Build Your Own Clone Message Board

Hi, just finished my first build, had some problems immediately, first time i tried the pedal with a 9v adapter the led lit, but there was only a very faint dry signal, the bypass signal works fine. I tried plugging in a battery and a 9v, and then the battery on its own, same problem with the signal, but now the led won't light anymore, there is a very faint dry signal though. I am fairly new to this so i'm assuming my soldering went wrong somewhere, i can't get the brick off the board to take a look though, any advice?

I have done voltage tests on the ic's, the brick, and 78lo5 and 5088, they are all exactly as they should be. The led is now working again, and if i turn my amp up loud i get a signal that sounds reverbed but very fuzzy. Unfortunately i still can't get the brick off, been working at it with wick for ages, but i think it may be a problem with a signal path somewhere? Advice would be appreciated.

Yup, sounds like a cold solder joint somewhere. First thing: go through and reflow all of your solder joints. Just touch the iron to them until the solder liquifies then move on. As for removing the brick, it takes some work. If you have most of the solder off, then try to figure which of the pins is giving the most trouble. Heat it up and see if that loosens the brick.
Also pictures will help.
-P

No need to remove the brick yet if voltages check out okay. Please post pictures first.

Got the brick off, reflowed everything, still nothing, there's no current draw at all when i checked, voltages still seem fine, i've only checked the brick and ic's. Sorry i can't post pictures, i don't own a high res camera, i'll try borrow one. I'm pretty sure from the symptoms that something is faulty, or maybe i've accidentally shorted the circuit and fried one of the IC's?

If you still have the brick off, test the pedal that way. You will get dry, buffered signal without the brick installed. Since your dry signal wasn't good, that's what you should be troubleshooting anyway, not the brick. Post IC voltages please.

I'm thinking i accidentally shorted the input jack against something when testing outside of the box, could this have fried one of the IC's or electrolytics? I will post IC voltages later today, is it worth putting up a few pictures from a blackberry, it' the only camera i've got?

Okay, mounted it in the box without the brick, i got a weak dry signal and no led, but when i turned it over one of the long flat bits on the bottom of the output jack connected with the back of the pot and i got a full dry signal and the led on.

Can you point out the long flat bit on the output jack that shorted to the pot and brought the circuit to life?

At the top left, on the jack there are two prongs on the underside on the diagram that aren't wired, it's the left one of those. The one inbetween the blue and black wires.

That "prong" is connected to the RING lug of the input jack. When a plug is in the jack it creates a path to ground (the SLEEVE) for the battery. When you remove the plug you turn the battery off by breaking it's path to ground. When that prong made contact with the pot it provided a path to ground which would have turned the battery ON and powered up the circuit.

Also, you referred to that jack earlier as the output jack. It is the input jack. Make sure you have your guitar cords going in and out in the correct jacks. The circuit won't work backwards.

And, since the circuit didn't seem to work until you shorted the input jack ring connector to the back of a pot, the 'ring' wire from the pcb to the ring lug of the input jack probably has a bad solder joint on it. You should redo those joints.

Okay, got it working, reflowed everything, but i think the problem was either a bad ground connection at the battery, or the fact that i was testing it using a contact mic, it worked straight away when i tested it with a guitar. Anyway, reverb sounds good, theres a slight lag for the wet signal but sounds kinda cool, first two pots don;t seem to do much though? Is this normal? Many thanks for all the advice.

The knob on the left is reverb tone, which changes the tone on the wet signal only. The middle knob is dwell; should have hear it sort of carry the reverb longer when it's up.