Rangemaster wiring (n00b alert)

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thom
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Post by thom »

I decided to give my old rangemaster project another try. Bought as a kit years ago, assembled it, threw it in my "fail box" because I was too lazy at that time to debug it.

I know there's a number of things that could be wrong, but I tought it'd make sense to go over the obvious stuff, to make sure I didn't make some silly wiring mistake. I can't find the original wiring layout for it though, so I was hoping someone here could point me to a layout that would work for this schematic.

The led/dc bus 3PDT schematics I found on the net don't even vaguely resemble what I'm looking at, so I'm curious if:

a) I was drunk when I build it and screwed pretty much all ofboard connections.
b) The wiring is unorthodox but functional, and something else is wrong.

The bypassed signal sounds fine, I get no sound at all when the effect is supposed to be working. And I'm not sure if this helps in any way...: But when I pull out the guitar cable from the input jack, I noticed that when the tip of the cable touches the shorter lug of the input jack (the one that's supposed to connect with the guitar cable jack's sleeve) I get a pretty normal guitar sound when then effect's turned on. It's not distorted though, and not boosted at all either. It's actually a little less loud then the bypassed circuit, and the level pot doesn't influence the signal.

If you guys need the schematic to be able to help, I'll dig it up and post it too.

Thanks a lot.
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DrNomis
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Post by DrNomis »

thom wrote:I decided to give my old rangemaster project another try. Bought as a kit years ago, assembled it, threw it in my "fail box" because I was too lazy at that time to debug it.

I know there's a number of things that could be wrong, but I tought it'd make sense to go over the obvious stuff, to make sure I didn't make some silly wiring mistake. I can't find the original wiring layout for it though, so I was hoping someone here could point me to a layout that would work for this schematic.

The led/dc bus 3PDT schematics I found on the net don't even vaguely resemble what I'm looking at, so I'm curious if:

a) I was drunk when I build it and screwed pretty much all ofboard connections.
b) The wiring is unorthodox but functional, and something else is wrong.

The bypassed signal sounds fine, I get no sound at all when the effect is supposed to be working. And I'm not sure if this helps in any way...: But when I pull out the guitar cable from the input jack, I noticed that when the tip of the cable touches the shorter lug of the input jack (the one that's supposed to connect with the guitar cable jack's sleeve) I get a pretty normal guitar sound when then effect's turned on. It's not distorted though, and not boosted at all either. It's actually a little less loud then the bypassed circuit, and the level pot doesn't influence the signal.

If you guys need the schematic to be able to help, I'll dig it up and post it too.

Thanks a lot.


I think I see what could be causing your Rangemaster to not work properly,on the circuit board,R7 seems to be going to the negative supply when it really should be going to ground,this is causing the output to be held negative at the full battery voltage,hope that helps......... :)
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thom
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Post by thom »

Wow thanks. You sure though, can anyone else comfirm this? Apparantly I'm not knowledgeable enough myself, and the schematic/layout comes from a pretty reputable supplier of kits and part...:scratch:

Thanks.

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Post by mysticwhiskey »

Don't know if you've already found these, but here's the RangeMaster project page from the musikding website:

http://diy.musikding.de/content/view/74/8/

The wiring layout diagram is here:

http://diy.musikding.de/images/Rangemas ... ahtung.jpg

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Post by DrNomis »

Here's the schematic from the same website.... :)


Note,I had assumed that they had set the circuit board up for a positive grounding system,when it is actually a negative ground system (this catches me out every time).... :oops:
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thom
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Post by thom »

mysticwhiskey wrote:Don't know if you've already found these, but here's the RangeMaster project page from the musikding website:

http://diy.musikding.de/content/view/74/8/

The wiring layout diagram is here:

http://diy.musikding.de/images/Rangemas ... ahtung.jpg
Damn, don't know how I overlooked that, I only found a schematic/layout of a new rangemaster version on their site.

Looks like my wiring is okay though, guess I should look for the problem elsewhere:(

Also, I don't suppose it'd be a good idea to check if the transistor is working by trying an ac128 I have laying around?

Thanks.

Edit: I just no noticed I forgot the ofboard cap...Could that be the problem, and is it fixable or did I maybe already fry something?
Edit2: Seems like there could be something wired wrong after all. So just to make sure: How is the pot in that wiring layout orientated? Shaft up or down? Thanks.

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Post by mysticwhiskey »

thom wrote:I just no noticed I forgot the ofboard cap...Could that be the problem...
I don't think it would cause the circuit to stop working if you left it out. That's just there for power supply filtering.
thom wrote:...and is it fixable...
Sure, just add the cap in :)
thom wrote:How is the pot in that wiring layout orientated? Shaft up or down?
Shaft up. But even if you had it wired backwards, the circuit would still work (albeit the boost control would work backwards).

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thom
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Post by thom »

Thanks a lot.

So how about that transistor? Would an ac128 work to at least test the circuit?

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Post by DrNomis »

thom wrote:Thanks a lot.

So how about that transistor? Would an ac128 work to at least test the circuit?

Yes,it should work fine provided that it is a good one with a gain of at least 100,you can also try a transistor with a gain of 75,but probably not anything lower than that,if you measure the voltage on the transistor's "C" terminal with a multimeter (red probe on circuit ground),you should see at least about -4.5-7 Volts,if so,that means the circuit is biasing up properly.... :)
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