My Dumbleator

[Structo]

I finished up my Dumbleator this afternoon.

Man, that took longer than I thought it would.
I pretty much worked at it for two days.

I decided to build this in a Hammond enclosure because A, it was cheaper than the rack unit and B, I wanted to put the transformer and choke inside.
It's 17 x 10 x 3 with cover in black powder coat.

I bought the box and most of the parts from Antique Electronic Supply
I had ordered a tag board from them but they were out of them.
A big shout out to Doug Hoffman, I ordered some G10 and a handful of other components on Christmas day and didn't think I would get it for another week.
He surprised me and I received it on Monday.
That's from South Carolina to Oregon in a couple days.
It took AES about a week to get my order here and they are in Arizona.....

This chassis has about the same footprint as my D'Lite amp so I can put the Dumbleator on top the speaker cab and the amp on top of that.

I haven't had the guts to power it up yet, so I'll wait until tomorrow when I have a fresh mind.
I just hope it doesn't let any magic smoke out.

One thing strange, I ordered two F & T 47uf/500v caps and two 30uf/500v caps.
For some reason, the 30uf caps are bigger in size than the 47uf.
Why would that be?

I used a Fender stand alone reverb PT (TF47609) and a 2207 choke.
The PT puts out 240vac.
I used a bridge rectifier with the choke between the two 47uf caps.

Not sure about my dropping string yet so I will have to check my voltages when I do power it up.
I used a 22K and 100K dropper on it.

I also skipped the standby switch on this.
Unless somebody talks me into one, I don't really see the need for one.

Now I have to figure out how to use it!
Right now I don't even know what jack is what or how to use the controls.
I'll look at somebody else's product online to see if I can find out how to work it.

Big thanks to Brandon of Bludotone Amps for his excellent tutorial he wrote.

Not sure how I am going to do the panel labeling yet.
I looked around for the white dry transfer lettering made by Datamark but didn't have much luck finding it.
I may lacquer the front and use waterslide decals and then bury them in lacquer. I've done that a few times on pedal enclosures.

[IMG:800:600]http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b392/ ... G_0258.jpg[/img]
[IMG:800:600]http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b392/ ... G_0257.jpg[/img]
[IMG:800:600]http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b392/ ... G_0264.jpg[/img]
[IMG:800:600]http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b392/ ... G_0284.jpg[/img]
[IMG:799:598]http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b392/ ... G_0282.jpg[/img]
[IMG:800:600]http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b392/ ... G_0275.jpg[/img]


And a nice surprise this afternoon.
It snowed!

[IMG:800:600]http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b392/ ... G_0269.jpg[/img]

[bigmik]

nice job,hope the start up goes well
I'll be looking forward to the tone report

[angelodp]

Hi Tom, way to go, hope it fires up nicely. Here is my take on controls. You have recovery input and output, and a drive knob. I have my Drive at 12 o'clock ( almost always ), the input is at 70-100% and the ouput acts as the Master volume. I do believe that this is more or less standard operating procedure for this device.

Good luck ange

[CHIP]

Looks nice. I going to either build one or wait for Ceriatone to come out with their kit.

[M Fowler]

Tom,

That is looking good and your about done.

Mark

[talbany]

Tom

Looks great..Nice work.. Let us know how it sounds... Good Luck!!



Tony

[boldaslove6789]

I know how you feel

I am in buffalo!!!!!

[mcinku]

What a coincidence I finished mine yesterday as well
...but unfortunately we have only rain here

Really, big thanks to Brandon and also Airniles who designed this EU style power supply... and also Erwin who made me do this... I wanted to buy one of his but he said why not making it. Here in EU, getting parts is really pain in the ***... so at the end I didn't get that Dale plate resistor and all my caps are 716. That's the best I could do.

Here it is...
[img947]http://freeweb.siol.net/mcinku/images/g ... -Lator.jpg[/img]

[mcinku]

I forgot to say...

I tried mine and it works but there something strange happening with my voltages... I need to sort that thing out.

Any ideas what should I do first?
Here are my voltages...

[honeydip]

Hi,

I would measure the 820R Resistor to see whether you just took one with diffferent resistance that looks the same (8K2 or 82K...), because you cannot have voltage drop of over 2xx Volts over a 820R resistor. Check Solderjoints and ground connections of resistors and capacitors as well.

820R should give you a very small voltage drop. All this with the rectifier wired correctly.

Hope it helps, let us know.

Regards

Jan

[mcinku]

Hi,

I would measure the 820R Resistor to see whether you just took one with diffferent resistance that looks the same (8K2 or 82K...), because you cannot have voltage drop of over 2xx Volts over a 820R resistor. Check Solderjoints and ground connections of resistors and capacitors as well.

820R should give you a very small voltage drop. All this with the rectifier wired correctly.

Hope it helps, let us know.

Regards

Jan

Thanks,
I think I measured all resistors before I soldered them,... anyway I will recheck again.

[mcinku]

Man you were right, I had 820K in there , I really don't know how I missed that.

...and of course I don't have 820 available... I just went through my little stock and all I could find is 580 2W resistor,... I called my tech and he has 1K 2W. I'll take his 'cause it's closer to 820... I can't wait any longer, I just have to hear how this thing sounds like.

Jan thanks a lot for your help, I really appreciate it.

[honeydip]

I'm glad you found it

If you don't have 820R just take something close to that like 500R-1K5 with the appropriate power handling capability, it'll work even if the voltage won't be exactly what you were shooting for.

Now, tell us if it works and how it sounds, soundfiles appriciated.

BTW, I'm living in germany and orderer my DALE resistors and lots of other stuff over MOUSER.com and believe it or not, they send everything over to europe in 3 days with free shipment if your order is above 75Euros. It's easy.
Same thing with tubeandmore.com but longer delivery.

Best regards.

Jan

[dcribbs1412]

Inspiring build Tom
did you give up on the the ironsound fx?
really like to hear this.
as always thanks for sharing

[Structo]

Thanks for the kind words guys.
I'm not the greatest builder here but you guys set the bar pretty high.

Late last night I changed a couple shielded cable runs because they just looked too short.

Now I have to tear out the Ironsounds loop and wire a couple jacks into my amp.

At low volume the Ironsounds actually sounds pretty good.
It's when you turn it up to gigging volume that is starts sounding bad.
Most likely due to clipping since it only has a 30v swing, it's probably clipping the signal.
One of these days I'll buy an oscilloscope so I can see this stuff.

mcinku,
My transformer is supposed to put out 240vac, so close to yours.

My first dropping resistor is 22K after the choke, maybe that is too much?
The original shows a 135v PT but with a voltage doubler.
I went with a full wave bridge setup so the smoothing is better with choke and caps.

I saw a layout of an internal D'lator that I think Henry drew up and he had a 22K there or was it Gary from Glaswerks?
I believe he also used the reverb PT.
The specs on this PT said 306v DC, which is probably the voltage under a heavier load.
Since this is a single tube my voltage will probably be higher.

Hey, how did you do the front panel graphics?
That looks killer!

I think I am going try to find some Datamark dry transfer lettering.
I just have to find it.
I may check a local craft store here.