Arsenio Novo - TubeSound Overdrive

tuemmueh · Post by **tuemmueh** » 27 Oct 2007, 11:18

oh, i forgot!

d) create your own layout ...

frank.clarke · Post by **frank.clarke** » 01 Nov 2007, 22:11

I remember the original posting, but I wasn't good at building stuff then. Nice soundclip, I should try it out.

Post by **modman** » 04 Nov 2007, 11:30

PZ, wow both at the clips and the reworking of the circuit.
Incredible stuff. We could give this one its own place in the projects folder (with your name on it) once we rip up a layout. If you feel like sharing it out wide, that is... let me know

thanks for taking this one to your breadboard

sosodef · Post by **sosodef** » 04 Nov 2007, 12:07

what does the added input buffer do for the circuit?

pz · Post by pz » 04 Nov 2007, 21:51

modman wrote:PZ, wow both at the clips and the reworking of the circuit.
Incredible stuff. We could give this one its own place in the projects folder (with your name on it) once we rip up a layout. If you feel like sharing it out wide, that is... let me know

Ok! Just designed the pcb, quite compact and busy, but fits into the 1590B box. Requires 1/8W standing resistors, caps: 5mm raster.

I'll post the pdf file when i finish labelling the components.
The 3 band tone stack with trimpots could be used with normal pots also, then the Tone knob can be labelled just Presence.

@sosodef:
With the ~200k input impedance i didn't like the sound. The pickup loading was too high, the sound was a little bit like fixed wah effect due to shifting of the pickups resonant peak. With buffer the sound is more open and the circuit reponds better to picking techniues. That's my opinion...

grolschie · Post by **grolschie** » 04 Nov 2007, 23:26

pz wrote:thanks
here's another sound sample. This time only one guitar. I tried to play some different techniques to show how does this circuit respond to picking and what is the gain range. Again - PX4d used as speaker sim. with a touch of reverb.
sound sample 2 1.8MB

I tried cascading two of such circuits, but the sound was to muddy, to much gain and compression, even when i put the voltage divider between the stages to take the signal a little bit down. With only one stage this od sounds great, probably would be good as booster too.

This sounds really good!

solderboy · Post by **solderboy** » 12 Nov 2007, 22:25

Hi,

i just build one TubeSound OD = it's really great !!!!!

I used a 10uF Cap instead of the 22uF Cap = C2
I only had some big 22uF (perhaps replace it or make it switchable = another one 10uF parallel)

Think the Cap at this point makes the distortion more thin, or thick..
I detected such reaction by playing around with the Cap in a FuzzFace Circuit (usualy a 22uF - i replaced it by several other.. a 4,7uF takes the typical FuzzFace Sound away and gives a more Distortion like Tone)

bye
Solderboy

MoreCowbell · Post by **MoreCowbell** » 12 Nov 2007, 23:22

modman wrote:PZ, wow both at the clips and the reworking of the circuit.
Incredible stuff. We could give this one its own place in the projects folder (with your name on it) once we rip up a layout. If you feel like sharing it out wide, that is... let me know

thanks for taking this one to your breadboard

I have vero and perf layouts for it from YEARS ago...i just have to find 'em !

MoreCowbell · Post by **MoreCowbell** » 13 Nov 2007, 00:09

Hopefully this link will work....

TUBE SOUND OVERDRIVE VERO LAYOUT

gnognofasciani · Post by **gnognofasciani** » 13 Nov 2007, 08:58

I've built one and tweaked a little, but it didn't sound that great to me...

solderboy · Post by **solderboy** » 13 Nov 2007, 22:51

gnognofasciani wrote:I've built one and tweaked a little, but it didn't sound that great to me...

Hi,

as i build it i had problems with it !!...
unfortunately my 10K Resistors used up and i combinated an 8k2 with a 10K Trim at the junktion between Ground and the "bottom" of the two Transistors
another 10KTrim from 9v+ to bring it to 4.5 Volts after it.

