madox

Ditto; just got mine today. Much thanks.

Have you considered just using stripboard for the expansion? Is it required to fit a particular form factor? I will also house a number of components on an expansion board, and use panel mount MIDI sockets. The interface hardware is really simple, readily available in through hole, so there should be no problem in a stripboard design. This would probably be a fast route to a working result, and is very unlikely to perform any worse than a professionally manufactured PCB. I use a cheap stripboard CAD program called VeeCAD, for which there is also a functional free version available. It can import netlists from schematic capture programs, provided one uses compatible schematic symbol/device footprint libraries in each program.

Ah, cool man. Sorry to stick my nose in. Just thought it worth bringing up. Cheers

Even though there is no intention to have this confused with Doug's panel work, perhaps there is an opportunity to pool buying power, seeing as a number of people on Doug's list will be having Doug purchase cases within the U.S., and those cases will first be sent to Doug, also in the U.S.? Is this what was already going to be happening behind the scenes? Anyway, it seems to make sense, though I am not really sure what everyone's arrangements are in this matter.

Awesome, dude; that's darn good of you! Thanks muchly, madox

Ditto. Sounds great to me, too. Is it possible to add a couple extra PT-10's to an order, but not have the panels machined by you? Please let me know if I am out of line in this request. The reason I ask, is that I need a couple of PT-10's for other projects; I was going to buy all cases locally, for a pretty high price, just to avoid the shipping. I know this wasn't intended as a PT-10 group buy, and you are already doing us all a favour, and I will understand if this is asking too much, but thought it worth asking anyway. Cheers dude

I'm going to mount mine on a 1U 19" rack face plate. I will not be purchasing a complete rack unit though, as the electronic componentry is so small. I will construct a slim enclosure on the rear of the face plate, to cover the electronics, and provide rear connectors, power socket etc. Don't know if that helps for your situation, though. All my midi sockets will be panel mount, not PCB mount.

Is that gold flashing on the PCB? Looks nice. It will seem a shame when I close some up inside an opaque case.

Ditto on the thanks. Great news. I'll still be hanging out for complete kits though, to consolidate shipping expenses. Doug is still working on his set of panels too. Really looking forward to it, particularly after hearing some of the seriously kick ass demos. Maybe I'm in the minority, but the time frames actually suit me pretty well. There is always so much going on, and various financial demands, that I doubt I would have had the resources to build a kit any sooner, anyway. Cheers to those concerned. I hope I get to buy you all drinks some time.

Hey, congrats. I think that's already pretty decent, and more financial success than I hope to achieve with my music. I will be happy if people enjoy my tunes, and some airplay would be sweet. Luckily there is a very decent and diverse local radio station in my little town of Perth.

Hi Eric, I've had a look at your site quite a number of times, though I can't say I've had the pleasure of using your products. Nice job you do with your marketing though, and nice surprise to see you here. Have you got a name in mind for your proposed drum machine? Hope it all works out. Cheers, madox

Hi, The details have been discussed previously. Have you watched the instructional video that was posted in this forum a couple of times? I think it is a really good place to start. Flux reduces the surface tension of the wet (molten) solder, and enables it to flow a lot more easily. Basically, using flux allows the surface tension of the solder to snap into shape around the hot exposed metal surface, and bead away from the solder mask and other materials. Most flux is basically doing the same thing, as described above, and it probably won't matter which type you use. Some solder additive fluxes are really operating on the viscosity of the solder, rather than the surface tension, and don't really achieve the same result. I have used gel/paste a lot, which is fine, but not cheap. Liquid flux is cheaper, and is used to good effect in the video. Most fluxes will require you to clean your PCB with something like isopropyl alcohol. Do the cleaning before fitting any components that may be affected by or retain moisture, such as potentiometers or switches. These things rarely require flux. Using a rounded tip is important, as a small, sharp tip can tear the materials on the PCB when it is dragged accross (particularly when working in a hurry). Using a large, rounded tip carries a more appropriate amount of solder, and easily drags the wet solder bead accross the contacts. The instructional video recommends using a fillet tip, as the groove will cup the solder. I haven't tried that kind of tip, but it makes sense, and sure appears to work well. You can still solder pin by pin, with a fine tip iron, if you prefer. It requires more time, imparts more heat to the components and PCB, requires better control of the solder quantity, requires greater manual dexterity, and is more prone to faults. Keep in mind that very fine tracks/pads for some SMD devices, can burn or tear away from the PCB much more easily than what is usually used for through hole designs. Hope that helps. It would probably be worth practicing on an old discarded PCB, if you can. -edit: Flux is still helpful when soldering pins individually, though is not as critical as when drag soldering, provided that your tip and solder remain on the one pair of pin and pad. Working this way definitely is possible, though I think not the easiest choice.

