Holden - Phase 3

bajaman · Post by **bajaman** » 28 Jan 2009, 08:34

Hi folks
I was literally blown away when a customer dropped by with one of these pedals today - he wanted me to fit a dc input socket, which i did AFTER first taking some pictures. Mike Lewis and Bill LeGros built a few of these in the early seventies and I have not seen one for many years. It still works fine too!!!
Note the use of foam plastic to wrap the circuit board and prevent it shorting out against the metal case.
Some of the phase tone experts may know what it was ca clone of - then again maybe it was a completely original design.
enjoy the pictures - sorry for the shaky hands

bajaman
members/bajaman/Holden%20Phase%203/

uncleboko · Post by **uncleboko** » 28 Jan 2009, 10:02

Many thanks for that, with 741s it must have been made in the 1970s and a very basic 4 stager I should think.

For these photos, best to lean the board upright against a glass or something, on a flat surface on a bright sunny day - in the kitchen perhaps, then stand the camera on the same surface raised to the correct height on a book or similar. Switch off flash, hold camera firmly on surface and picture should be good and clear.

DiscoFreq · Post by **DiscoFreq** » 28 Jan 2009, 15:05

Ah, finally I see one of those Holden pedals

I'm still looking for pictures of the Holden Fuzz (and other Holden pedals?)

kiwiandy · Post by **kiwiandy** » 28 Jan 2009, 15:23

Hi,

Sorry no Kiwi innovative design inside, I'm afraid. They were pretty much an MXR Phase 90 clone, with a few minor component value changes. The second control varied the feedback (I don't remember exactly how). A pretty good sounding phaser, all the same- the only problem was that the box was a little to small to change batteries easily- maybe that's why the owner wanted a DC socket.
I've got a yellow one somewhere, with a phenolic pcb- otherwise looks about the same.

Fuzzer · Post by **Fuzzer** » 28 Jan 2009, 16:19

Yes, I'm inclined to say it's a Phase 90 clone.

bajaman · Post by **bajaman** » 28 Jan 2009, 20:24

Hi folks - please bear in mind that New Zealand had a fortress economy built around it in the 70s.
You were NOT allowed to bring imported electronic musical equipment into NZ easily - import licences etc.
The folks at Holden built a very good clone for the eager NZ musicians who wanted that new sound that Jimi was getting.
Hell - at one stage Fender Twin reverbs were imported as chassis "spare parts" - no transformers or combo enclosures. They were built locally - the cabinets were made of chipboard - the covering was very thin vinyl, the transformers were shit ( it took three manufacturers to build a decent output transformer) and the speakers were all different. they were silver faced models too. i still see them for service, but they are not worth as much as the genuine made in U.S.A Fender product on the second hand market.
Oh yes - you had to be registered as a church organization if you wanted to import a Hammond Organ

We were all behind the 8 ball here in NZ until the import license restrictions were finally lifted when the 1984 Labour government swept to power.

( unfortunately this spelt the death knell for many NZ manufacturers

)
bajaman

kiwiandy · Post by **kiwiandy** » 29 Jan 2009, 01:40

Hi Bajaman,

I wasn't trying to knock Holden for cloning the MXR unit. I imagine that they offered their effect line more as a service to local musicians than as a profit-making venture, given the R&D and manufacturing setup costs involved for such a small population (consisting of mainly farmers and rugby players at the time).
Anyhow, many of the big US brands in the early 70's (Ross, DOD etc.) "borrowed" circuits quite freely from MXR too (or vice versa)- and there are not really that many ways to implement a phaser circuit, especially with 70's technology and the availability of parts in NZ at the time.
As you know, Holden's bread and butter was their wonderful range of valve amps, which were head and shoulders above anything else available in NZ. I've repaired several dozen of them and the problems have always been minor.

Andy

bajaman · Post by **bajaman** » 29 Jan 2009, 03:54

Greetings Kiwiandy
what part of NZ are you situated in?
Yes - I agree - the Holden Valve amps were superb beasts - i still have a few 200watt heads and slaves in my workshop too.
cheers
bajaman

kiwiandy · Post by **kiwiandy** » 30 Jan 2009, 06:32

Hi Bajaman,

I'm up in Auckland, but please don't hold that against me,

, I'm very fond of Christchurch too (Andy Brown runs a very good Whisky shop there, with free samples to boot!).

