BOSS CE1 PROJECT: MN3002 or TDA1022P: DOC UPLOADED

[skyled]

You might try something like this:
https://tagboardeffects.blogspot.com/2012/01/mini-blend-jfet.html

It's small enough that you could probably stuff it in. I'm planning on using a 1590xx enclosure on mine so I think I would have plenty of room if I did that.

[skyled]

So this video of That Pedal Show collaborating with TC Electronic on the Boss CE1 was just posted a couple days ago:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbjWvN9nGAk

Dan's CE1 sounds great and now I feel I have to put the High/Low switch in. Stuffing that in this clone would make the High side non-true bypass while leaving the Low true bypass.

Also, his vibrato side is messed up and disconnected from the LFO so it creates more of a Boss Dimension D/C or mild flanger effect which is very cool.

[skyled]

I came up with a quick vero layout for doing the High/Low switch. I'm not very good at them but I think this one came out alright.

[Monkey_Relish]

To make the both the Hi / Low true bypass, you could wire the blue wire (input to the hi/Lo switch) and the green wire (hi/Lo switch output to KOC board input) to the C1 pads (blue to the pad closest to the switch, green to the other). You would have to solder C1 in series with the switch output green wire.

Mr Relish

[Monkey_Relish]

I would mod your vero so the switch green wire went to the vero, where C1 would be mounted in series, then another wire after C1 went from the vero to the KOC board second C1 pad. Much neater.

Mr Relish

[skyled]

Yes I'm sure it could be modded to be true bypass, but if you watch the video where he demos the high/low switch, the high side acts as an overdrive. He explained that much like the Echoplex EP3 preamp, people would use the drive sound of the effect without using the chorus/echo effect at all. Doing it as a stomp switch would be ideal.

[chorusjunkie]

On the original Boss CE-1 there is also an op-amp(IC-1) after the transistor high/low switch(Q1 circuit),i believe it also affects clipping.

[Monkey_Relish]

On the original Boss CE-1 there is also an op-amp(IC-1) after the transistor high/low switch(Q1 circuit),i believe it also affects clipping.

Isn't there one on this circuit, or am I missing something?
(Two actually, one is a unity gain buffer).

Mr Relish

[skyled]

This should be simple, but I can't understand which wire goes to what on the stereo switch out. Could anybody help? I've drawn a doodle to show you as reference.

[RDL68]

For anyone interested, at the time of writing, this is an untested Ch/V LED (not bypass LED) mod idea.

I finally got around to wiring up my attempt at this chorus.
I haven't even plugged a guitar in yet, but before I did put it aside (was too tired to continue) I connected 9v to at least check the LED's were working. They were.

As the Ch/V LED was always on, even in bypass mode, I had a quick look into how to sort that out (because admittedly pedals that do that drive me nuts) & so it's why I had this idea:

Going by the schematic, B1/B2/B3 of the Ch/V 3PDT don't appear to be used by anything in the circuit.
So the idea is to use a 3pin dual color LED, which not only swaps color depending on Ch or V mode (so the user knows what mode it's in at a glance), but stops flashing altogether in bypass mode.

First to keep that flashing LED off in bypass mode (if you choose to do so). It looks like pulling out the Ch/V LED's negative wire from the PCB & reconnecting it to A1 of the bypass 3PDT should do the trick. Simple as that.

If you also wanted a dual color LED, that wire from A1 of the bypass 3PDT would then go from that bypass A1 to the longest lead (common, the middle one) of a 3pin LED.

Then instead of the positive Ch/V LED wire going straight to the LED from the PCB, connect that wire from where it is on the PCB to B2 of the Ch/V 3PDT. The remaining 2 leads of a 3pin LED (both positives for their respective colors) should then go to B1 & B3 of the Ch/V 3PDT.
Whatever color dual LED you use or what color you want representing chorus mode or V mode is up to you, red/blue, blue/red, red/green etc.

As I said, I'm just too tired to persist with it for the moment, so I'll hopefully confirm over the next few days (or week) when I get back around to testing this idea out. Not to mention any trimmers, possible troubleshooting etc. Hell no, not now, must eat & sleeeep....
Anyone cluey enough can probably verify it at a glance anyway.

[RDL68]

Just adding to my previous post.

