High Gain SLO Influenced Amplifier Build Log For misterwhizzy

Re: High Gain SLO Influenced Amplifier Build Log For misterwhizzy

This looks awesome.
I do have a few questions for you though, I'm looking to take up a new hobby/project and this looks quite interesting/fun. So, on a scale of 1-10 how difficult would you say a build like this would be? I have some basic soldering knowledge and have done some basic amplifier repairs myself.
Also could you post some clips of what it sounds like, preferably something along the lines of thrash as that's what I mainly play so the amps ability to do something like that would be a major deciding factor to me?
Also any tips or advice you may be able to give would veritably appreciated.

Thanks,

Dan
 
Very nice build. Thanks for the slide show. I love looking at alternative layouts.

One technical question: what kind of grounding scheme did you use? Bus, star, galactic (no I didn't make that term up), something else?

I'd be guaranteed to screw up the wiring with everything white but it does look very cool.

Thanks,

Chip
 
Re: High Gain SLO Influenced Amplifier Build Log For misterwhizzy

Fresh_Start said:
Very nice build. Thanks for the slide show. I love looking at alternative layouts.

One technical question: what kind of grounding scheme did you use? Bus, star, galactic (no I didn't make that term up), something else?

I'd be guaranteed to screw up the wiring with everything white but it does look very cool.

Thanks,

Chip
Click to expand...

Thanks! I used a strict star scheme. I really should have use more wire colours but once I started with the white I loved it too much. It took a lot of double checking to make sure everything was being hooked up right!
 
Re: High Gain SLO Influenced Amplifier Build Log For misterwhizzy

tyrian89 said:
This looks awesome.
I do have a few questions for you though, I'm looking to take up a new hobby/project and this looks quite interesting/fun. So, on a scale of 1-10 how difficult would you say a build like this would be? I have some basic soldering knowledge and have done some basic amplifier repairs myself.
Also could you post some clips of what it sounds like, preferably something along the lines of thrash as that's what I mainly play so the amps ability to do something like that would be a major deciding factor to me?
Also any tips or advice you may be able to give would veritably appreciated.

Thanks,

Dan
Click to expand...

If you are looking to get into this i'd recommend maybe taking on a smaller project first as this is fairly complex. However I myself ignored this advice and went straight from stomp boxes to a SLO.

I guess it's only hard if you aren't willing to put the time and effort in to gain the required knowledge. It's all out there for free too. Aiken Amps is a very good resource but is currently partially down and the valve wizard site and books by Merlin Blencowe taught me pretty much all that I know!

http://www.freewebs.com/valvewizard/

It looks a bit cheap but the amount of knowledge contained within is invaluable.

As for the clips I'll see what I can do. Is there anything in particular or just general thrash?
 
Re: High Gain SLO Influenced Amplifier Build Log For misterwhizzy

Hey guys got a quick clip that I threw together in a few minutes.

This is completely unmixed other than a touch of reverb on the snare.

It isn't really the best representation of the amp as I suck at recording.



I have the day off work tomorrow so ill spend some time trying to get something better together and also a thrash clip for tyrian.
 
Re: High Gain SLO Influenced Amplifier Build Log For misterwhizzy

Sounds great! What are the speakers? I'm really just too lazy to reread the thread to find out, plus it keeps your thread on the front page a bit longer.
 
Re: High Gain SLO Influenced Amplifier Build Log For misterwhizzy

I don't think I actually mentioned them anyway. Its a Peavey 2x12 with 2 V30s.

Quite an old thing now but its a workhorse for sure.
 
Re: High Gain SLO Influenced Amplifier Build Log For misterwhizzy

tyrian89 said:
This looks awesome.
I do have a few questions for you though, I'm looking to take up a new hobby/project and this looks quite interesting/fun. So, on a scale of 1-10 how difficult would you say a build like this would be? I have some basic soldering knowledge and have done some basic amplifier repairs myself.
Also could you post some clips of what it sounds like, preferably something along the lines of thrash as that's what I mainly play so the amps ability to do something like that would be a major deciding factor to me?
Also any tips or advice you may be able to give would veritably appreciated.

Thanks,

Dan
Click to expand...

If you build it to the clone spec, it's not extremely difficult, but it does take a bit of time. Bolting down the sockets and trannies are the easy parts. Soldering the boards neatly may take some time. Making sure you route everything in a neat and orderly manner is the time-consuming parts. These amps have a lot of gain, and if you dont pay attention to where those wires go and what wires they may come in contact with, you may end up with a very noisy, messy amp. If you want to jump straight into something like this, do like Tony said and grab a few books, read some internet amp sites and do a little homework before you get down to it. Just take your time, plan everything out and make sure you mock it all up prior to assembly.

My first build felt like it took forever because I mocked it up two or three times before settling on all of my connections, routing, etc. In the long run, it was worth it because it turned out awesome. OCD FTW! :)
 
Re: High Gain SLO Influenced Amplifier Build Log For misterwhizzy

Soulcrusher_X said:
If you build it to the clone spec, it's not extremely difficult, but it does take a bit of time. Bolting down the sockets and trannies are the easy parts. Soldering the boards neatly may take some time. Making sure you route everything in a neat and orderly manner is the time-consuming parts. These amps have a lot of gain, and if you dont pay attention to where those wires go and what wires they may come in contact with, you may end up with a very noisy, messy amp. If you want to jump straight into something like this, do like Tony said and grab a few books, read some internet amp sites and do a little homework before you get down to it. Just take your time, plan everything out and make sure you mock it all up prior to assembly.

