Author: mirosol (Page 20 of 29)

Ibanez DL10 Delay

DL10

What is it?
Ibanez DL10 Digital Delay from Power series. Made in japan between 1986-1989.

The Ibanez delays are usually highly praised and for a reason. Solid construction and nice design. When i think of it, many other types have design flaws. This of course isn’t limited to just Ibanez. Still. usable delays are more common than, for example, usable distortions. The design here seems to be pretty much the same as found on DL5, or, we could once again argue that DL5 is just a remake of this unit. Opening the standard 10-serie box shows a couple of components mounted on the solder side of the board. This always makes me a little suspicious. This time, i think the components are there by the manufacturing process. I reached this conclusion by having obtained a second DL10 in defunct state. Or it would be highly unlikely that two separate units (one bought from canada and the other from a local guitarist) have the exactly same mod performed on them.

DL10-guts1

Hand drawn acid trip traces always make me smile. This time there’s another vow-factor due to crowded digital board and the hand drawn traces. Heart of the delay circuitry is Mitsubishi M50195P, which is one of the standard echo family chips Ibanez has used on most of their delay circuits. Including Master series Flanger and a lot of others.

DL10-guts2

Good delay pedal needs to be  simple to use and still offer more controls than just one tone. The Power series delays are all pretty good items. This one is more of a simple standard, while the others offer more and more special features. Let’s face it. Maxon designers have had their spoons flying pretty high in the 80’s. After all, there are seven different delay designs in a series which was manufactured from 1986 to 1989.

How does it sound?
Like a very nice delay with reasonably good control range. This stretches from tight slap back to neverending feedback with nice long delay time. This unit is common and lots of people are still using it for a good reason. Usable. Not much more to add.

Ibanez MS10 Metal Charger

MS10

What is it?
Ibanez MS10 Metal Charger from Power series. Made in japan between 1986-89.

Apparently, these units were a big seller. Which is once again something that i find intriguing. How does a very average distortion design with obvious fault in it become a big seller? I really do not know the answer to that question. Do you?

The fault i’m talking about is the low output level, which doesn’t rise above unity even with both, Level and Gain controls maxed. Gladly, this fault can be addressed with relative ease, as i’ve done with my unit. I do feel quite sad about that, as most people tend to think this is a collectible unit and so it’s ok to keep asking near astronomical prices for very common Power series box – with a built-in fault. No question about it. If i come across another unit in decent condition, and more importantly, for a reasonable price, i’ll grab it.

MS10-guts

One of the dullest board designs in the series. The circuit design is quite complex with couple of separate clipping stages. As you can see from the photo above, i’ve removed one of the hard clipping stages to get the overall level up. Also swapping/upping one of the caps from the tone section is a thing i recommend. That way you can get more bass in addition to standard Ibanez mid-hump.

For some reason i’m missing the component side photo of this unit. I wouldn’t be bothered. The SML from Master series uses the same board.

How does it sound?
To me. Not much like anything. The more bass and omitted one clipping section do make it a lot better, but still it is nothing more than mild distortion driver. With the mods the overall tone is a lot more overdrivish than anything that i’d associate with a “metal” distortion. Stock unit works the best with a high gainer tube head – when pushed into the drive channel. Modded one works well as a standalone overdrive too. Not the worst distortion pedal there is, but definitely not among the best either.

Despite everything. I’d recommend the mods.

Electro Harmonix Ego Microphone Booster

Guess i haven’t been this deep into producing vintage pedal porn before…

EHX-Ego

What is it?
Electro Harmonix Ego Microphone Booster. Made in US around 1969, according to pot labels.

Got this unit as a defunct gift from J. Stolpe of Väinö Grön (and numerous other bands/musical outfits). Story is the he found this unit from his father’s belongings and kept it. As we got into talks about my favourite subject in the world, he just decided to give it to me. The signal was passing on “bypass” mode and when the battery was connected and the boost engaged it acted as a dirty buffer. After looking into the design, it became clear that the design is 1:1 with all the original LPB-1s and 2s. All it takes to create a one transistor boost is an input cap, two resistors from supply to base and base to ground (these two form a bias voltage for the transistor), gain setting resistor from emitter to ground and a resistor from supply to the collector. Oh. And a output cap. Boost control is your standard 100K pot (output cap to lug 3, lug 1 to ground and lug 2 is your output). By the way, Beavisaudio has a perfect one paged article/image about how the single transistor booster works. If you’re not familiar with the subject, check it out here.

EHX-Ego-guts

The fault in this unit was with the resistor from transistor emitter to ground. It was completely burned out and cut in two. Looked like someone had already tried to fix it with not so great results. I was afraid that the 36999 branded transistor was dead due to the heat. Those transistors are  apparently Fairchild made clones of 2N5088, that they manufactured for EHX in late 60s. I have no way of verifying this information, but it was on the internet, so it *must* be true.