I haven't worked on mine again yet, but I remembered it's difficult (or impossible) to fit those 3pin dual-color LED's in those common chrome bezels many of us use, so I thought I should mention that. Most (if not all) only have 2 holes in the plastic holders that come with them, especially the 3mm ones. Even if they had 3 holes, the legs of 3-pin LED's stick out sideways near the top & wont push in. I know many of the larger 10mm bezels have the holders for 3-pins, but not so sure about 5mm. I'm sure any could be used without bezels, I just prefer the LED's locked in place & also to match my other humble builds.

I've already drilled & installed 2 x 3mm bezels, one on either side near the stomp switches, for mode & bypass, so as a simple workaround for mine, as well as an easier approach to anyone that does it later, I'll just use those 2 side LED's to show the mode instead of a single dual-color LED.

That means 2 negative wires from A1 of the bypass 3PDT to the 2 separate LED's instead. Then the 2 positive wires from those 2 LED's to the Ch/V 3PDT (B1 & B3 respectively). B2 to the Ch/v positive LED pad on the PCB as described above in previous post.

For the bypass LED, the simple solution would be to drill a 3rd LED hole for a 3rd 2pin LED. Well, at least they'll all fit the various bezels around...

Hopefully the above helps others do theirs better the first time around or those that have finished theirs can go back & do it too. It'll still look OK with 3 LED's, so I'll just put the 3rd for bypass in the middle somewhere, maybe use a 5mm instead of 3mm like the other 2. Best of all no flashing in bypass mode & the rate LED becomes a mode indicator as well. Maybe increase the rate LED's CLR resistor from 10k to 15k to tone done the brightness of it a little. It's extra noticeable because it flashes.

[RDL68]

Another day, better rested...so I did the LED mod & it does work. However, after 20 seconds or so the Recon power module failed out of the blue. It wasn't related to the mod because I only moved the LED ground from the 'always on' point of the PCB to an existing ground point which is on the bypass switch. Also the positives of the LED's & their +v from the PCB were just moved to 3 unused lugs of the mode switch, so all unrelated.

Anyway, I was only running off a 9v battery for testing purposes, so maybe it was draining too much current, especially if it had dropped far enough below 9v (it wasn't a brand new one, might've sagged down to 6 or 7v by now). When the replacement Recon turns up I'll use an adapter instead & if it does it again then there's some troubleshooting ahead before powering it up again.

There's no visible shorts or anything like that, but with 2 extra mini pcb's in there taking power (hi/lo switch mod and blender) my guess is too much current drain & possibly too much pressure on the Recon module. It's specs say the input voltage range is 10.8 to 13.2V DC. My local retailer puts it at 9 to 18v, so I must've been at absolute minimum at best with a battery, which probably wouldn't be good....as I discovered.
It's not a major drama, I've already taken the module out as I wait on the mail, it's just disappointing I didn't get as far as plugging a guitar in & I wasn't able to verify the other mods today. But, at least the LED's, the LFO & the rate knobs are confirmed working.

[RDL68]

At the time of writing, it's nearly a week since I ordered another Recom RD-1215D power module. It's looking like it wont show up in the mail until next week. When I get it, apart from using a power adapter instead of a battery, I'll temporarily disconnect the 2 small mod PCB's & get the main PCB going first.

The Hi/low switch mod runs off the same 14v voltage as the main PCB, which I wired to the positive side of C12 based on the schematic.

The Blender PCB (from pedalparts uk) might be an issue in this case because it runs off 9v, not 14v. I had that connected straight from the DC jack, bypassing the Recom & main PCB altogether. So I've developed a concern (or a doubt) that instead of it being OK to do that, it may have added an extra 9v to the main 14v or caused another problem that way.

They're great Blender PCB's though, I've used them in a few other modulation's, but ones that run at 9v, so no potential voltage conflict previously. They should be fine to run at the same 14v as the main CE1 PCB, as the only voltage sensitive part on it, a 2n5952, can handle up to 25v. So after I get the main PCB going, I'll run the Blender off 14v as well this time around.

Going off topic for a moment, in the meantime, I grabbed a couple of pedals I'd built a while ago (from a pile of awaiting calibration/waiting to be fixed). A VFE Phaser bought from Madbean & a Carlin Compressor.
The Phaser just needed a trimpot adjustment done by ear, so it's done. I like it. It's probably on the milder end of the phaser spectrum, but that means it's actually usable. There's quite a few settings & different stages compared to the old one-knobbers & can even get a bit chunky sounding if that's your thing. There's nothing like the Doppleganger though, but that's another story...
The Carlin Compressor is one I hadn't heard before, so I didn't know what I was in for. When I quickly tested it with a guitar months ago, all I got was distortion & not a usable one, so that's why it was put aside. Going back to it now, it's meant to be a distortion with a sustain knob. It did require a trimmer adjustment so the dist knob goes from mild overdrive to more saturated distortion. Depending on how the trimmer is set, the sustain can be a bit uneven & start making the whole thing sound spatty or pulsey (unusable), but I got it as good as I could & it is what it is. The sustain is quite long, but I'm still undecided on the gain aspect, so I might need another go at the trimpot later or to see how it pairs with another dirt box or something.

