Fairfield Circuitry - The Accountant

aegert · Post by **aegert** » 15 Jan 2014, 16:43

So I have to start off by saying I build pedals. I am an Electrical engineer by Schooling but have moved to the dark side of sales LOL. I can understand a circuit. Sometimes I have to brush the cobwebs away with help but I have found that there are many like me. Some are NOOBS. Some learn over time some have a really good understanding and can do good designs and make fine pedals, but there are very few creative artists, who just transcend and come up with inspired unique designs; that just fill voids. Steadily have been falling in love with Fairfield Circuitry.. Guillaume Fairfield (Mr. Fairfield) is one such pioneer. I have bought 100's of pedals kept a few copied 3x that and sold many of the ones I bought, but I will never part with anything with a Fairfield stamp. They are works of art, visually simplistic, elegantly laid out and packaged and sonically brilliant hitting the exact mark intended.. THANKS Guillaume.. You have a humble fan for life..

Not only is all the above true but in reading his comments on posts here he is, what seams to be, more importantly , a zealot sharer only concerned with spreading information... Living by the actions of if you open yourself up to the world it will beat a path to your door.. Something to be envied.

So... I just got the Fairfield Circuitry Accountant Compressor... I have had tons of Comps on my board but this is like having an URI1176 on my pedal board in an A sized box!... OK Granted no in and out Transformers but it is so evidently a well designed JFET Compressor. I wil have to rip it off to run a ribbon through it for vocals! It will run with a looping synth rig, guitar bass.. If I sound like a commercial I am sorry I am not and have nothing to do with Fairfield. Just blown away... Do yourselves a favor and check it outwith 3 ratio settings: 6:1, 12:1 and 3:1 and 3 input pad setting s of 0db, -8db and -16db you can run this as a near non existent slight coloring comp to a squashing limiter! no guess work. Utterly simple interface...

Here are a couple of shots. Its SMT don't ask me to trace word is its 4layers but i'm sure Guillaume will chime in... For $150 Just buy the thing it will be with you for life!

fairfield · Post by **fairfield** » 15 Jan 2014, 17:25

Wow, I'm floating on a cloud. Thanks for the kind words aegert... I'm speechless...

Really happy to see you feel the 1176, it's a beautiful piece of gear and was indeed an inspiration for this design.

For those looking to trace, the PCB is 2-layers and the routing is pretty straight-forward. Happy hunting!

Back to work!

aegert · Post by **aegert** » 15 Jan 2014, 17:52

All thanks to you

I saw in the blog the 3x3 mixer .. I am really interested in that.. any info out there on it? Does it have loops? lfo? buffers? send/ret inserts? I am looking for a base for a table loop synth rig... it might be it.. save going out and getting a small Mackie Any info woudl be appreciated..

I have a mixer schem with buffered dry wet mix with rtn/snd and insert but I woudl forgo building it if the 3x3 was similar with 3 channs...

aegert · Post by **aegert** » 15 Jan 2014, 17:54

Oh how about some large and xl shirts LOL

coldcraft · Post by **coldcraft** » 15 Jan 2014, 18:15

all that engineering for the PCB and they wire it like that? shame

aegert · Post by **aegert** » 15 Jan 2014, 18:51

coldcraft wrote:all that engineering for the PCB and they wire it like that? shame

commathe · Post by **commathe** » 16 Jan 2014, 01:58

coldcraft wrote:all that engineering for the PCB and they wire it like that? shame

I know right. Such tone loss, what a waste! I'd also be ashamed to have a fellow musician open up the box and see that something on my board had that kind of wiring. What a disgrace!

aegert · Post by **aegert** » 16 Jan 2014, 02:13

commathe wrote:
coldcraft wrote:all that engineering for the PCB and they wire it like that? shame
I know right. Such tone loss, what a waste! I'd also be ashamed to have a fellow musician open up the box and see that something on my board had that kind of wiring. What a disgrace!

Say what you will but I doubt any commenting will ever come up with a circuit this good.. I have serviced amps for 25 years. Some of the best sounding amps I have ever had were rats nests of point to point. ..

Probably best to just live by the adage if you don't have something nice to say ... don't say it...

Tone sucking?

coldcraft · Post by **coldcraft** » 16 Jan 2014, 04:10

not saying anything about the tone, just that the builder should take a little pride in their work. its called a rats nest for a reason. That product would be a nightmare to repair if the 3PDT was to break.

commathe · Post by **commathe** » 16 Jan 2014, 07:18

aegert wrote:
commathe wrote:
coldcraft wrote:all that engineering for the PCB and they wire it like that? shame
I know right. Such tone loss, what a waste! I'd also be ashamed to have a fellow musician open up the box and see that something on my board had that kind of wiring. What a disgrace!
Say what you will but I doubt any commenting will ever come up with a circuit this good.. I have serviced amps for 25 years. Some of the best sounding amps I have ever had were rats nests of point to point. ..

