failed projects

permanent hearing damage · Post by **permanent hearing damage** » Wed Apr 22, 2009 10:16 am

so i'm considering getting a mic pre kit from hamptone or seventh circle audio. admittedly, my soldering skills are not great. i have recently started making my own cables and such, but that's about it. my electronics knowledge is pretty limited - i mean, i know what caps and resistors look like and all that.

so i guess i'm wondering if those kits should be simple enough for someone of my limited experience to handle. i figure it would be a good learning experience either way but i don't wanna drop $700-900 for something i can't get working. i'd just assume spend the money on a vintech or a sage pre or something.

any of you have a hard time assembling these things? like to the point of just giving up?

vikingrecording · Post by **vikingrecording** » Wed Apr 22, 2009 11:41 am

I have not made either, but i they appear to come with great documentation and all the bits and bobs you'll need to get your kit off the ground.

Also, I dont think you can totally f*** these up.

djimbe · Post by **djimbe** » Wed Apr 22, 2009 3:41 pm

Anybody can "screw up" a build...experienced or not. Everyone makes a mistake now and again. There's usually a difference in magnitude of screw up and certainly differences in ability to recover from same.

I've found success from DIY projects comes from personal confidence and a desire to persevere. Anything that shakes either can set a job back. Working through problems builds the confidence to do more, and learn more about what the "bibs and bobbs" really do. Success breeds success. Find a project you truely believe you can succeed at for a first one, work through it, and the second, third, fourth, etc. become that much easier.

The SCA and Hamptone stuff is very well documented, and there is great support from the manufacturers. Those are just two such outfits of a number. You could quite likely build a fine, well planned kit. There will be questions and problems for a first timer, though. Expect it. How you handle those problems will determine the success of the project, not how well the kit is planned out. My roommate had trouble with one of the early Hamptone kits, he got great help from Tim, kept at the job and got it done. Sounds wonderful. Some minor pain along the way. There are still parts from the original crapped up power supply sitting on a high shelf in one of my shops.

There's a number of things I've given up on, but not good kits. I've screwed up plenty of my own stuff, lemme tell you...

Got any API preamps? The SCA A12 is a fine kit and not very difficult. And it sounds better than my 312's on some sources.

vikingrecording · Post by **vikingrecording** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 6:35 am

man, i feel like an ass being so casual about it.

Good luck with the kit, Steve. Persevere!

The Scum · Post by **The Scum** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 10:26 am

I suppose I should chime in.

I was another early Hamptone adoper. I bought one of the original revision tube kits when the first article was published.

If you hang out here, then you know I'm not exactly a novice...my day gig is as an R&D engineer.

So you can imagine my frustration when I built up the kit, and it didn't work all that well. The power supply was wonky. It would make these crazy sounds on the output...like a freaked out police siren. Cool for a modular synth, not so sool for a mic pre.

I stripped and rebuilt the power supply twoce, and the problem wouldn't go away...I messed with it for better than a year. I finally gave in and sent it back to Hamptone. They pulled out the old supply, and popped in a newer, redesigned one. And it worked...though the repair wasn't cheap...

So the upshot - you're unlikely to break the things so severely that it can't be fixed at all. The suppliers of these kits are also there to clean up after you, should you need it. The Hamptone kits have also had some bugs worked out in the meantime.

If you're wary of spending that kind of cash right off, build a couple of simpler kits to get your skills together. Look for Velleman kits, and also look at Paia...both of them have somewhat more detailed instructions for a beginner (though neither offer top-shelf mic preamps).

rwc · Post by **rwc** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 5:23 pm

One thing to note is the learning experience with DIY projects.

If you buy something with a specially made PCB, a bunch of parts, and an instructions set saying "put piece A into the A slot on the board"

don't expect it to be a learning experience for anything beyond soldering.

ott0bot · Post by **ott0bot** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 5:33 pm

I'd say try a DIY guitar pedal of something a bit more simple to practive your soldering skills. Then try out the SCA kit. Heck just use a old phone or something you don't care about and pop some capacitors off and resolder, then test it out. You'll get the hang of it if you're not a complete clutz!