And than i used the 20K in association with the 10KTrim to ground.

there is only a little zone, where it really sounds good (You hear it, when you connect it, hit the Guitarstrings and listen to the Sound whyle carefuly adjust the trim...

perhaps You try out a socket and use different Resistorvalues.

or do You not like the Sound overall?

its a Distortion Sound.... but works great with Guitarvolume !!!

i love it !!!

bye
Solderboy

gnognofasciani · Post by **gnognofasciani** » 14 Nov 2007, 08:21

It worked but not the way I expected

solderboy · Post by **solderboy** » 14 Nov 2007, 09:31

gnognofasciani wrote:It worked but not the way I expected

ah.. ok...

its not sooo versatile - no Gaincontrol, no Tone Control, but at the end.. for me.. it makes a quite good Distortionsound... for playing around ok...

Did You try the Highway89 yet?.. thats an Overdrive Circuit, that sounds more smooth, not so edgy, but can work at higher Gain ....

Greets
Solderboy

drop123 · Post by **drop123** » 07 Aug 2008, 12:01

solderboy wrote:
gnognofasciani wrote: its not sooo versatile - no Gaincontrol, no Tone Control, but at the end.. for me.. it makes a quite good Distortionsound... for playing around ok...

i'm very very new to this kinda stuff, but could you use the trimpot as a gain control, if you were to wire it as an offboard pot?

i could be entirely wrong about this... can anyone explain how altering the trim pot changes the tone in terms of electronics? is it like transistor biasing or something?

any input welcome, just trying to get a better understanding of how it all works...

drop123 · Post by **drop123** » 07 Aug 2008, 13:59

can't seem to edit my post, but another thing i thought of was perhaps a pot to ground from the emitter of the NPN, a bit like the gain control on a fuzz face. would this work?

allesz · Post by **allesz** » 08 Mar 2010, 16:48

I just breadborded it two days ago (the simple, original, and unbuffered version, I just used a 10 K trimmer and two complementary bc type transistors (hFe about 250).

I must agree that the circuit is not very flexible; I was wondering about setting the trimmer (by ear), but it was an easy task because it really sounded good in one small fraction of the trimmer travel.

I have to say that the sound is remarkably good: it drives the signal in a different (and more musical) way instead of the usual diode clippers; the sound feels natural, dinamic, shiny and airy;
the gain is not too much but I think that if you use it with a tube amp you can get great sound out of it;
try it, you may discover you just need a one knob thing like this to be happy.

allesz · Post by **allesz** » 16 Mar 2010, 18:31

Another update, I was experimentig some more on this circuit to tweack it a little to my taste.
I pulled out one of the transistor (the pnp) and the sound remained the same.
I don't understand what happened, I rebuild it some times with the same results, maybe I did something wrong.....
Anyway I am working on the idea as a plain simple booster (with just one tranny), the sound is good. Still I am scratching my head....

pedcab · Post by **pedcab** » 08 Dec 2012, 12:51

Hi all

Following some pretty convicing opinions from a friend reagrding this project I decided to buil it myself, and since while I was searching for info about on the weeb I came across this post I thought ouf leaving my contribution here.

I build it using a 2n3906/3904 pair and .22uF input 0.1/output caps and here's the result :

Sound sample (nevermind the technique)
https://soundcloud.com/#pedro_cabral/an ... und-sample

I also experimented with a fet buffer at the input but I didn't like it...

It was recorded using the setup in the picture:

A yamaha pac311 loaded with fender noiseless and gibson PUs into a Roland Cube (using the onboard looper), out from the line out to a behringer UB502 mixer and into nuendo 3.

Maybe the used sound chain does not make full justice to the circuit, which has to be the best I've ever came across taking into account the ultra-low parts count...Less is best? I guess...

Further into this subject here's a more "scientific" approach in a friend's blog:

http://www.diale.org/arsenio.html

Regards from Portugal!

Pedro

pedcab · Post by **pedcab** » 08 Dec 2012, 14:01

Furthermore, here's my simulation of my interpretation of the circuit (@0.25Vpp, 1kHz)

Funny waveform, seems to fold over on itself, just like described by Arsénio Novo

BTW, has someone managed to find out more about the guy himself?

Regards from Portugal

Arsenio Novo - TubeSound Overdrive [documentation]