Anyway. The burned resistor seemed like 330R in value, so i went through all my boxes and drawers for similar carbon composition resistor to match the original. Nope. I didn’t have any. So i just fixed it, no matter of the cost. As you can see in the photo above, there’s one resistor that doesn’t quite match the others. I used the standard 1/6W 1% metal film resistor in its place. Works. And even the original transistor works perfectly!

Then i thought to myself, “what makes this a microphone booster, as the circuit is 1:1 with Linear Power Booster?” The jacks. That must be it. The LPB has the other end as a plug – you know, to be used with a guitar. If there are two jacks, then it must be for the microphone. Damn i just love vintage stuff like this!

How does it sound?
Exactly like the linear power booster(s). Clean and loudish  to the ~90% of the knob sweep. And then badly distorting at the end. The circuit keeps the frequencies well in tact while the line driving capabilities are worth a mention. Not great thing, but very cool little tool to have. In fact, i’d recommend every guitarist to use one of the LPB-1s in their lifetime. It should at least open ones eyes to the idea behind loud “clean” boosters.

Boss RV-2 Digital Reverb

Boss-RV2

What is it?
Boss RV-2 Digital Reverb. Made in japan, 1987.

Got the unit in a bag of crap i bought from one local guy. The unit was missing a bottom plate altogether and it was not in working condition. Checked the insides around for a while and there were just couple of loose wires coming from the jacks to the board. Soldered those back to their places and got it running. The missing bottom plate was another issue. Where was i to acquire a grey label Boss bottom plate? Nowhere. But i had an old japanese DD-3 with burned chip in a  spare parts box, so i scavenged the plate from that one. It is with blue label and from around 1988, so it’s not the closest possible match, but it’ll have to suffice.

This is likely to be the very first digital reverb in a compact pedal form ever. With all the features of professional rack mount units included, it’s bound to be quite complex design.

Boss-RV2-guts1

I may have written about filled boards before, but this one takes the grand price. The boards are made with tiniest SMD-components and the design still had no  chance of fitting in a standard Boss enclosure. Didn’t notice it at first. But yes. The box is slightly taller than the standard boxes. Apparently, the taller box is used only in PSM-5 and RV-2. PSM-5 needs the taller box because of the jacks at where the knobs normally are. This one however.. Needs all the possible space to house the boards. All the other designs fit in the standard one.

These pictures do not cover the detail of two stacked boards too well, but that’s how it’s made. With two massively crowded, two-sided boards bonded together. More as a detail, even the digital chips are Boss-branded. This must have been pretty expensive thing to manufacture…

Boss-RV2-guts2

Quick googling around didn’t give out a schematic, but i’d like to see one – just to see if i could understand anything of it.. All in all, this is the most complex design in such a small enclosure i’ve ever seen. The board design has more components on it than your 90’s PC motherboard. And it’s still nothing more than a reverb unit, mimicking a full fledged rack mount monster. The features easily trump most of the modern table top units. Six modes from plate to gate, to room, to hall and panned reverbs. All with adjustable time from 0.2 to 10 seconds. Then there’s the pre-EQ control for tuning the frequency range that we want to reverberate. And mix control, of course. Overall, very controllable.

Boss-RV2-guts3

It does surprise me that the current market value of these units is not higher. First of all, these were only made in japan for less than a year and a half, from 1987 to 1988. Second, the engineering is more than just respectable. Third…

How does it sound?
It doesn’t sound bad at all. Sure, it may not last too many rounds in the same cage with high-end brand rack mounted studio reverbs.. But then again. This is just a tiny pedal from Boss’ compact series and it’s meant to be used with a guitar. As a guitar effect? Just beautiful from small ambient plate to massive, wettter-than-ever surf reverberation. Good controls, good overall feel and sound. Where some (or be exact, most) Boss compact pedals leave me with no feelings at all, this one is not one of them. It’s versatile and usable pedal. And on top of that it is an important piece of stompbox history. So.. If you have a grey label bottom plate laying around without a pedal, drop me a line…

Danelectro LM-1 Black Paisley Liquid Metal

LM1-BlackPaisley

What is it?
Danelectro LM-1 Black Paisley Liquid Metal distortion with optional down octave. Made in china around early to mid 00s.

Danelectro is a fun and sometimes quite surprising brand that truly appeals to me. For some reason i’m sort of an sucker for those floral patterns, so the graphics on the pedal have their own piece. of attraction as well. Where some of the Danelectro units are meh, kinda ok or well designed (or sometimes just redesigned), there are some that really blow my mind. This unit is one of those. In addition to very successful graphic design, just take a look of the photo below. Check the placement of the SMD resistors and caps. symmetry is astounding. No schematic around. I think that this is not a prime suspect for tracing due to heavy component count and pretty complex overall design. After all, it is a super high gain distortion with good EQ controls and an added flip-flop based down octave.

