Man o War DX - modulation only works at full depth

[slowpogo]

Everything else about the pedal seems to work great, voltages look normal etc. But as the title says, I only hear modulation when the Depth knob is maxed. I'm using a 9203 photocell from Small Bear. I've tried pairing a bunch of different LEDs with it and even swapped in a VTL5C3 - the only thing that varied between them was the depth of the modulation (at max)...with brighter LEDs the mod is BIG when it's there, as you'd expect. But turn the knob below maximum, even a little bit, and there's zero modulation.

I'm using a 50kB pot for Depth as listed in the parts list. However the schematic shows 100kB, so not sure which is correct. Is that the issue? any other ideas?

[Thewintersoldier]

I'm getting ready to build one so I'm really curious whats going on with your modulation section. Are all the values correct for the lfo section?

[Govmnt_Lacky]

Honestly, I cannot ever remember a project that has anything less than 100K for a Depth control.

My guess is that the BOM is incorrect and the schematic is the way to go.

[slowpogo]

I'm getting ready to build one so I'm really curious whats going on with your modulation section. Are all the values correct for the lfo section?

Yes, values are correct and I reflowed the joints to be safe.

Honestly, I cannot ever remember a project that has anything less than 100K for a Depth control.

My guess is that the BOM is incorrect and the schematic is the way to go.

Maybe you're right but thing is, this project has been around for years. You'd think that would have been clarified in the doc by now.

[Govmnt_Lacky]

Maybe you're right but thing is, this project has been around for years. You'd think that would have been clarified in the doc by now.

Agreed however, fact remains that there are still differences in the document. Maybe Brian will see this and give it some attention.

[slowpogo]

update...I had been testing the modulation with the delay time in the top 1/3 or so.

However with shorter delay times (about 2:00 and lower) the depth knob DOES work more or less as expected.

I don't usually use modulation with shorter delay times so that's not too helpful. But I think I can say there's nothing functionally wrong with the Depth pot.

[Bio77]

Did you add the fix at the end of the build doc for the modulation switch?  Can you post some pics?

[Thewintersoldier]

Did you add the fix at the end of the build doc for the modulation switch?  Can you post some pics?

I thought the fix just cut off the modulation sooner in the center (off) position. I'm waiting to hear from Brian before I start my build, and I'm finishing up a couple others too haha

[Thewintersoldier]

So I asked Brian and this is what he told me: "It should be 100k. I don't know how 50k ended up in the BOM. IIRC, I tried a few different values and even used a 250k at one point, but 100k is what I remember being the best choice. Not that it makes a huge difference - the larger size will give some more range for shallow depth settings."
Choice is yours to make. I'm gonna go with 100k on my build.