Catalinbread RAH debugging?!?!?!?!

[Drayve85]

Alright, so, I’ve built this peda, and I’m getting signal, getting overdrive, and the crazy sensitive tone-stack is working also. The big problem is that I have to turn my lil silver face champ amp up to 4 or 5 in order to hear the pedal even with all the controls on said pedal at 10. Any ideas what could be sucking the volume outta this build?? PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE HELP ME. I’m running outta hair to pull out! I’m using 2n7000s cuz I don’t have any bs170’s and I put 1n4744’s because I don’t have any 9V1’s. Also a 1uf cap in place of the 680 nf cap. Anything, please!!!lol thank you in advance!

P.S. I apologize for the rats nest of a build. I’m still learning. Not my first or fifth build, but a beginner nine the less.E977385A-B0DD-4206-99D3-A23D17C1A599.jpeg902ACC30-40EB-4DE5-8ABA-38E4D9BCBB8F.jpeg

[Pavlos]

Hi, welcome to the site and I think it's safe to say we're all still learning........some of us (Myself included) have a lot more to learn than others though

First thing I noticed about your board is that you have a lot of components sitting quite high with long lead out wires/legs showing, which means that they can easily be moved accidentally (Such as contact with wiring when putting in the box) and create short circuits with neighbouring components.

Secong thing I noticed was that it looks like you have spliced a shorter lengths of wire together to be able to reach pots, switch etc. This can be a potential weak point in that you could have one or more bad solder joints which are preventing the circuit to work as expected.

Looks like you might be using some components salvaged from older equipment? if so, did you check them to make sure they were still useable? Even with brand new components you can sometimes get a bad one.

Quick google search shows the 1N4744 as being 15V zener whereas the circuit calls for 9V zener. Someone with far better technical understanding would be able to tell if this would be a problem?

If you haven't done it already a good place to start is to make sure you have all the componets in the correct place and that they are the correct values, and where appropriate they are oriented correctly (Electrolytic caps, diodes etc) check that any cuts and links are in the correct place and that there are no solder bridges or shorts between components and that all of the solder joints are clean and good. Using a magnifying glass or jewellers loupe can be a useful to see tiny but annoying shorts. If you don't have one already, even a fairly basic and cheap digital multimeter is really useful for checking pretty anything and everything. Other than that, an audio probe can be handy for fault finding and there is plenty of good advice in the Faults, Offboard and Build Guide headings at the top of the home page. Main thing is just to steadily and patiently work your way through the posssibilities.

Hope this helps

[induction]

The substitutions are fine.

2n7000 is a commonly used substitute in the SHO, and this circuit is a bunch of modified SHOs in series. There might be a small impact on the tone, but it should work.

The protection diodes are fine too. The goal is to prevent static discharge of greater than 20V from punching through the gate, so 15V is fine. These should have no effect on the sound at all.

I suggest posting photos of the copper side of the vero as well.

[Drayve85]

Thank you for the welcome, very much! I’ll get the pics of the copper side here shortly today. I have and use a older but still very DMM, it’s a FLUKE. The only salvaged components that I don’t remember check are the electrolytics, so if all else fails I’ll have to check them, but they’re not really all that old. I don’t think they would be a problem, but who knows!lol I’ve check numerous times for shorts on the copper side, used a loupe also, I’ll check it again. I’ve checked component placement and value three or four times. Like I said, I’m getting signal and overdrive, it’s just REALLY quiet! I have to turn my amp up quite a bit just to get it to bedroom volume. I can’t think of what that could be. I’ve swapped out the 2n7000’s for three new ones, and still the same problem. I’ll reflow the solder joints on the pots, and the rest of ‘em prolly. Thank you for verifying that the substitutions are alright, I’ve been wondering about that!  I did have to flip the tranny’s around because they were the opposite pinout to the bs170s. Can anybody think of any reason why I would be getting EXTREMELY low volume?? Thank you again!

[Drayve85]

Here are the pics of the copper side. I just got done re-flowing the solder joints.6BE4BF0D-96D6-4D9C-BFC9-76B0602DE7A1.jpeg4134575B-DFA4-41EF-BD41-420E4B725816.jpegBD3BDD57-1E75-4076-B181-0AA2F99260E3.jpegBEB721E9-BD3C-4FA2-B303-B640DD226F6A.jpeg

[Drayve85]

Alright. Update!: so now the volume is where it should be. But now I’m getting a pretty loud hum when the pedal is on. It decreases when the bass knob is turned down and/or the mids knob is turned up. And, the overdrive is really fizzy sounding, and not at all natural sounding. By that I mean that the decay of the note kind of has that big muff pi sound when a note decays, sorta gatey-ish. Idk if it’s due to the 2n7000’s? I wouldn’t think so, but..... could it possibly be a bad component somewhere??

[induction]

The symptoms you describe could be caused by a bad ground connection, or a short between components. Also, some of your stranded wire connections on the footswitch look a little sketchy. Just guesses, though.

What did you change that fixed the volume?

Edit: I see what looks like cold solder joints on the copper side. Reflow the solder everywhere, especially anywhere that the component legs or wires are visible through the solder.

[Drayve85]

Thanks a lot for the reply! I’ll check all of the connections again today. Honestly, I couldn’t tell ya what it was exactly that fixed the volume.lol but, I re-flowed all the solder joints on the very board and most of the pot lugs, so I’m assuming it was something in there. I did swap an old 47pf ceramic I had in there for a new MLCC 39pf, idk if that was it either.
One thing I’ve learned from this build is to not skimp and buy cheap stompswitches! I bought a handful from lovemyswitches.com and I won’t be doing that again!lol I noticed there is not much epoxy on the lugs and if ya hold the soldering iron on one for more than a couple seconds, it starts melting the plastic enclosure and the whole lug starts to move. Maybe that’s my problem, a cold solder joint on one or more of the lugs on the stompswitch. I’ll let y’all know!

[induction]

Drayve85 wrote

One thing I’ve learned from this build is to not skimp and buy cheap stompswitches! I bought a handful from lovemyswitches.com and I won’t be doing that again!lol I noticed there is not much epoxy on the lugs and if ya hold the soldering iron on one for more than a couple seconds, it starts melting the plastic enclosure and the whole lug starts to move.

This is pretty true across the board, so I wouldn't be too hard on your stompswitch source. A good rule of thumb is to never heat a switch lug for more than 1 second at a time.

If you notice that the switch lugs are not shiny when you start, it's often worthwhile to clean them with rubbing alcohol and/or emery paper before you start soldering. Any grease (or melted plastic from the sheath of an overheated wire) will inhibit the wetting of the solder to the lug, which makes it take longer and increases the risk of ruining your switch.

Most of us have ruined a few switches along the way.

[Drayve85]

“ This is pretty true across the board, so I wouldn't be too hard on your stompswitch source.”
“Most of us have ruined a few switches along the way.“
Those make me feel a lot better!!lol  and, I wasn’t being hard on the supplier, lovemyswitches.com actually gets high regards in my book! Fast shipping and quick replies. My only complaint would be that they don’t have a too wide array of items to buy, but I believe they are just starting out, so I can’t really complain about that anyways. But, I was putting the blame on myself for buying the stompswitches in my earlier remark.
I wasn’t able to get to the pedal today, tomorrow for sure. I’ll check back in with what happens. Thanks again, everyone. I appreciate it!!