LM1-BlackPaisley-guts

All the controls deliver what they promise. To begin with, there’s your volume pot, in addition to distortion and two band EQ with separate controls for bass and treble. Next, there’s the mids control on a switch that goes from flat mids to scooped to boosted. Lastly there’s a down octave slide switch between the jacks. All the controls work well and offer quite a large palette of tweakability.

How does it sound?

The sound has its own character when it comes to distortion. Down octave feels quite wild, even though this doesn’t get even close to overwhelming DOD Buzzbox kind of wild. The personality in the sound reminds me easily of many classic metal distortions, like Boss HM-2 and MT-2. Boosted mids on this one are probably a game saver for many HM-2 fans. Output level is sufficient and the EQ plus the mids switch offer a lot of versatility for overall tone. Very versatile and still it manages to have a personality. Very recommended Danelectro unit, and not just for down octave enthusiasts.

Colorless writings, part 8 – Short but sweet

I’ve been wanting to write this piece for a long time. As a note to self (and to you, too)…

These are just guitar effect pedals. They are not magic. Capacitance is capacitance and resistance is resistance. One component won’t sound any different from another with exactly the same value in capacitance or resistance. They are not magic. The thing called “mojo” is just a psychosis. It doesn’t exist. These are just guitar effect pedals.

Ibanez DFL Digital Flanger

DFL

What is it?
Ibanez DFL Digital Flanger from Master Series. Made in japan in mid 80’s. Missing the type plate sticker, but otherwise in very good condition.

Now, for real, get ready for running in the guts of the iron worm. The basis for all the metal worm psychedelic action is MC4101F. There’s also a schematic available for download at Schematics Unlimited. Must be one of the most complex pedal designs i’ve seen so far. Just look at the solder joints. The board is so full that it’s simply amazing.

DFL-guts1

The amount of usable controls are  also notable. There’s your standard Speed and Width. And Delay Time and Regeneration. Plus a three position switch for delay time range from 0.5-4ms to 1-8ms and finally to 2-16ms. Those ranges offer pretty much every usable delay times that are needed for flange effect. There are scans of user’s manual up on Tone Home.

DFL-guts3

With wide range of  controls, it is very usable and well made flanger. Even i don’t consider myself as a huge flanger fan or big time user, this unit still impresses me. And for the complexity.. There’s really not much for me to go on about with my puny understanding that is all based on simple analog circuits.

There are rumours around the internet that these units are ultimately rare and the number produced is very low. I don’t believe either of those claims are true as at the time of writing there are five different units for sale on ebay.

How does it sound?
In the guts of a iron worm. Metallic and cold. Simply beautiful sound. And over the pot at the same time. If you’re after a soft sounding airplane sweeper, you should pass this one completely. It offers harsh, deep flange that’ll melt your brains. Just beautiful.

Ibanez PL5 Power Lead

PL5

What is it?
Ibanez PL5 Powerlead from Soundtank series in a plastic enclosure. Made in taiwan around 1993.

I also have another one of these, build around 1996, in mint condition and in its original cardboard box. The whole series doesn’t disappoint much in terms of dirtbox quality. Most of them sound just right, but there are couple exceptions. This being one of them. Apparently the Powerlead was the second most sold design of all Soundtanks – only falling behind TS5 sales. Amounts originally sold make this very common design, so anyone should be able to score one for cheap. Is it worth it? I can’t be certain about that. But it is definitely not the worst dirt box in the series. Schematic is available online.

PL5-guts2

Looking at the schematic, there’s your standard Ibanez buffering and electronic switching, which passes the signal to single transistor gain stage. After this, the main gain stage is basically a YAR with it’s hard clipping diodes and couple of the component values reworked. The tone control after the YAR is not you standard passive treble cutter, but tri-gyrator to tweak the frequencies that get passed forward. Lastly there is quite standard volume control that mixes the signal passage between Vref voltage (virtual ground) and the output buffering.

PL5-guts1

It is equipped with JRC4558D, and there are some things that can improve the performance. Swapping couple of components is on my to-do list and i’m committed to mod this particular unit once i get to it. Tweaking the first, discrete gain stage to push the main gain stage more is where i’ll begin. Then swapping the 220R resistor for 22K to bring out more gain of the main stage. The two paths to ground from non-inverting input should be tweaked too. Lastly the clipper diodes could be swapped for LEDs or even two pairs to push it slightly further. It may need some other swaps too, but we’ll see about those once i open it up on my bench again.