Hopefully I'll get the CE1 sorted next week & report back on the mods.

[RDL68]

Over a week since last CE1 update, so just a quick one. The replacement Recom has turned up so I'll turn my focus back to sorting out my CE1 in the coming days.

I've been doing a complete rebuild of another golden oldie this week, Dod Flanger 640. I used to be able to get a great chorus out of that one too, as well as strong jet to mild flangeing. So far I've replaced everything but the resistors, also got rid of the AC power cable & built a DC power supply for it. Those DC jacks fit the former AC hole perfectly. Had to replace the AC rocker switch (with internal light) with the DC version from the same manufacturer (or the light wouldn't work). Instead of using that rocker light to indicate on/off AC power, might use it for wet/bypass indicator instead, saves drilling the original enclosure & more useful that way.
Everything will be the same without the AC cable & without going through that noisy old internal transformer (spikey SAD1024 killers they were). Most of the old capacitors still tested OK, but they're all replaced regardless considering they're approx 40yrs old.
A ceramic capacitor these days can be as small as a match head, but one they used then was a higher voltage one the size of a small coin. I only mention it because it literally squished between my fingers like a sticky lollie that was lost in the back of the 2nd drawer for years, I've never seen a part so age-weary it disintegrated like that before.

Also got a few dirt boxes out of the way from my pile of "to do laters" that I'd been putting off.
A Tonebender Mk3, using AC125 transistors, also put the internal trimmer as an extra 4th knob as it added more variety & was wasted otherwise.
Then a Nobels ODR1 (overdrive) from an Aion PCB.
Then a Guv'nor (distortion).
Those 3 only had minor things preventing them working first go, so didn't take me long to finally get them running. All sounded OK too, I'm usually fussy with dirt boxes, most can sound crap to me.

Apart from that there were a couple of VFE builds. They both had the same problem I've had with 5 out of 6 VFE builds. The switching boards weren't working. Probably just bad luck with relays, but the actual main PCB's sound great when working though.

Anyway, I just have to wire up the freshened Dod 640 PCB over the next day or so & pop in the fresh IC's, shouldn't take long, fingers crossed. Then back to the CE1 after that...

[RDL68]

More modulation banter after another weekend...
I got the Dod Flanger 640 finished. It's successfully converted to DC jack, rocker power switch now an identical DC model that serves as effect on indicator, true bypass, all old parts apart from resistors replaced, so it's basically finished.
One minor prob, audio probing the signal stopped at the input pins of the SAD1024. I have 3 of those chips, 2 new & one that was tested working before being mailed to me, so the BBD isn't the problem...
In the 80's the SAD1024 used to fail every year or 2 in it, so I'd just go buy another for $10 & it worked as good as new. Last time it happened, replacing the SAD1024 didn't get it to fire up, tried a few more new ones, still no luck, so I replaced the other 3 IC's in there as well before I gave up & it went into storage ever since. What I think happened/what I think the problem likely is, would be I think I replaced the original cd4013ae with a cd4013be at the time. It's all in the suffix. I had similar issues last year getting the madbean Electric Mistress to fire up as well, which turned out that the cd4049 was the difference of it working or not depending on the chips suffix being "be" or "ube". Also in that one the same problem happens with the LM311 chip. The "n" or "p" suffix on those has to be the correct one too or it wont work.
So, I've got some cd4013ae's on the way from the UK which should hopefully do the trick.
Looking at the data sheets, there are some differences between the "ae" & "be" version 4013's, same pinout & function, but propagation delay is 45ns on "be" and 350ns on "ae". That's the first potential problem. Seems to be differences at clock input frequency at different voltages & other subtle differences between the 2 chips. I think I've seen enough without checking max frequency, load capacitance etc. It only takes one minor change to throw the whole circuit out of wack, as evident with the Mistress circuit, so it's looking like the 4013 chip variant has been the problem all along. At least now that's sorted I can get back to the CE1 & get that one going....