I made a de-booster??

[micro]

OK so I have built this puppy and am getting signal, however it is 4dB quieter than my straight guitar signal (with the volume
on the boost all the way up).

Some potential issues...(Im a total noob so clearly I need help!!)

I used a nonpolarized 47uf cap, and all the others are polarized (with the arrow along the side of the cap), is this OK?

Also, my .1uf input cap is much, much smaller than the one in Aron's pic. Does this matter?

I used an NPN222A transister (its silver).

The only pot I could find is a  "Mini" 5k Linear Taper.

Any ideas would be much appreciated.

[Barcode80]

5k might be a tad low. probably increasing might help?

that is a very low gain transistor if i remember correctly. likely a higher one like a 5088 or something would be more suited.

[aron]

>I used a nonpolarized 47uf cap, and all the others are polarized (with the arrow along the side of the cap), is this OK?

Fine.

>Also, my .1uf input cap is much, much smaller than the one in Aron's pic. Does this matter?

Also fine.

>I used an NPN222A transister (its silver).

Fine.

>The only pot I could find is a  "Mini" 5k Linear Taper.

Also fine. I think you either have a wiring issue or your transistor might be in backwards. Triple check the orientation of your transistor.

http://www.eng.yale.edu/ee-labs/morse/compo/datasheets/2N2222.pdf

Aron

[micro]

Thanks for the replies guys.


Well I swapped out three different transistors positioned
both ways for each.One gave about the same volume as the first
and one did nothing at all.

One question. The picture for the wiring shows a positive and negative
on the cap attached to the pot. If I have a non polarized cap do I ignore this
or should I be seeing some negative mark on my cap?
Oh and I tried two new batteries so its not that.

[aron]

Non polarized means don't worry. The problem is somewhere else.

[micro]

Before I make another atempt at this project, does it matter what kind of solder you use? I'm pretty sure
the kind I used is really thick but as long as you are getting signal with a multimeter it should be OK right?
That wouldnt cause a reduced signal would it?

[micro]

Hmmmm...one more possible problem. When I got my 100k resistors they were the last few in the bin at the electronic store.
Its possible someone threw them in there where they werent supposed to go. How do I measure the resistor with a multimeter?
Do I set it to 2k, 20k, or 200k?

such a noob....

[aron]

Set it to the next range higher than what you expect.
Left the end off the resistor to test and put your meter probes across the resistor.

[micro]

Son of a gun, my 100k resistors are really 10k resistors!
OK so clearly that would be a problem.

Well Ive already started a much cleaner build of this project, so if I can get it working, it looks like I'll have two.



Just to be sure....is this right? I'm not using a switch so does the positive power need to connect to the sleeve
of the input jack from the board, or does it stop at the board? Im not using and LED either.

[micro]

alright, nevermind. i built it. it rocks.
thanks to Gus for the design and Aron for the tutorial!

im officially addicted.

thanks guys!!