1176 Mnats Rev D finished!

[Futureman]

wooo..

I'm so please.

Sure, it was a 'dot the dots' sort of assembly, but this thing kicks arse.

A kick drum and a synth pad never sounded so good together.. nice and pumpy.

Just gotta wire up the lamp, and calibrate it.. but it works perfectly, and very quiet noise floor.

[13thbeach]

Wow what a good job. it looks great. Sure it sounds great also

[prequalizer]

Most people twist those wires together, especially certain power wires but if it works for you, untwisted, more power to you.

If you sell, some people who look at the internals and notice a messy wiring could look at it as not a clean internal build but it looks great though : ).

[heathen]

Nice job.

[Futureman]

Most people twist those wires together, especially certain power wires but if it works for you, untwisted, more power to you.

If you sell, some people who look at the internals and notice a messy wiring could look at it as not a clean internal build but it looks great though : ).

Well, in my defence, I havent cable tied anything down yet. (I had only just finished testing it)
All audio cables are shielded.
As for selling... yea.. fat chance on that one.

Next one is a bit more ghetto style with a few choices of input transformers.
I'm thinking of going from a jaycar $8 special, UTC12 and some salvaged trannies

[waitup]

Good work man! I'm populating the pcb for my rev D at the moment. If I run into dramas wiring it, expect a PM in your inbox!

[chris p]

Nice job Mike - I love the full on retro look you achieved.

Don't knock DIY when its just populating boards and wiring it all up. You still get to learn a great deal about the unit, and about audio design, in doing just that.

I've never really got the idea of twisting power cables, except for neatness and ease of cable tying. Unshielded audio, yes, but power?

And now the question on everyone DIYer's mind - how did you do your front panel legends? (I have just tried a different solution for front panels, but I'll post that once I've got the guts built).

[JEvans_AU]

Hey Mike, how hard was this to build? I am used to doing the usual mic cable stuff but it has been a while since i have done any large circuit board stuff, also is this similar/the same as the DIY build Dobz is doing on GS? cheers Jono

[waitup]

Hairball case?

[Futureman]

Yep, Hairball case - Mike (Hairball) is brilliant, and for neat, spiffy looking DIY, that case is a godsend. Everything fits together nicely... I actually made another case from a salvaged bit of stuff, and that looks fine, but the hairball case is bitchin... For my second one, I was going to use my ghetto case, but the more I think about it, the more I'm thinking about getting another from Hairball.

As for difficulty, It's not thaaaat tricky. I've made more complex things before. But as always, be prepared to read read read read, and read some more.. I was lucky in that it worked right off the bat.

Someone asked me about links and price that it cost me for this... Hard to say exactly as I got enough parts for 2, and staggered my ordering as new things came available (So payed more than I needed to).. but I'd guestimate $500-$600 for 1 Rev D. Some of the other Rev's are cheaper (No T-Pad, and input tranny).
http://www.prodigy-pro.com/diy/index.ph ... ;topicseen
http://hairballaudio.com/shop/

Hairball also have a BOM for all parts from mouser, which is what I used.. (Exluding the T-Pad attenuator, Input Transformer, output transformer , VU & case and power Tranny etc)

Regards
Mike

[Mac]

Hey Mike,
good job - congratulations.
I know how awesome it feels to have these working, especially as you spend far more time doing the wiring than stuffing the boards!!

Take your time with the calibration setup - and dont be afraid to lift the lid and keep fiddling with the settings. As you probably already know calibration is EVERYTHING with 1176's.
I have 3 and am about to jump on a Rev A in one of Mikes Blue Stripe cases. Calibration can make or break them.

Enjoy.

Mac.

PS....I have Aussie parts BOM's if anyone is interested with parts numbers from Active, Rockby and Jaycar.

[astrovic]

Real nice Mike!

And now the question on everyone DIYer's mind - how did you do your front panel legends? (I have just tried a different solution for front panels, but I'll post that once I've got the guts built).

Ooh err, I'm looking forward to this. I've pretty much given up and haven't got to the point of being prepared to shell out for FPD or anything like.

While we're talking 1176's - I got a dual A & D done in Jan:

[Futureman]

I was thinking of making a Rev A also.. whats your thoughts compared to the Rev D ?

As for my face.. I cheated and got my case from hairball.

Regards
Mike

[Futureman]

I finished this up a week ago, but had to wait till I could get a nice 10Watt resistor for the VU lamp.

Very pleased.

I should have my second one done in a week me thinks.

[astrovic]

man, so nice and neat! Great work.

I'm very impressed with the Rev A. It has a great sound - more coloured than the later Revisions IMO. It does have a higher noise floor, of course, but really there'd be very very few situations in which the difference in noise levels would matter.

[rick]

hey mike
that looks very impressive - as good as i have seen actually
what did it cost you ? (minus your time of coarse )

[Futureman]

hey mike
that looks very impressive - as good as i have seen actually
what did it cost you ? (minus your time of coarse )

Cheers.

