malekko chicklet (1590a SMD, esp for Dirk ;-) )

rocklander · Post by **rocklander** » 09 Jan 2012, 08:44

built a couple of pedals for a bloke and took this in payment... FINALLY get to give something back to the community.. happy to dissect further (within reason) if anyone wants anything specific.

I have higher res if needed, but have reduced for uploadability

enjoy.

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Sweetalk · Post by **Sweetalk** » 10 Jan 2012, 15:01

Great!!!, it's a little bit tricky to trace it from the pictures but thank you!!

Seiche · Post by **Seiche** » 10 Jan 2012, 18:45

cool! wow, 3 pt2399s

what does the pedal do? chiclet is a chewing gum for me.
Can you take a picture of what's between the daughter board of the pots and the main pcb? on some of their pedals there were additional chips or traces there.

rocklander · Post by **rocklander** » 10 Jan 2012, 19:11

Sweetalk wrote:Great!!!, it's a little bit tricky to trace it from the pictures but thank you!!

I agree.. and whilst it'll be hard to trace, I reckon the opportunity to figure out what they're doing to get reverb out of the 3X pt2399 (just like the belton brick) might be a useful thing to have figured out longer term.. not sure how many smd projects would come of it, but decent reverb pedals in 1590BB without the hassle of having to source the belton would be pretty cool

Seiche wrote:cool! wow, 3 pt2399s what does the pedal do? chiclet is a chewing gum for me.
Can you take a picture of what's between the daughter board of the pots and the main pcb? on some of their pedals there were additional chips or traces there.

as above, it's a reverb. from memory there's traces but no components. if I get time this weekend I'll desolder the daughter board and the audio jacks and take better pics of both sides of the main and daughter boards.. the flash tends to cast weird shadows on macro mode

so need a day with sunshine, but we've had weeks of rain in a row this summer

Seiche · Post by **Seiche** » 10 Jan 2012, 19:22

rocklander wrote:but we've had weeks of rain in a row this summer

at least it's summer over there

man i wanna cheat winter again and go to NZ.

anyway, reverb? cool stuff, didn't know that works.

culturejam · Post by **culturejam** » 10 Jan 2012, 19:28

Seiche wrote:anyway, reverb? cool stuff, didn't know that works.

The running rumor/theory* is that the Belton Brick is three (or maybe four) PT2399s with associated mixing and such incorporated.

* And maybe it's proven, but I can't recall a definitive answer.

madbean · Post by **madbean** » 10 Jan 2012, 20:06

I think the patent application for the Belton thing has some circuit outline on how the PT's are hooked up in parallel to achieve the reverb effect. I have it around somewhere. It's probably similar.

rocklander · Post by **rocklander** » 10 Jan 2012, 20:25

madbean wrote:I think the patent application for the Belton thing has some circuit outline on how the PT's are hooked up in parallel to achieve the reverb effect. I have it around somewhere. It's probably similar.

if it has a patent, is it wise to RE it here though? partly why I think it may be cool to RE this instead.. no patent

culturejam · Post by **culturejam** » 10 Jan 2012, 20:45

I don't think it's patent infringement to discuss what's disclosed in a patent. But I'm no lawyer.

Seiche · Post by **Seiche** » 10 Jan 2012, 20:49

culturejam wrote:I don't think it's patent infringement to discuss what's disclosed in a patent. But I'm no lawyer.

yeah, why would it be? You can read most patents on google, although i didn't find the belton brick patent (if there is one).

rocklander · Post by **rocklander** » 10 Jan 2012, 20:58

yeah, I don't understand the legal ramifications, but I can't help but wonder what the point of a patent is if not to stop someone else doing the same "new" thing...

I guess my point is that I'd like to see if something (this pedal? belton, I don't care) can be REd to the extent that we (the royal 'we' cos I got no tech kung fu) can start making ccts/projects that use multi (3 or more?) pt2399's as DIY reverb pedals...
discussing the patent may not infringe legally, but will it lead us to that goal of a usable cct building block? the chicklet wont have any protection from such activity.... :shrug: but as you were... bothers me not.

Dirk_Hendrik · Post by **Dirk_Hendrik** » 10 Jan 2012, 21:37

rocklander wrote:yeah, I don't understand the legal ramifications, but I can't help but wonder what the point of a patent is if not to stop someone else doing the same "new" thing...