Do you know of any other effects produced by Holden?- I seem to recall a spring reverb unit, and a maybe fuzz (which I think could also trace its ancestry to MXR) .

A few years ago I saw some Action Fuzz units- they looked to be pretty much a copy of the 1st Maestro (tirangular w/ germanium trannies) Fuzz boxes. A friend of mine got hold of the left-over stock (mostly cases and knobs) and was keen on completing them- I'll try to track him down a post some photos.

Andy

DiscoFreq · Post by **DiscoFreq** » 30 Jan 2009, 07:02

kiwiandy wrote:Hi Bajaman,

I'm up in Auckland, but please don't hold that against me, , I'm very fond of Christchurch too (Andy Brown runs a very good Whisky shop there, with free samples to boot!).

Do you know of any other effects produced by Holden?- I seem to recall a spring reverb unit, and a maybe fuzz (which I think could also trace its ancestry to MXR) .

A few years ago I saw some Action Fuzz units- they looked to be pretty much a copy of the 1st Maestro (tirangular w/ germanium trannies) Fuzz boxes. A friend of mine got hold of the left-over stock (mostly cases and knobs) and was keen on completing them- I'll try to track him down a post some photos.

Andy

Action Fuzz? What's that?

bajaman · Post by **bajaman** » 30 Jan 2009, 08:06

Holden also made a spring reverb unit - analogguru has the schematic on his site.
They also made a tape echo unit utilising an 8 track cartridge mechanism, and a fuzz box in a similar case to the phase 3.
These do come through my workshop on odd occasions - I promise to take pictures when I encounter them next.
Under Mike Lewis, Holden produced many solid state devices. The most popular being the Holden DC208 Graphic head (200 watts into 8 ohms, with two channels and a 7 band graphic eq section - one of the channels used a switchable distortion section with the same type of bypass switching as the early Hot Cakes).
Lots of bass players used these with two 8 ohm 15s too get 300 watts into 4 ohms, although they were never designed for 4 ohm operation.
There was also a hybrid model with a 100watt 4 x EL34 or 2 x KT88 output stage, which became popular with guitar players.
A third variation which is VERY rare was called the Professional - it had a completely different solid state front end with reverb and tremelo and a 4 x KT88 200 watt output stage. Mike told me they only made about 6 of these - they were just too expensive to build. I know someone who still has one of these - I will get photos etc in the future.
Yet another very popular model was the Holden DC208 slave (200 watt into 8 ohm power amplifier).
Not to forget the stereo version - the Holden DC408 ( 2 x 200watt into 8 ohm power amplifiers)
and of course - the Holden DC208M a mono power amplifier with a six channel mixer stage for the front end.
Mike produced many small 8 channel and 16 channel mixers as well as some very large professional mixing consoles which were used in many New Zealand nightclubs in the 80s. He also ran a small hire section - so local bands were never short of a good PA system at a reasonable price for the weekend.
What happened?????????????????
In 1984, the labour government soared to power in a landslide victory against the previous protectionist Tory government.
One of the first things labour did was enact the New Zealand nuclear free legislation ( still in place today!) float the Kiwi dollar, and remove all import licensing restrictions, allowing previously unavailable musical equipment to be imported freely into NZ.
Mike battled on with some fine new mixer and power amplifier designs, but he was fighting a losing battle and in the early 90s he quietly closed up his factory and took a job as an audio consultant - systems engineer for a local Audio and video hire company called Shipley's. He worked for Shipley's up until his retirement a couple of years ago, but he still finds time to play fine guitar in a local 4 piece country rock style band. He still lives locally - i must drop in and have a cuppa with him someday - see if i can get him to join the forum - he would have some interesting stories to tell about the heyday of New Zealand music before disco's and karaoke bars and amateurs pretending to play with backing tracks came along.
cheers
bajaman

george giblet · Post by **george giblet** » 30 Jan 2009, 17:08

Trace:

I just hacked an existing schematic.

Basically a Phase 90 with feedback.

The feedback causes a gain loss which is compensated by increasing the gain of the transistor stage. This type of feedback is similar to the EH small-stone.