The Case + All audio Transformers + Power Transformer + input attenuator + Push buttons + Knobs + VU = $420 incl postage (From Hairball Audio in the States)

PCB is about $20 from Mnats (Australia)

All other components , including IEC sockets, XLR sockets, Conductive plastic output pot ra ra ra - $100 (Actually, the parts price is less, but I doubled my mouser order up and inflated it until it was $200, after which postage was free.. So, instead of 1 resistor, I got 10 etc..)

= Approx $540 total.

Regards
Mike

[prequalizer]

hey mike
that looks very impressive - as good as i have seen actually
what did it cost you ? (minus your time of coarse )

Cheers.

The Case + All audio Transformers + Power Transformer + input attenuator + Push buttons + Knobs + VU = $420 incl postage (From Hairball Audio in the States)

PCB is about $20 from Mnats (Australia)

All other components , including IEC sockets, XLR sockets, Conductive plastic output pot ra ra ra - $100 (Actually, the parts price is less, but I doubled my mouser order up and inflated it until it was $200, after which postage was free.. So, instead of 1 resistor, I got 10 etc..)

= Approx $540 total.

Regards
Mike

1 doubled to 10, thats more than double? Are you saying if you buy 10, you would pay for the price of 2 components?

Did you pay $20 USD for the Mants board, because it sais $20 USD for the boards or did you pay $20 Australian dollars.

[Sammas]

hey mike
that looks very impressive - as good as i have seen actually
what did it cost you ? (minus your time of coarse )

Cheers.

The Case + All audio Transformers + Power Transformer + input attenuator + Push buttons + Knobs + VU = $420 incl postage (From Hairball Audio in the States)

PCB is about $20 from Mnats (Australia)

All other components , including IEC sockets, XLR sockets, Conductive plastic output pot ra ra ra - $100 (Actually, the parts price is less, but I doubled my mouser order up and inflated it until it was $200, after which postage was free.. So, instead of 1 resistor, I got 10 etc..)

= Approx $540 total.

Regards
Mike

1 doubled to 10, thats more than double? Are you saying if you buy 10, you would pay for the price of 2 components?

Did you pay $20 USD for the Mants board, because it sais $20 USD for the boards or did you pay $20 Australian dollars.

Resistors are like 2cents a pop or something insanely cheap. The vast majority of electronics retailers sell them in packs of 10, particularly for 1/4watt resistors. It isn't really possible to just buy 2. It's a good thing though. I have a nice collection of resistors and caps now that I just start building and once I run out of parts then I make an order.


As far as the Mnat's boards. You use to be able to get "mates rates" if you were located from Australia. Now I believe it's just $20us regardless. Not the end of the world though. It's only an extra $2.

[Futureman]

Did you pay $20 USD for the Mants board, because it sais $20 USD for the boards or did you pay $20 Australian dollars.

right... so, to have full disclosure.

Yes, the board cost me $20 USD = $21.55 AU.

Sorry guys, I should have elaborated.

[Futureman]

Resistors are like 2cents a pop or something insanely cheap. The vast majority of electronics retailers sell them in packs of 10, particularly for 1/4watt resistors. It isn't really possible to just buy 2. It's a good thing though. I have a nice collection of resistors and caps now that I just start building and once I run out of parts then I make an order.

True dat.

Mouser does actually let you buy one resistor etc, but as you mentioned, it's good to have extra bits.

I bought quiet a few spares of those 'hard to get' diodes and the odd/strange resistor values.. eg 12.523k .. not your standard jaycar value.. lol.. If people are sourcing parts locally, and are having a hard time sourcing them, gimme a yell.

[mfdu]

if you are really anal about it (umm, who isn't?) then a 10pack of resistors allows you to sort and match for exact values.
there's a variance across values, so if you need multiple components you want to pick for equivalent values.
a 10K pack may vary from 9.4K to 9.9K.

getting those things right enables me to listen to the difference between things like capacitors or trannies
if you're not bent on building exact clones . . .


or is it just me?



even measuring each component value, i have three different flavours of 1176 (rev g, rev h, gold can caps vs. redcaps vs. greencaps, OEP trannie in/out vs. elec.bal in/trannie out vs. vs. wierd old Astor trannies etc) and a non-working 4th channel!
some transistor has packed up, so i have to chase the voltages all the way round to find the faulty component.


and i thought i was doing so well!

[Mac]

Hey Chris,
No it isn't just you. I always check my resistors on the way to the board I am populating, and tend to skip over ones that are out of tollerance.

Truth be told, there's lots of places on a circuit it probably doesnt matter, but when I was building my linkable dual mono 1176, and signal path of my GSSL I was really anal - some parts of the circuit a small difference can make a big difference between stereo channels.

the joys of DIY.... you get to be anal about component selection and matching.....

Mac

[Futureman]

Woo!

Second one down.

