My Cornish Style Board, WIP. (pics inside)

[elshiftos]

The board is almost up and running. I am waiting on a bunch of PCBs from John Lyons (power supplies and 3pdt switching pcbs)

Today I tried to make sure every circuit was ready to be wired up, doing odds and ends, etc. The EQs still need to be mounted, which will be a pain, and some spare parts for a few fx here and there.

I have used about 200ft of belden paired cable 

The transformer, input/output board are all ready to go, as well as amost every effect. It is hard to think about how the entire thing is routed, really gotta take your time and think about it. Heres the latest pics, the coil of wires on top are for the PSUs-FX, and the other large coil to the right is for all the s/rs, volume, wah, whammy, etc.

Some of the FX circuits are kind of just floating there until I solder the wires, then I will secure them to the board. Anyways, enjoy!

Question: I am going to mount the Power supplies on the back wall, to the left of the in/out panel. Do power supplies themselves "radiate noise" like a transformer does? I think if I have any problems I will just encase that entire area with a metal wall....The closest effect is a GE7 and the delay mixer... Every single wire is shielded to ground

Yes, beware of radiated hum from transformers! In the second pic from the bottom, I have mounted a slimline mains transformer under the shelf. I am experiencing hum pickup on any pedal placed directly above, and also stray pickup on 9VDC cables is getting into the 'gainy' pedals and causing hum/buzz.
http://www.steveevans.org/pedals/
I am looking into a small toroid in a metal case under the shelf, or at worst, an EXTERNAL PSU...nooo!!

[sjaltenb]

Well the curiosity was killing me so I had to see for myself if this whole thing was going to work, granted there were a lot of variables that were left out of this mix. Throughout this entire project my #1 fear has been excessive noise. the whole point was to cut down on the noise, not add, So i have taken an overly proactive route in building this thing, to ensure I do all I can from the beginning to keep the noise out.

the vintage Tube Driver is the highest gain pedal that I have that is close to the massive transformer. It runs on 12V ac, directly from the tranny. I'd say its about 6 inches away.

Using my makeshift, unshielded test rig, I connected the signals to the tube driver. I went ahead and wired the mains to my power entry module, screwing the earth into the enclosure,and attaching the tranny shield and the AC lead's shields which all converge to a strip by the transformer.

Now, of course the transformer was far from loaded, so the radiation was probably not near what it will be once all 14 outputs are being used. However...

No noise! . I was getting a healthy 13.2VAC out of the transformer and The TD fired right up and sounded awesome! I cranked the gain and volume and it still noiseless

This was pretty encouraging. Of course, a lot of things will be added and changed by the time I'm done, but hey, its a start! I'm getting so close!

[Taylor]

I remember seeing a diagram of your grounding scheme at some point, and I wanted to look at it again, but can't find it. I am building my own multi-effect (set up more like a modular synth than a pedalboard) and I need some ideas on how to ground everything without ground loops.

Can you post that diagram again? Thanks.

[sjaltenb]

Yeah I will see if i can find it. Im on another computer right now.

I just ran some tests with the transformer-->power supply--effect. It seemed to be OK. Not perfect yet. I am still not convinced that my little test rig does not induce ground hum. The power supply is putting out a perfect 9.02V though which is good. The modulation effects are taking to it EXTREMELY well. The high gain stuff is, well, high gain and its going to be the noise producers

The way my grounding runs is thus: Ground in from FX board goes to the ground of the power supply. The power supply has a "ground in" pad which is wired to the star ground. So basically everything eventually hits ground. I just made it convenient because the 9v and ground from run the PSU in a single paired cable to each effect.

The input/output panel has all the sleeves physically connected to the metal plate. The plate then has a single wire running to star. All wire is shielded to ground.

[Auke Haarsma]

I have the pic you send me in my inbox Stephen. If you want me to, I can post it for you.

[sjaltenb]

Updates!

almost Everything is wired up and ready to go, my switch and power supply PCBs should be here soon:


These will hold two LEDs to shine up on the panel and will soon have a black cover over the bottom 1 3/4" of the panel

more wires.



This panel mixes the delays (Delay 1 Repeat volume, delay 2 repeat volume (both are remote rack units) and the 3rd is the parallel mix for the Tube Rotosphere. The switches are Dry Kill (kills the main signal into the mixer) and the 2nd is Serial/Parallel option for the rotosphere

Here are the EQs. All i have to do is glue the faceplate down...

So far its been about 250ft of cable, almost all of it paired, so roughly 550 ft

[liddokun]

Wow. Keep up the great work! I would cry if I had to do all that off board wiring. 

[Papa_lazerous]

Wow you are really getting on with your build now!  Sorry I havent looked in sooner but dropped off the radar here for a little while....  Thanks for the mention about the Ealge work on the PSU. cant wait to see it finished

[sjaltenb]

More pics!! More Progress.

A HUGE thanks to John Lyons for his help buildling the PCBs. I have now populated all the power supplies, and mounted all the switch PCBs. The switches are 3pdts but switch two LEDs, have ground connections for the LEDs and for grounding the input, power for the LEDs and also provide grounds for all the shielded cable.