My friend has one we are going to built (soon I hope) and they have super detailed instructions and all the parts labeled. We are both moderately skilled and it doesn't seem above out heads.

suppositron · Post by **suppositron** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 5:46 pm

Follow the directions! The most common mistake you can make building something with a limited background is putting in diodes and caps backwards which can be fatal. Also wrong values of resistors in the wrong spots. I guess other problems you can run into is solder bridges or cold solder joints.

ckeene · Post by **ckeene** » Fri Apr 24, 2009 8:39 am

I'm pretty good at soldering and following directions, but out of 3 SCA projects I had to send an N72 (had a short somewhere) and a C-84 (bad/damaged transistor) to Tim for repair. So, mistakes definitely happen with kits and if Tim didn't do such a good job with support I'd be SOL.

IMO the most important skill you need to have is the ability to solder PCBs without making a mess. You absolutely need to be able to neatly and tightly solder in order to do an SCA project. Whoever suggested starting out with a couple guitar pedals was right-on.

The other thing you should learn is how to read a schematic, and how to identify components.

-ck

Corey Y · Post by **Corey Y** » Mon Apr 27, 2009 8:36 pm

Making mistakes is the best method of technical advancement, I think. I just fried a PCB on a Tube Sound Fuzz clone this weekend because I had a bum tip for my new Weller soldering iron and I was too pissed off to give up and wait to buy a new one. So I ended up finally having a friend show me how to etch my own circuit boards and it came out super clean and went together beautifully.

Expensive mistakes or completely trashing something that can't be replaced sucks. Making frustrating mistakes that make me want to smash something or pull my hair out usually result in me learning a much better way to do something.

rodabod · Post by **rodabod** » Tue Apr 28, 2009 11:04 am

My advice is double-check everything, take your time, and be very very neat with your soldering and wiring. If you can't make a shiny, wet solder joint with the right amount of solder, then don't bother.

single_fin · Post by **single_fin** » Tue Apr 28, 2009 7:59 pm

rwc wrote:One thing to note is the learning experience with DIY projects.

If you buy something with a specially made PCB, a bunch of parts, and an instructions set saying "put piece A into the A slot on the board"

don't expect it to be a learning experience for anything beyond soldering.

i disagree. my first build was a paia fatman synth. i learned a hell of a lot. i learned about all the different types of components, which ones a polarised, which aren't, what components are heat sensitive, how to use a mulimeter, what the bands on resistors mean, what order to put parts in, what a volt, omh etc. is

i guess if you wanted to build a kit and not learn anything you could. but if you want to learn, then using a kit in conjunction with a basic electronis books is a great way to go.
the hard yards i put in lerning and understanding what i was doing as i was making the kit have stood me in great stead -- not a single project since has failed. oh wait, i have a pile of not quite right distortion boxes.

uncle bastard · Post by **uncle bastard** » Thu Apr 30, 2009 2:46 am

single_fin wrote:
rwc wrote:One thing to note is the learning experience with DIY projects.

If you buy something with a specially made PCB, a bunch of parts, and an instructions set saying "put piece A into the A slot on the board"

don't expect it to be a learning experience for anything beyond soldering.
i disagree. my first build was a paia fatman synth. i learned a hell of a lot. i learned about all the different types of components, which ones a polarised, which aren't, what components are heat sensitive, how to use a mulimeter, what the bands on resistors mean, what order to put parts in, what a volt, omh etc. is

i guess if you wanted to build a kit and not learn anything you could. but if you want to learn, then using a kit in conjunction with a basic electronis books is a great way to go.
the hard yards i put in lerning and understanding what i was doing as i was making the kit have stood me in great stead -- not a single project since has failed. oh wait, i have a pile of not quite right distortion boxes.

Ha! I know how that feels. I've ballsed up an OLC Slow Century by soldering the transistor sockets before I should have, which means there are three connections I won't be able to make. New kit required...

casey campbell · Post by **casey campbell** » Thu Apr 30, 2009 1:50 pm

can anyone say "paia"

they make an excellent tube mic pre kit..

easy to build, goes toe to toe with most.

cheap too.

good luck.

The Scum · Post by **The Scum** » Thu Apr 30, 2009 2:29 pm

New kit required...

Not really. You'll just need to learn how to desolder, also.

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