Tremulus Lune wasn't working....(build pics enclosed)

[mrsage]

I finally finished the enclosure for my Tremulus Lune, and I got confirmation from Commonsound that the pot values I had were correct (turns out they were for the old version, but still worked fine).

So I finished the offboard wiring and tested it to make sure everything switched and unswitched.

Then I wired up the pots, which created an absolute jungle.

Then I put in a battery and plugged a cable into the input jack.

Nothing. No LED.

So I tried another battery.

:oops:

That one worked.

So I wired it up to my drum machine so I could test it out. Everything worked fine on bypass mode. The LED came on in engaged mode.

But the signal was quieter and there was no tremolo.

Crap. I'm going to have another Tonebender MK-II on my hands (I still haven't fixed that one).

So I unplug everything and start looking to see if any traces are bridged or anything like that.

:oops: (again)







I discovered that the Tremulus Lune works much better if you install the Op Amps. Preferably in their sockets. They don't affect the sound much sitting in a plastic bag on your workbench.

So I put those in and....
...SUCCESS!! On the (almost) first try!



And just to show you how much I learned from this experience, I next plugged it into my amp to play around for a while, only to find out that MY AMP WAS BROKEN!!! Then I saw the plug laying on the ground. And the surge protector in the "off" position.

Man, I'm dense sometimes.

[mrsage]

Here are the fruits of my labour:

[smashinator]

ooooooo pretty!

I love the ol' "didn't plug it into the amp" problem.  I've done that one a few too many times....  :oops:

[mrsage]

Yeah...that gets me every time.

I thought people around here would like the Star Wars font I found...there seem to be quite a few Star Wars quotes in people's signatures.

[MartyMart]

Nice build, wow  looks great !!
Yeah, the "its not plugged in" one will get you everytime !!
though I havn't done that with an op-amp. . . . . . .YET !

Regards,
Marty

[aaronkessman]

looks great. how bout a shot of the guts?

[aaronkessman]

also, where did you get your LDR/photocell and what are its specs?

[aaronkessman]

also also, what are the switch and extra stomper for?

looks like a really simple circuit. i may try this one on perf.

[moogatroid2000]

LOL!  :lol:  That was a funny read. I have done many of the same things.
Say, care to share the star wars font? I do think that is way cool.
I was thinking of calling my trem lune something along the lines of Tremulus Falcon or Millenium Lune or some such. My thinking with mine was "She may not look like much kid but, she's got it where it counts. I've done a lot of special modifications myself." LOL
Mine is as ugly and unrefined looking as anythign I have seen. If I get a camera anytime soon I will try to post some pics.
Your TL looks great BTW!!!!

[mrsage]

looks great. how bout a shot of the guts?

I knew there would be some pedal porn requests!

Here you go:




A shot of the pcb wired in:




I'm pretty proud of the LED/receptor contraption I rigged up. I took some black shrink wrap that was just big enough to fit them both in, I put them in facing each other, then I shrunk it a bit. Creates a light-tite connection that is pretty solid. The shrink wrap seals around the back ends of the LED and receptor to hold them in place:

[mrsage]

also, where did you get your LDR/photocell and what are its specs?

It was from the Tremulus Kit on 4ms. I just ordered the whole thing from them for the ease of the one-stop shop...I think they have a mouser parts list somewhere. The LED is just a regular yellow T-1 one, I believe. I actually haven't seen it on...it's been wrapped up in the shrink wrap.

[mrsage]

also also, what are the switch and extra stomper for?

looks like a really simple circuit. i may try this one on perf.

I was waiting for someone to ask that.

You'll notice from the pictures that there's an extra hole in the enclosure. I was going to add an expression pedal, but I'll hold off for now since it's so tight in there. I also don't have an expression pedal yet, so I'll work on it once I've got the actual pedal.

The extra stomp and toggle are to add the option for a momentary switch. It's a 4PDT toggle to select between the 3PDT latching switch and a DPDT momentary.

I was inspired by REM's "What's the Frequency Kenneth," where there's a tremolo part on the chorus that kicks on for like 2 beats...I figured I would add that as an option so that you can kick on the trem for just a brief second without having to double stomp.

You can't use both the latching and momentary in the same song (unless you kick the toggle over), but that's okay...I don't think you'd need a latching and momentary tremolo in the same song anyway.

[mrsage]

LOL!  :lol:  That was a funny read. I have done many of the same things.
Say, care to share the star wars font?

Do a search on google for "Boba Fonts." To comes up on one of the first couple of hits. It's just a windows font you can add to Word or whatever.

Here's another use of it:



That's a Fuzz Face clone from Big Tone Music Brewery.

[Narcosynthesis]

LOL!  :lol:  That was a funny read. I have done many of the same things.
Say, care to share the star wars font?

Do a search on google for "Boba Fonts." To comes up on one of the first couple of hits. It's just a windows font you can add to Word or whatever.

Here's another use of it:



That's a Fuzz Face clone from Big Tone Music Brewery.

note the positioning of the switch on the picture  :shock:

David

[aaronkessman]

looks great!

did youg et the board and box with your kit?

the mouser partlist has an out of date LDR part on it. mouser doesnt seem to carry ANY anymore.

also, do you absolutely need another switch for momentary? (Great to include, btw) i havent thought it out, but intuition tells me it should be able to happen with less than that....

but yeah, awesome work.

[mrsage]

looks great!

did youg et the board and box with your kit?

the mouser partlist has an out of date LDR part on it. mouser doesnt seem to carry ANY anymore.

also, do you absolutely need another switch for momentary? (Great to include, btw) i havent thought it out, but intuition tells me it should be able to happen with less than that....

but yeah, awesome work.

The board was etched for me using the Commonsound .pdf file and the box was from Small Bear (1590 BB). I'm not sure what to say on the LDR...Maybe sign up for the commonsound forums and ask on there. Or check their archives. I'm sure it's been addressed somewhere...

I couldn't think of another way to hook up the momentary switch without the toggle in there...I'm sure there's a way, but I'm relatively new to all this. I wanted to make sure it stayed True Bypass, so basically the toggle has wires running to Input, Output, Board In and Board out. Then it takes the corresponding inputs from each switch. I agree, though...that's a lot of extra wires in there.

[BrotherLush]

I too just finished my 'Lune yesterday.   Actually ended up being the first pedal that I've ever built!  It fired-up just fine the first time too!  The only problem that I had was that I tried the rate-doubler mod and it doesn't seem to work.  I'm pretty sure that I put a 100uF electrolytic from Smooth 2 pot to ground (via a switch) but mine seems to not double the rate, but octuple it (or, maybe, decrease the rate by a factor of about 8 to my ears).  Other than that, it works well and is buttery-smooth!  Any ideas as to what I did wrong?

the mouser partlist has an out of date LDR part on it. mouser doesnt seem to carry ANY anymore.

I got all my parts from mouser like 3 weeks ago.  I used the partslist for the 'lune build located at fuzzcentral.tripod.com

Thanks!
-Bryan

[BDuguay]

Say mrsage,
I've wanted to build a trem pedal for quite some time now, and your build looks effen fantastic! Please tell me all there is to tell about the Lune.
Thanks,
B.

[ryanscissorhands]

What method did you use to get the BOBA FUZZ graphic on that pedal? I hope to someday do a similar thing: make a marshall shredmaster and put a picture of Shredder from the ORIGINAL Ninja Turtles on it.

[StephenGiles]

Wonderful looking boxes, I could never get anywhere near that quality finish. I like the birds nest of wires inside - that's nearer to my may of working!
Stephen