Holden used to make Wasp amplifiers in Australia and New-Zealand.

FredFarkus · Post by **FredFarkus** » 30 Jan 2009, 17:42

Essentially a Phase90 with variable feedback. Nice...

Thanks for the trace.

Check the box. Another mystery solved.

kiwiandy · Post by **kiwiandy** » 31 Jan 2009, 01:12

Hi all,

Thanks for posting the schematic George,- the enhance pot wires had broken off mine and I could never figure out how to fix it. There are a couple of differences in component values on mine, that make it closer to the original MXR circuit- R1 = 10k and R17 = 150k. I might have an earlier version, though, as the PCB is phenolic not fibreglass.

By the way, here's a link to some more info on Holden amps- with some pictures, and more info on their history-

http://www.ozvalveamps.elands.com/holden.htm

As for the Action Fuzz, I'm afraid I don't have much more info at the moment. They were manufactured in Christchurch, by the "Electronics Division of New Zealand Musical Industries Ltd." There was a band around Christchurch in the mid 60's called Chants R & B, who released a single "Action". I guess that the Action Fuzz was intended to cash in on the success of the single. It was manufactured by Bernie Bisphan, who also built amps for the band. The few that I've seen looked like the old Maestro fuzz (inside and out)- had a fuzz and a volume control, and either the input or output cable attached to the box, rather than two sockets. I'll post some photos if I can track one down.
Maybe you know some more, Bajaman?

george giblet · Post by **george giblet** » 31 Jan 2009, 03:48

> that make it closer to the original MXR circuit- R1 = 10k and R17 = 150k.

Thanks, can you read the date codes on your ICs? I'll add it to the schematic.

Actually, I wasn't 100% sure if R1 was 10k even on the the fibreglass board. The multiplier band looks more like the yellow bands on the other resistors and the 330k change/difference supports this.

Those WASP amps were quite common in the late 70's but I don't see at all now. They used to make cabinets too. I had a 15" bass cab and a friend of mine had a 4x12" quad box.

(Aren't essentially and basically the same thing?)

kiwiandy · Post by **kiwiandy** » 31 Jan 2009, 04:24

I just found the box for my phaser, and it just says "phaser" on the front (model 1 presumably?). I guess there must have been a "Phase 2" model too. This may account for any circuit differences, though.

There are unfortunately no date codes on the 741's- they are NS devices- LM741CN, the only other number on the IC case is 346, next to the NS logo, but I don't think it's a date code.

I noticed a couple of other differences- R25 = 2M2, and the PNP is a BC557. These are definitely different to the pics posted by Bajaman, so your original values for the other resistors may be correct.

As far as I know, Holden changed their name to Wasp for the OZ market to avoid confusion with the car brand. Most KT88 models had the same circuit, but I think there were some different EL34 models on either side of the Tasman- there were some NZ models with reverb and tremolo that looked and sounded more like Fenders.

george giblet · Post by **george giblet** » 31 Jan 2009, 05:18

I just found the box for my phaser, and it just says "phaser" on the front (model 1 presumably?). I guess there must have been a "Phase 2" model too. This may account for any circuit differences, though.

Hmmm, sounds like there's more to the history doesn't it. They could also be playing with words because Phase 3 was hotted-up Ford car (and competitor to Holden) of the same era,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GTHO_Phase_III

perhaps implying it's a hotted-up phaser - who knows!

Thanks for checking it out. If I had to guess I say the 346 code means week 46 of 1973. Not an unreasonable date considering the "Phase 3" is 1977.

I'll just leave the schem as is for now.

DiscoFreq · Post by **DiscoFreq** » 31 Jan 2009, 08:40

An old auction without images: http://www.trademe.co.nz/Browse/Listing ... =106272982

And here they show a Holden FuzFaze:
http://www.talkbass.com/forum/showthread.php?t=326606

Looks great

DiscoFreq · Post by **DiscoFreq** » 02 Feb 2009, 08:46

https://cgi.ebay.com.au/VINTAGE-70s-HOL ... RCH:AU:101

DiscoFreq · Post by **DiscoFreq** » 11 Feb 2009, 12:08

I just received pictures of the Holden Phuzz 2 (no gut shots):
http://filters.muziq.be/model/holden/phuzz/2