This is still a Rev D.. but different output transformer than my other one. (This one EA-5002, the last one was a cinemag.. will be good to see what (if much) is the difference.

I've yet to calibrate it and pin down the wiring, but it's all kicking nicely!

I had a nice french disco style track running through it.. oh la la.

I really want to put a sidechain input on this one.. but I think I'll need a little help with that.

[Alistair]

Looks great!

Is the cost of the unit essentially-

Mnat's board at $26 USD or whatever depending on unit?

Hairball kit- FET Compressor Rev A/D Kit with Enclosure $350.00 USD (this seems to include all trannies and odd parts)

Plus a whole bunch of caps and resistors from Mouser (as per the parts list in the 1176 PDF on the prodigy pro site). ~$100USD

plus 20-50 hours of your life you can never get back?

Seems like a pretty great price and probably a bit of fun. Is this how you bought everything? Or is it common to upgrade the transformers etc.?

[Futureman]

Seems like a pretty great price and probably a bit of fun. Is this how you bought everything? Or is it common to upgrade the transformers etc.?

Pretty much exactly what you said..

As for the transformers.. you have two options for the outputs.. (well 3, if you could find a NOS output transformer from an original 1176)

Buy one from Hairball with all your other bits.. or buy one from cinemag.

When I started, Hairball were not selling much.. just the T-pad attenuator. so I bought my trannies from cinemag. then for the second one, I got them from hairball. Now they pretty much sell everything hardware for the 1176, except the components.
I haven't put them side by side, but I think I like the EA-5002 better (sold through hairball)

As for the 10-20 hours of your life.. yep, depends how quick you are. The second one sounded completely wrong when i finished it.. horrible asymetric distortion, I spent about 2 hours with it and a scope, trying to source the problem.. then I saw that I missed a resistor! fool! . I must have looked closely at that board 1000 times . after I put the resistor in. Bing! 100%.

Regards
Mike

[Alistair]

Yeah, the big comment on all of the FAQ's etc is 'check the components before they go in the board, and check the board ten times!'.

The board doesn't look very big, but it's so densely populated I can imagine it's easy to miss things.

The biggest cost increase seems to be getting the enclosure from Hairball- another $120 US plus an increase in shipping. I've found this http://www.diy-racked.com/diy-talk/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=18. If you scroll down they have a dual/stereo 1176 enclosure which is pretty cool, and at about $210 AUD shipped not that much more than a single from Hairball.

It would be pretty cool to have a nice stereo comp for around $1000 built... I just have to decide whether I've got the skills (ie patience) to build two.

[ghengis]

The biggest cost increase seems to be getting the enclosure from Hairball- another $120 US plus an increase in shipping. I've found this http://www.diy-racked.com/diy-talk/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=18. If you scroll down they have a dual/stereo 1176 enclosure which is pretty cool, and at about $210 AUD shipped not that much more than a single from Hairball.

It would be pretty cool to have a nice stereo comp for around $1000 built... I just have to decide whether I've got the skills (ie patience) to build two.

I've made a couple of 1176s using cases from Hairball and I think their cases are 100% worth it compared to the diy-racked (purusha) cases. The Purusha ones are ok, but I have built several and they can be a bit of a pain in terms of having things the exact fit. He also doesn't like pot nuts on the outside which means a hidden layer behind the front panel. While aesthetically nice, they are a bit of a pain to get together. Hairball does 1 case and does it exceptionally well and well laid out - highly recommended just to buy it all from him, it will end up easier in the long run. If you are going for the push buttons it is the only choice - he supplies all of the mounting hardware.

If you are wanting other cases for different projects (eg La2, or mic pres) as well as the 1176, then the choice to combine shipping brings the diy-racked cases back into favour. Also, if you are doing rotary versions of 1176 then it is also beneficial to go with the diy-rack cases.

cya
Geoff

[Futureman]

I guess my experience with hairball has been great... sure, postage is a few bucks, but their cases fit together so perfectly, and are nicely made. Also, you can get the transformers, knobs, switches, attenuator's & VU's all in one hit.
You can even buy a tiny PCB for the attenuator to make wiring it simpler.

$500 for a absolute bitching compressor is wellllllll worth it. Especially if you have the time to build it.

I enjoy DIY and projects.. even repairing stuff.. it's a challenge.. and also for me, A kind of confidence thing, in that you fix or build a distortion pedal.. wow, it sounds good.. I think the next thing I'll build / fix will be more complicated.. hey.. it worked.. That envelope filter doesn't look so tricky after all, I'll tackle that. Pretty soon your finding and replacing faulty 4000 series digital IC's in your deltalabs delay that you love and cherish.

Regards
Mike

[Alistair]

Good to hear those opinions on the quality/ease. I have to wonder if Hairball is considering bringing out a stereo enclosure considering they are now selling link PCB's. Maybe a better (if larger and heaver!) option is to just build two, install the separate link boards in each unit, and find a way to run a switching jack/cables inbetween, so you have the option of linking.