I expect there would often be enough solder left after use of the wick. I still wouldn't recommend using wick for SMT, particularly if not experienced. As mentioned before, it can grab pads, and damage PCBs. At least try using flux, and gently drag soldering with a rounded tip. Remember to tag down the corners of the chip with solder first. Some pick and place machines actually use an adhesive to hold the devices in place, while wave or oven soldering. You could try this, but not all glues would be appropriate. Certainly some would fume in an unpleasant way.

I haven't seen the schematic, but it is possibly an extract of a larger design. Sometimes it is easier just to keep the component designators unchanged, for cross referencing, and re-use of parts lists etc.

Thanks Thorsten. Much appreciated.

Hey, cheers guys, thats great. Look forward to it.

I can definitely understand the time factor. I think anyone who organises these things for the community is already being very generous with time and effort. I hope you're not putting yourself out, financially, to help the rest of us with our hobbies though. I for one wouldn't mind paying in advance, if that is the case. Otherwise just take your time, I suppose. Cheers dude. -madox edit: I know other people do put their own money up front for group purchasing etc, which is certainly appreciated too, but perhaps it is not always necessary for it to be done this way?

Hi TK, For the Australian purchasers having gear sent through our local delivery proxy, shall we pay you first for the purchase + first leg of delivery (to Australia), and then later pay our proxy for the last leg of delivery?

There are various ways one could achieve the result, and what you have done is not wrong. If you were to use trim pots, they could replace the fixed R2,R3. Even with expensive, low tolerance fixed resistors, you may not get the precision you would like, as the +/- 12V are also subject to error with respect to the 0V ground. As you are doing the circuit by hand, in low volume, there is no real problem with using trim pots to set the range. You can use a spot of adhesive to fix the pot positions once correctly set. If you are concerned with precision, then you may also like to keep in mind that the potentiometer R1 may also not provide a full range swing on the wiper resistance. For example, your minimum resistance may be 0.01 x R1 and max may be 0.92 x R1. All the resistances will also be subject to some level of drift, though this is rarely a problem for this kind of application, and in practice, high precision is rarely needed. If you would like to calculate component values, you can look up the 'resistor divider' relationship.

Ah, thanks for pointing that out. I had missed that. Cheers

Fantastic. Thanks for the detailed explanation. I haven't yet built an MB-6582, though there is one in the pipe. I am thinking to either use a completely different enclosure (maybe custom built) with enough height to fit the additional boards, or possibly still house the main instrument in the PT-10, but include a bus port to connect to a separate filter box. Has anyone got any good ideas about how to house all the boards? Cheers

I am not sure about how the capabilities of this work: For use with a fully featured MB-6582, with 4 stereo outputs, can I use 4 AOut modules (of whichever type), and 4 Dual SSM2044 modules, so as to have individually controllable SSM2044 filters for each half of each stereo output pair? Can the SID software handle this case?

Hey, no probs. I can still try to look into it, during the week. The discount is through my current employer. I am not likely to stay in my current job for very much longer though.

Hi, just let you know I won't be joining the group buy. I think I have most of the parts available as spares already. I was considering organising a group purchase for others though, as I can receive a discount for most Altronics parts, depending on quantity. However, I think the Rockby prices, or futurlec wouldn't be very different for this purchase (I haven't checked yet). Altronics retail RRP's are generally quite a bit cheaper than RS or Farnell, but often a bit costlier than Jaycar, Rockby, or futurlec. I would have to confirm if the discounted prices would work out any better, overall. I can generally avoid the delivery charges, as well (from Altronics to me). If other Aussies are interested, I could look into organising a group buy quote through Altronics. However, I probably couldn't fit this in within the next week, as my schedule is pretty full.

@TK Hi, I emailed you earlier to arrange for individual postage from Germany, and receieved a confirmation reply; shall I just make new arrangements to receive items through a proxy in Australia? I'm perfectly OK with doing that, but want to avoid any confusion. Cheers madox