Belton Reverb, True Bypass, Tails

Started by Unlikekurt, January 28, 2017, 02:24:28 PM

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Unlikekurt

Was thinking about how my reverb pedal using the Belton brick would be nicer if it had tails when bypassed.
It is a true bypass switching arrangement.
I'm thinking it would be relatively easy, to simply tie the output of the effect circuit to the output jack.
It would no longer be "true bypass" of course, but the tails would carry through and the input to the effect would still be grounded during bypass.
I wouldn't anticipate any really adverse impact on the guitar signal, etc.
Any thoughts?


R.G.

You can't have true bypass and "tails". They're antithetical, but you already knew that.

You can run the dry and delayed signal to a mixer of some kind that goes directly to the output jack. It can be a passive, resistive mixer or some kind of active mixer, but just soldering the delay output to the output jack will give problems unless you work out how they are to be mixed so they don't fight one another.
R.G.

In response to the questions in the forum - PCB Layout for Musical Effects is available from The Book Patch. Search "PCB Layout" and it ought to appear.

Ice-9

Of Course you can't have true bypass and tails, well not at the same time but with some nifty little internal switches you can swap between the two types of bypass. TB/Tails switching.

Anyway your main question of having tails with the belton brick has been done many times and a great effect to have a look at or build is Rob's/deadastronaught's CHASM REVERB. Huge thread about it here, go have a search.
www.stanleyfx.co.uk

Sanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting the same result. Mick Taylor

Please at least have 1 forum post before sending me a PM demanding something.

Unlikekurt

Thanks guys.
And you are correct.  As I noted in the original post "it would no longer be "true-bypass" of course".  So I am not oblivious to that.
And I'm also certain that are elegant ways of addressing the idea of tails with the belton brick.
In short I was asking if anyone had tied the effect output to the output jack and what their results were.

slacker

I don't know exactly what your circuit is but the output is probably a low impedance, if you tie this to the output then it will massively load down and tone suck your guitar when the effect is bypassed, probably to the point that you can't hear the guitar. It's basically like connecting a small value resistor across the tip and sleeve of your guitar cable. Like the others have said you need to buffer the dry signal and then mix the reverb signal with that. Your pedal most likely has all the circuitry needed to modify it to have tails it will just need rewiring a bit. If you post a schematic someone should be able to figure it out.

Kipper4

I wired mine a little differently to that.
I have a switch (toggle) to swap between always on or tails with a momentary footswitch (for the tails)


Edit
my mistake I did this to a rebote delay not a belton reverb.
Ma throats as dry as an overcooked kipper.


Smoke me a Kipper. I'll be back for breakfast.

Grey Paper.
http://www.aronnelson.com/DIYFiles/up/

anotherjim

In principle, you have the standard reverb pedal signal flow.
Signal in > Feedback mix > Delay > Output mix with Signal in > Signal out.
To kill the reverb but keep the tails, you cut Signal-in before the feedback mix, but, of course, leave Signal in connected to the Output mix. Whatever is already in the delay will decay over some time according to how much feedback is happening.

How you cut the signal-in to the delay is up to you. With careful design, another stomp switch might give almost click free operation, but a better method is electronic switching like Rob used in the Chasm. That is identical in principle to electronic bypass switching as in Boss & other pedals.

Around all that, you can have standard true bypass switching for when you want to completely cut the effect from your signal path.

If you insist on trying direct connection at the out jack, I dunno - it might work if it's connected via 2 resistors about 47k-100k - yes one resistor would be always in the bypass path and I think you will need it there . As Slacker already said, you can't simply tie actively driven outputs together without consequences, hence the use of resistors. I would expect some volume loss/tone suck anyway and wouldn't bother to try it myself.


Unlikekurt

Figured I would finish this up.
Lifted the inout to the Belton brick (pin3) from the pcb and installed a jfet as a switch inbetween.  Biased the brick side of the jfet to vb via a 1M.
Then wired pcb input and output directly to the input and output jacks.
Worked a treat.