9v vs 18v on triple wreck

[ham_phist]

Hi all,

I built a triple wreck and have been powering it with my one spot. I'm noticing just a lot of noise, like the hiss ypu get when you use a high gain distortion pedal. Not necessarily unexpected. But I'm wondering if that problem improves when you use an 18v power supply or charge pump? What changes sonically I guess is my question.

Have a great new years, be safe. I'm obviously posting on online pedal forums... keepin it "buck wild."

[Beaker]

The theory says yes - 18V will give you added clean headroom, and a lot more volume.

http://tagboardeffects.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/wampler-triple-wreck.html

It is discussed in the notes at the top of the page, along with the link for the charge pump you need to add.

I dropped one in a ROG Ginger I built just before Christmas, and it make a big difference - in a good way!


However, always worth checking your signal and power wires are well separated in the pedal first - or use shielded cable. That can make a big difference too.

[Frank_NH]

I think it depends on the nature of the noise.  If it "hisses" when you turn up the gain and no input is attached, I think that you can't really do much except use shielded wire at the input and/or apply a noise gate.  Gain is gain, regardless if you use 9V or 18V, and what is happening when you hear hiss is that the noise signal is being amplified by your gain stages.  Of course, it's not noticeable when you your playing (your guitar signal is much larger than the noise), but if you want silence when you mute your strings, a noise gate is the answer.

My Thunderbird hisses, and it runs at 24V.  It's still an awesome effect, though...

One path for experimentation would be to design a high gain circuit which includes a noise gate embedded in the signal path to control hiss. Don't know offhand of anything on the commercial market with that feature.

Finally, I'm just referring to hiss as the noise source.  If there is humming (from grounding or poor power filtering) or interference caused by radio signals, there are other ways to control those.
 

[ham_phist]

awesome, thanks guys! I know it's not an issue of grounding, it's simply the gain. I haven't tried it into my "real" amp either, just the Fender 2x12 solid state amp. Most pedals sound alright with it into the dirty channel, but the real test is my 800. But I noticed that it just doesn't seem like as much gain as it should. I will try the pump and my klone in front of it also.

[Muadzin]

Frank_NH wrote

One path for experimentation would be to design a high gain circuit which includes a noise gate embedded in the signal path to control hiss. Don't know offhand of anything on the commercial market with that feature.

Zvex Box of Metal?

Personally I'd wish every higain dirtbox had a built in noise gate. It would save pedal board real estate by elimating a noise gate pedal and you could adjust it per pedal, instead of one setting fits all.

Doesn't seem to be much need for it though. Even though the Zvex Box of Metal has been traced and is on offer as a vero layout here, it doesn't have the noise gate included. In fact nobody seems to have bothered to trace the noise gate section properly.

[Frank_NH]

Re: noise gate.  This topic surfaced when folks on another forum were discussing the hiss associated with the Thunderbird.  Someone mentioned adding a noise gate at one of the later gain stages, and that it seemed to work.  I believe the idea was to have a send/return so you could connect a commercial noise gate pedal.  

There is one other possibility that might help and that is to use a low noise op amp.  Here is a helpful article on this subject:

http://hammer.ampage.org/files/Device1-8.PDF

It also mentions using metal film resistor to reduce noise.  This is probably mandatory for high gain circuits like the triple wreck.