repairing a broken delay pedal

[kingnimrod]

I had an old tokai analog delay that someone gave me that sounded great until it crapped out on me...

Today I decided to try to fix it and put it into a new box, but I am running into difficulties.

When it started to malfunction, basically it just passed a clean signal with no effect. To get the delay to work, I had to mash around on the case or maybe push down on the input jack -- in other words, something went screwy. I thought maybe just re-soldering the input jack would do the trick, but no luck. It powers on (I replaced the power jack and installed a new on/off switch) but still only passes a clean signal.

Nothing looks broken on the top of the circuit board, and at this point I don't see any broken solder joints on the back. Can anyone  point out what I might look for in trying to solve this problem?

Once I get it fixed, I'm installing it in a nice big die-cast box and painting it metal-flake lime gold and sapphire blue, and will give it a crazy name. Hoping to mystify my friends with it.

Oh yeah - for cool cases you can look at http://www.cheaperthandirt.com and look for the ammo boxes

[Fret Wire]

I'm sure someone could make an amp chassis out of it. Those ammo cans are great for general purpose storage, real rugged.

[kingnimrod]

well, I fixed the main problem - There were a couple of broken solder joints on of the little trim thingies (I really need to get a book). I just resoldered them, and tested with a little casio keyboard and battery-powered amp. It works!! This thing makes some sick UFO sounds with the feedback set high!

Today I'm going to try to find the right switch, and will paint the box.  This thing started its life as the Tokai TDL-1, but it will be reborn as the ZOMBULATOR. I will post pix once it's done.

Do they make momentary switches with the same heavy-duty fat metal cap construction as the on/off switch I used? I'm assuming they do, as I believe that's what's on my Rat and Blue box.

One other mod I made to this pedal was to remove the 9v battery conectors, making it a wallwart-only device. I suppose I could add this back in later, but I just didn't want to mess with jamming a 9v in there.

As for the ammo cases - look in the "military surplus" section.

[Rodgre]

Hey Kingnimrod, nice to see you over here.

Roger

[kingnimrod]

messing around with the pedal ( well, the guts sitting on my desk here) gave me an idea -

is there a way to install something between the board and the delay time pot so I could throw a switch that would give me either fluctuating back/forth delay settings or some kind of slurring randomness (meaning it's not jumping around between random values, but going up and down the value range between them -- furthermore, if that IS possible, could I add another pot that controls the rate at which it does this?

that would be very exciting!