How does it sound?
Not great. At first the tone control feels to be working wrong. It basically adds low frequencies when turned clockwise. Overall tone is big and distorted, but still it doesn’t thrill me. Name says it all. It offers powerful lead tone that’s not completely unlike the classic hair metal guitar solos of the early nineties. Not great, but not too bad either. Definitely next from worst of the original six pack, right after Modern Fusion.

Danelectro DJ-3 BLT Slap Echo

DJ3-BLT
What is it?
Danelectro DJ-3 BLT Slap Echo from mini series, made in china.

Most of the mini series effects are good and usable. This one is no exception. One can hear what the circuit is all about by just listening to it. It’s PT2399 delay with fixed delay time. Did this surprise you? Not me. PT2399 is widely used and trained ear can spot one easily. It has analog quality to its repeats, while remaining nearly free of unwanted noise. The reason for PT2399 being so popular chip for delays and echos is probably the simple usage. It requires way less components than any analog or any modern digital counterpart and the datasheet has an example circuit in it. That one can be slightly tweaked, and voilá, completely new delay circuit has arrived to take over the market from another PT2399 design. The example, of course, needs an mixer amp to accompany it, but otherwise.. That’s the circuit found in many, many modern delay pedals.

There are several reports on how to modify your BLT for full featured delay/echo. The one posted at FSB by Soulsonic will guide you through the process if you feel like doing it to your pedal. I won’t be modding mine as i seem to have a few delays that can do exactly what this would do once modded.

DJ3-BLT-guts
This unit has nothing too special going for it. Standard Dano electronic switching, modern traces and the main board (the one with controls on it) is pretty tight fit with all the surface mount components. By itself, it is nice cheap echo/delay with fixed delay time. I’m getting a feeling that many of the Dano designs are just your standard effects with one or more controls dropped. It doesn’t make them bad in any way. It just feels like the designer has made some of the choices for us.

How does it sound?
Good. Usable slapback echo with mix and feedback/repeat amount controls. It has the PT2399 chip’s signature sound, so you really can’t go wrong with this pedal. It’s fun and it can be modded to full echo/delay with relative ease.

Ibanez SML Super Metal

SML

What is it?
Ibanez SML Super Metal from Master Series. Made in japan mid 80’s.

I wasn’t planning to go after the Master series due to the rocket prices. Of course i have been interested in these too, but the status and rarity ridden cost of collecting these made the series not too pleasing. For that same reason i won’t be collecting any of the older Ibanezes with the same enthusiasm as the later ones. To pay over 200 euros for used and beaten unit just doesn’t suit me. Of course i’ll keep my eye out for any of the pre-7 series Ibanez pedal that surfaces. But. If the price and condition are right, i might go for it.

This unit came to me in a deal with pink DE7 and the total price was good, so i really had no choice. The unit was basically broken with burnt and removed polarity protection diode, out and DC jacks were disconnected and solder joints broken. And the level pot had some dead areas on the sweep. The outside condition is good as the image shows. Just couple of paint chips and mild worn. The jacks were easy to reattach by just reflowing the solder. Cleaning the level pot didn’t help enough, but i thought i’d leave it as it is and not start to hunt down a new pot.

SML-guts1

Standard and neat looking board. basically the biggest differences between the L and 10 series are the pots. in fact, this design is believed to be exactly the same circuit as older SM9 Super Metal. Lots of gain stages and clippers. And lots of control over the characteristics. Level shouldn’t need much explaining (other than it needs to be maxed to get even near to unity levels), Drive and Attack control the amount and character of the distortion. Punch and Edge take care of the EQ. These controls are very usable and have a drastic effect on the sound.

SML-guts2

The unit is sharing the board with later SM10 Metal Charger, which makes the two identical. Even though the unity level problem is apparent on all three designs (SM9, SML and MS10), the popularity can be explained without an issue.

Update! I recently got another one of these. At fist glance, both seemed and sounded quite identical. Until i noticed the silk screened labels on top of the boxes. The unit pictured above has a lot higher serial number (about 10x higher) and the labels are grey. On the other unit, the labels are printed in green and the label sticker has clearly different tint of neon green on it. All this suggests that there are at least two separate production runs of SML in existence.

How does it sound?
This being the reason for the popularity. The sound. In vast ocean of distortion pedals, this unit still has some personality and edge that most other simply don’t have. I’m liking the sound even though it has a serious flaw with the output level. And it’s a good thing i got this. I modded my SM10 for more level and i was left with mixed feelings. It is definitely more usable with mods (as this would be too), but there’s still something in the original sound that i want to keep. This probably ain’t the best metal distortion there is, but it’s very good either way.

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