I got a lot of the wiring and signal routing done.....but theres always more to do

[John Lyons]

Insane!
Glad to help you out.

john

[sjaltenb]

It works!!!

The board is up and running and HO-LY- CRAP its amazing!!! So quiet I dont even believe. The only noise this thing puts out is anything that comes from the guitar. If phase cancel in position 2, I can crank whatever effects I want to the max, Compressor+fuzz+tube driver and nothing, zilch, silence. Until I play a note!

I havent installed the buffers yet, so the tone is a little dull, but So far I am amazed. All the work has payed off. Effects that are up and running:

Skreddy Lunar Module
Colorsound Power Boost
DynaComp
BYOC Muff (triangle) +its GE7
Tube driver 1 and 2
phase 90
microvibe
2nd Ge7 for Distortion
_________________
Still to do:
Fix and install CS2
Wire Master EQ
Add external trimp to CE2 and its done
Build buffers and splitters
wire Delay mixer
wire the electric Mistress
rewire external power jacks (wrong + lug, do'h!)
Add a power supply for the LEDs and Fans
Hum Free amp splitter
___________________________________
Phew! All the power supplies work great, my grounding seems to work great. Theres not TOO much heat but the fans will be for fun.

If you cant tell, the two power board are stacked and very stable. (#8 bolts). Enjoy!

[JKowalski]

That's.... well, that's pretty dam ridiculous! 

Massive achievement. Really good work.



Make a vid of it in action?

[sjaltenb]

Thanks!

I will once all the fun stuff like the LEDs and fans are all done, along with the rest of the effecst.

On a different note...those fans are NOT just for style points I just figured out! With the back off, and most of the power supplies running and power effects (say around 70% of max...NOT counting the 2nd transformer and PSUs for the fans and LEDs)...the temperature around the back of the board was around 120 degrees F! That transformer was putting out some heat!

So i plugged the fans into a wall wart to see if they helped and voila! A healthy ~82F. I imagine that once all the rest is installed, especially the 2nd transfomer and with the back on, it would have only gotten hotter! Good thing I put them in. Plus they are very quiet, and only cost me $12 bucks.

[R O Tiree]

Which way have you got the fans going? I'd think maybe about making the one on the left in that pic above the "exhaust" and the one on the right "intake" - take the air off that hot transformer and dump it straight outside, rather than blow air past it and end up filling the box with hot air as a result?

Those tubes in the Tube Drivers will also add their fair share of heat? You going to get a pair of mini-fans for them as well, blowing the waste heat towards the exhaust?

[sjaltenb]

The board is now fully functional! Besides the LEDs....waiting on a transformer

Everything is installed and working!!! Sorry for no updates lately, but I'll try to take you through with some photos. Lots of wiring!

For reference, this is how the signal chain ended up (final)

Dual Input w/ Switch-
JFET Buffer/Splitter- Out to tuner
Wah Loop w/ Reverse Switch for "Echoes"
Colorsound PowerBoost Clone
Skreddy Lunar Module Fuzz
Boss CS2 Compressor
DIY DynaComp Clone
Chander/Butler Tube Driver #1
Remote Whammy S/R
DIY RAT w/ GE-7 EQ
Spare Distortion Send/Return- Shares RAT GE-7
BYOC Triange Muff w/ GE7 EQ
Chandler/Butler Tube Driver #2
Electric Mistress w/ LBP2 Boost
BYOC Phase 90
VooDoo Lab MicroVibe
Boss CE-2 Chorus
Boss GE-7 EQ
S/R For Hughes and Kettner Rotosphere with Series/parallel mixing
Volume S/R
4 Way JFET Splitter--->

GGG Mixer Inputs: The digital delays only return the repeats to mix with the original analog signal.
1)Dry Input  w/  Defeat switch for checking delays
2)Send Return for TC Electronic D-Two Delay
3)Send Return for 2nd Rack Delay
4)GGG PT-80 delay (onboard) with dry defeat switch

The Dry signal and 3 delays are then sent to a GGG ABY Amp Splitter and Out to amp(s)!

The Board also has 2x 12 Volt fans, blue LED backlighting with dimmer, Red LED indicators with dimmer, 4x250ma isolated external 9VDC outputs, addditional 120v IEC output, and....ZERO NOISE!

Here are the photos:









Now, THANK YOU TO EVERYEONE FOR YOUR HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! it would be impossible to list everyone but special thanks to: R.G., ZedminFX, John Lyons!, Sody54 and every single person who ever responded to a post asking for questions and advice!!!!!!!

More to come soon...

[sjaltenb]

Final (more or less) Gutshots.

[ParlorCitySound]

 
That thing is raw!

I'm really impressed. Great work!!

[themartin]

Hey man,

great board. How are you switching the Boss CE-2 on and off?

Thanks for your time.

Martin

[sjaltenb]

Hi,

The CE2 was modded to stay on all the time (no transistor switching) and the in/outs were put in a true bypass loop.

The enclosure is for sale on ebay, and is listed in the for sale/trade section.

Check itt out if you are interested.

[BadIdeas]

If I talked much, I'd be speechless.