My first build felt like it took forever because I mocked it up two or three times before settling on all of my connections, routing, etc. In the long run, it was worth it because it turned out awesome. OCD FTW! :)
Click to expand...

OCD is a gift in situations like these! I've seen so many people do these builds on the internet that do things such as running signal wires really close to the heaters etc and wonder why they have masses of noises of various types.

The biggest mistake that I made initially was something that really shouldn't have happened. It was partly due to my colour blindness and partly due to rushing. I mixed up a 475k and a 47.5k resistor which resulted in just having a clean and not so clean channel. It had me baffled for a few days!
 
The hardest part of building an amp is debugging the build. One of the best pieces of advice I ever got about amp building is "Plan to be wrong about something."

Another is that "No plan survives contact with the enemy, or in this case the amp."

Starting with a simple circuit and a known-good layout makes it a whole lot easier to learn how to debug a build. The more complicated the circuit and, especially, a higher gain circuit, the more important the layout becomes. The grounding scheme is vitally important for a noise-free build.

For example, it wasn't until my third Blackface Fender Reverb build that I figured out a foolproof method to eliminate for keeping the tremolo signal from bleeding into the rest of the circuit. Fourth amp build btw. I learn more about layout tricks on every build.
 
Re: High Gain SLO Influenced Amplifier Build Log For misterwhizzy

Fresh_Start said:
The hardest part of building an amp is debugging the build. One of the best pieces of advice I ever got about amp building is "Plan to be wrong about something."
Click to expand...

This is some fantastic advice. Also do you have any pics of your builds?

Here's a couple more clips for anyone interested.

Both of these are reamped DI's and my DI box isn't really the best but hey it gets the job done. Again theres no mixing whatsoever done to these just as the tracks went into reaper.

Also this is direct to the amp no pedals or anything.




 
Re: High Gain SLO Influenced Amplifier Build Log For misterwhizzy

Fresh_Start said:
Here's a thread about my Super Reverb derivative:
https://forum.seymourduncan.com/showthread.php?t=170266

The owner loves it.

Chip
Click to expand...

That is some very nice work! I didn't want to resurrect a thread from 2009 so i'll give my feedback here.

How do you find the epoxy board and if you drilled it yourself how is it on tooling? I can imagine its pretty hard on tips and such.

You have a very nice lead dress going on there and I bet it sounds fantastic! Do you have anything else planned?
 
Re: High Gain SLO Influenced Amplifier Build Log For misterwhizzy

Wow, Chip. That is nice. Neatness counts and you have it in spades.

Tony, check out http://turretboards.com/ I don't know if that's where Chip found his boards, but they do have lots of boards, parts, etc. I found a good 18 watt Marshall board to use as a basis for my JCA-style build. This time, I'll make sure to take pics.
 
Re: High Gain SLO Influenced Amplifier Build Log For misterwhizzy

Thanks! I'm aware of turretboards.com. Ive sent them a few emails over the last year and never got a reply :S

I don't actually mind making my own boards to be honest I was just wondering about impact epoxy glass boards have on drills etc.
 
Re: High Gain SLO Influenced Amplifier Build Log For misterwhizzy

I thought I saw another site that you can buy blank boards,the turrets and the staking tool, but it's eluding me right now. Im sure, I'll remember or maybe Chip will chime in with some good info.

EDIT nevermind: turretboards.com has all that stuff. lol I guess the real question now, is about the bits.

I'd like to know how drill bits fare with the epoxy as well. All the bits I have for metal last a long time, but I wonder how different the epoxy/phenolic boards would treat them? You would think the boards would be softer, but Ive been wrong before.
 
Last edited:
Re: High Gain SLO Influenced Amplifier Build Log For misterwhizzy

Soulcrusher_X said:
I thought I saw another site that you can buy blank boards,the turrets and the staking tool, but it's eluding me right now. Im sure, I'll remember or maybe Chip will chime in with some good info.

EDIT nevermind: turretboards.com has all that stuff. lol I guess the real question now, is about the bits.

I'd like to know how drill bits fare with the epoxy as well. All the bits I have for metal last a long time, but I wonder how different the epoxy/phenolic boards would treat them? You would think the boards would be softer, but Ive been wrong before.
Click to expand...

Well I know the phenolic ones are fine with them. But in Chips pictures it looks like hes using the fibre glass boards. FR4 I think.
 
Re: High Gain SLO Influenced Amplifier Build Log For misterwhizzy

IIRC the board material in the Super Reverb is G10 from McMaster Carr. You can buy it from Hoffman Amps too, along with turret staking tool and drill bits. Cutting the board to length is nasty - you need a hacksaw and MUST wear a mask! Better to buy cut-to-length from Doug Hoffman most times. Drill bits don't last too long either.

Here's my board drilling jig. The piece that's bolted down serves as a slide for the side-to-side part that holds the board itself. I drill one row of holes, then move the side-to-side part and secure with the c-clamp again. That way, all of the rows stay nice and parallel.

Drillingjig1.jpg


I made up this block to hold the lower part of the turret staking tool. After adjusting the height of the staker right, it minimizes flexing the board while staking the turrets:

Stakingjig.jpg


Note: I don't do hand-drawn layouts anymore!

Here's a link to Hoffman's instructions for his staking tool:
http://www.el34world.com/charts/toolhowto.htm

Cheers,

Chip
 
Re: High Gain SLO Influenced Amplifier Build Log For misterwhizzy

Hoffman! I forgot about them. Thanks for the links and the pics. :) Maybe I'll invest in a CNC machine to keep the dust out of my lungs.
 
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