?

[knifedawg]

update! functioning! yeah!

Only issue I'm having with it now is that the modulation doesn't really seem to be doing much. If I tweak the depth knob while signal is going through, it moves but then goes back to stationary. Also the level and depth controls seem to be quite a bit more sensitive than I think that they should be; like 50/50 blend happens around 9 or 10 o'clock on the blend knob.

[Luke51411]

Awesome! Glad you got it going. Ic 3 is the LFO, I would check voltages there and look at the solder in they are for bridges or bad joints.

[knifedawg]

Yeah IC3 is pretty wonky. I discovered that my socket was installed backwards (which probably doesn't do anything), but I flipped it and now my voltages there are even more strange.

1. 0
2. 4.17
3. 0
4. 0
5. 4.17
6. 0
7. 0
8. 0

That's, uh, not good. my connections look pretty secure and neat. I just tried cleaning it with isopropyl and that seemed to help at first but didn't really look like it did the trick. Any more ideas on what I could try here?

[jimilee]

Socket orientation doesn't matter, ic orientation is the only thing that matters.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[knifedawg]

Yeah, I figured but it was really bugging me aesthetically. Compulsive behavior lol.

[madbean]

Yeah IC3 is pretty wonky. I discovered that my socket was installed backwards (which probably doesn't do anything), but I flipped it and now my voltages there are even more strange.

1. 0
2. 4.17
3. 0
4. 0
5. 4.17
6. 0
7. 0
8. 0

That's, uh, not good. my connections look pretty secure and neat. I just tried cleaning it with isopropyl and that seemed to help at first but didn't really look like it did the trick. Any more ideas on what I could try here?

What if you remove the IC. What do you get on pins 8 and 4 in just the bare socket?

[knifedawg]

I'm still getting zeroes with the IC removed. :/

[knifedawg]

Alright so I fidgeted with that socket and replaced it and I think the problem is that socket 8 is kinda gross. Solder won't flow onto it. What do you guys recommend I do so that I can fix this and get this running 100% finally? Just use a little flux?