Tuesday 29 September 2015

When It Gets Colder - It's Time To Solder

I'm building this for an old friend. He'll have to guess what it is...

Also on the bench is a pair of Barton Decaying Analog Noise modules and a couple of Sloth Chaos boards from Nonlinear Circuits

Tuesday 22 September 2015

It's...

...A knob from an EMT140. Well technically it's a handwheel - that controls the asbestos shutters that control the reverb time. We refurbished two of them around fifteen years ago that alleged to come from Decca Studios. They were in fairly poor condition, so it was a bit of a punt but we got one really good unit out of the parts. This is the handwheel from the unit we couldn't salvage. Serial number 743

Monday 21 September 2015

We Still Grow Evil Tomatoes

Just a gentle reminder, like...

Oh Dear...

Yesterday morning I woke up and remembered there was a carboot sale across the road. Within seconds of getting out of bed I had returned with a pair of vintage Wharfedale speakers for a fiver - perfect for the modular. Meanwhile I had to get the workshop window replaced, and the last few days have involved the heady delights of pointing, filling, expanding foam & throwing out various half used tubes of caulk that dried out years ago.

Monday 14 September 2015

It Lives (Part Three)

Some modules just get dragged kicking & screaming into service. I'm afraid the Music Thing Spring Reverb was one of them. I bought the boards back in 2013 when they were just released and after nearly two years, a dead NE5532, a potentially dead reverb tank and a missed board connection I got around to finishing it. It's quite good too

Friday 11 September 2015

Of Mics & Men

I found this in a box this week. Some time ago at the dawn of the internet I needed a suspension mount for some pencil mics. And since I couldn't find any that didn't cost an absolute fortune, I built a pair myself out of some PVC drain couplings. Now the reason I come to mention this is because I can't find the second one, or the big box of mic clips that I used to have somewhere. Damn...

Thursday 3 September 2015

Another Handy Attenuator

Here's another attenuator I built a couple of months ago. I had a nice little Honeywell ten turn pot taken from an old scope and a handful of oversized Alco style knobs from a poorly executed Maplin order some years ago. A spare scrap of 2mm aluminium, a lump of old scaff board and hey presto...   ...I call it a Schrödinger Attenuator, because you never quite know whether (or how much) it's attenuating until you plug it in. In other news I finished the accounts AND finally fixed the other Blacet Time Machine (it had two broken traces)

Wednesday 2 September 2015

A Handy Little Herb Drier

It's getting to that time of year. Here's a handy little herb drier idea that I came up with last night. I've used Eucalyptus because I've a lot of that to hand. As you can guess I've not quite finished those accounts yet...

Tuesday 1 September 2015

I Shouldn't Be Writing This But...

...Isn't it funny that when there are accounts to sort out, you'll get around to doing absolutely anything but accounts...