Probably best to just live by the adage if you don't have something nice to say ... don't say it...

Tone sucking?

I was being sarcastic. My point was that such wiring doesn't have any affect on the sound so I don't think it's a bid deal. I also don't think it's that bad at all. I personally prefer a little extra as a service loop. The number of times I've gone in to mod or repair something but it's been put together with the bare minimum amount of wire is countless. In those situations, you have to either solder on extensions or rewire everything yourself. A bit of service loop is a good thing in my opinion. It's hardly a rat's nest.

aegert · Post by **aegert** » 16 Jan 2014, 12:18

Didn't mean to bite off heads...

The length of wire is the least of it.. for all we know there is a trimmer on the other side of the board so to service you have to turn the board over. With way to tight wire you would have to desolder the whole board.. and you know anyone who knows nothing in pedals opens the back of things and says OOOOH! what is that pot?!?! maybe if I turn it I can make it sound better so its hidden away...

My only point was really taking pot shots at something right out of the gate when someone posts something that they are all juiced about is____________________.

coldcraft · Post by **coldcraft** » 16 Jan 2014, 13:01

no heads were bitten. you should take a look inside a VFE pedal sometime to see what I mean.

aegert · Post by **aegert** » 16 Jan 2014, 14:26

coldcraft wrote:no heads were bitten. you should take a look inside a VFE pedal sometime to see what I mean.

I know emasculate wiring I can do it... You never know what or why builders do what they do.. to get to the point IMHO:

slagging a great designer / builder with anyone's own particular brand of the way things "SHOULD" be done is worng.. That's my only point...

jreeves47 · Post by **jreeves47** » 16 Jan 2014, 15:19

Lol at emasculate wiring. Sorry
Immaculate maybe?

aegert · Post by **aegert** » 16 Jan 2014, 15:31

jreeves47 wrote:Lol at emasculate wiring. Sorry
Immaculate maybe?

Perfect stupid keyboard mistake LOL yes couldn't have been better Guffawed..

fairfield · Post by **fairfield** » 16 Jan 2014, 17:12

coldcraft wrote:...just that the builder should take a little pride in their work. its called a rats nest for a reason. That product would be a nightmare to repair if the 3PDT was to break.

What a silly assumption. The team and I do take pride in our work. Putting aside the fact that most repairs are a nightmare, repairing this would be a breeze: note down what goes where, cut and strip wire ends, put in new switch, follow notes on what goes where, solder. It would take about an hour, 40 minutes of complaining about how shitty this repair is and 20 minutes to actually do it.

aegert wrote:All thanks to you I saw in the blog the 3x3 mixer .. I am really interested in that.. any info out there on it? Does it have loops? lfo? buffers? send/ret inserts?

The 3x3 matrix mixer is on hold for now. We had some really perplexing background noise that we weren't able to figure out fast enough. Probably our shitty ass wiring

. We'll definitely revisit the circuit but we have other priorities right now. It's really simple, 3 ins 3 outs and 9 volumes. 1 for each input to every output. So, yes it's buffered, no lfos and it's essentially a send/return machine. You could for example have your guitar at input 1, amp at output 1 and 2 independent effects loops at 2 and 3. These 2 loops could be mixed and fedback(?) in any number of ways. This is nothing revolutionary but I don't recall seeing a matrix mixer intended for effects pedals.

coldcraft · Post by **coldcraft** » 16 Jan 2014, 17:38

this unit retails for $150, correct?

atreidesheir · Post by **atreidesheir** » 16 Jan 2014, 23:13

Guillaume,
looks like you have bought better steel stamps, or are you guys are just getting really skilled at it. I liked the look and tried it, but it is a pain in the ass.

fairfield · Post by **fairfield** » 18 Jan 2014, 00:24

atreidesheir wrote:Guillaume,
looks like you have bought better steel stamps, or are you guys are just getting really skilled at it. I liked the look and tried it, but it is a pain in the ass.

The stamps we use are hardened steel, nothing special really. It took some getting used to but it's actually become quite an easy process, not very long at all. The trick is using a real sturdy table and a block behind what you're punching to eliminate the bounce from the enclosure. We also fill up the punched letters with paint.

atreidesheir · Post by **atreidesheir** » 18 Jan 2014, 03:39

fairfield wrote: We also fill up the punched letters with paint.

I should have figured that out for myself.