I took apart an old mouse, and between the wheel thingies, where i expected to find an LED-LDR pair, i found something slightly different. The LED was an infared, but the LDR had three pins. On the board, it was labeled "- + -", in the same place that the LED was labelled for polarity.
SO i ripped em off, and wired input jack - LDR thing - output jack, and put the LED across from it, with a switch to turn it on and off. no boost or anything in front.
What i found amazed me! With the LED on, it was pretty much clean, un effected. However, with the led off, it sounded almost as if it was passed through diode clipping stage....dirty, passive, distortion. THis is why i think i found a phototransistor.
I couldn't get it to work using the third pin of the LDR thing/phototransistor.
Cool :-D
I should try putting the LED on an LFO, but im too lazy right now.
ANd im not sure what happens in complete dark. It was under an altoids tin, when i tried, but some light leaked.
I found a couple of these (hfe 4-250) about a month ago, and have been playing with them ever since. I can't find any more discrete units, though. The 6 DIP stuff just doesn't have the same feel.
I've been using them in the input stage, feeding the light back off of the output. Ridiculous fun.
Does anyone have a source for discrete phototrannies?
Quote from: TravisDoes anyone have a source for discrete phototrannies?
Most of the 'surplus' guys have them, eg.
http://www.allelectronics.com/cgi-bin/category.cgi?category=search&item=PTR-1&type=store