One of the prime intentions of patents was that a) the inventor could make some income of his invention for a limited time and b) other clever guys could refrain from reinventing the wheel by studying the patent and develop onward from that point.

b) is too complex for those many who are blinded by a)

Example 1)
Watts was the first to develop a commercially usable steam engine. Patents were written and renewed in such a way that it took 10's of years before finally, after all Watts patents were really expired, the steam engine could, suddenly, be dramatically improved again with ideas that were on shelves for the same amount of years.... but infringing the Watts patents. Watts (and more importantly his attorny) were in the a) camp.

Example 2)
Look up the Brent K Butler patent for the tubedriver on http://www.uspto.gov. This "low voltage" overdrive patent effectively covers supply voltages up to 80 volts (out of my head). That 80 volts is low, but plenty, to run a 12AX7 triode amplifier. How come it's suddenly covered with a patent!?

Other than that,
Thanks for the pics Rock! I do appreciate this nice piece of neat engineering indeed.

culturejam · Post by **culturejam** » 10 Jan 2012, 23:04

rocklander wrote:yeah, I don't understand the legal ramifications, but I can't help but wonder what the point of a patent is if not to stop someone else doing the same "new" thing...

Maybe that patent covers only an "integrated circuit"? The Chicklet is very likely a bit different, at least in application. Who knows, though.

rocklander wrote:discussing the patent may not infringe legally, but will it lead us to that goal of a usable cct building block? the chicklet wont have any protection from such activity.... :shrug: but as you were... bothers me not.

I think if you go into business making a competing product that uses the same tech as the Belton, you'd run a chance of getting sued. It seems that the Chicklet is not really in the same market as the Belton brick (different customer base totally), and not designed for the same end use.

Also, it's not cheap to defend a patent. Just having one doesn't get you squat...except for (maybe) the upper hand in a legal battle (which, again, ain't cheap).

But anyway, I see no potential *reasonable* legal liability in a few hobbyists reverse engineering a pedal and discussing it's details vis-a-vis other products. That doesn't mean some self-aggrandizing douchebag won't possibly hassle somebody over it, but that's fairly unlikely.

Anyway, enough lawmongering. Let's get back to the fancy bits and bobs inside that pedal!

madbean · Post by **madbean** » 10 Jan 2012, 23:37

culturejam wrote:I don't think it's patent infringement to discuss what's disclosed in a patent. But I'm no lawyer.

Yeah the stuff I saw was in the actual application which is public. Nothing devious about it!

frequencycentral · Post by **frequencycentral** » 11 Jan 2012, 01:38

Yeah I have that doc too, the Belton is defo 3 x PT2399:

http://music-electronics-forum.com/atta ... patent.pdf

rocklander · Post by **rocklander** » 15 Jan 2012, 05:47

Seiche wrote:cool! wow, 3 pt2399s what does the pedal do? chiclet is a chewing gum for me.
Can you take a picture of what's between the daughter board of the pots and the main pcb? on some of their pedals there were additional chips or traces there.

well I had a go.. the through hole soldering mixed with extremely small smt (I mean this is particularly small.. the resistors seem to be about 25% the size of the smt I used to work on in the 90's) really has bested me with the gear I have.. just don't have the tools (physical and mental) to effectively remove anything off this board cos I'm too afraid that my ham-fistedness will knock/burn/melt something nearby .. sorry man. happy to post it to someone in the tracers area if they think they could do a clean job of it? my meagre resources (like I said, equipment both mental and physical

) are insufficient to take it on sorry.

PmCimini · Post by **PmCimini** » 15 Jan 2012, 06:35

Why did they use the smallest possible resistors and not regular 1206, for example? wth

Seiche · Post by **Seiche** » 15 Jan 2012, 12:20

PmCimini wrote:Why did they use the smallest possible resistors and not regular 1206, for example? wth

to make it untraceable?

culturejam · Post by **culturejam** » 15 Jan 2012, 14:12

Seiche wrote:
PmCimini wrote:Why did they use the smallest possible resistors and not regular 1206, for example? wth
to make it untraceable?

To make it as small as possible?

rocklander · Post by **rocklander** » 15 Jan 2012, 18:55

culturejam wrote:
Seiche wrote:
PmCimini wrote:Why did they use the smallest possible resistors and not regular 1206, for example? wth
to make it untraceable?
To make it as small as possible?

there's a lot of wide open spaces though...