Substantial Clipping

Output of fuzz circuit in purple showing harsh clipping of input signal.

Guitar Fuzz Circuit

A great sounding ToneBender MKII fuzz pedal circuit constructed with vintage Sanyo germanium transistors D3 harvested from a old reel-to-reel tape recorder circa 1960s. Planning to build this into a portable box with pots for adjusting gain and effect. A link to the source for this circuit can be found by clicking on the title of this post.

Dead in the Water

Our engine failed this afternoon coming out of Manchester harbor; good practice anchoring in a hurry. After some diagnostic work we discovered these parts inside the fuel bladder had popped out of place and blocked the gas flow.

Signal Generator Circuit with Volume Control

This is the prototype circuit using the XR-2206 signal generation IC. D3 extracted a Toshiba TC9235P volume control IC out of a small Cambridge SoundWorks desktop radio found at a yard sale; the up/down control (silver knob) is out of a CD player. The XR-2206 has a pin dedicated as an amplitude modulation input and early testing shows it works very well. For use testing our amplifiers, filters and enclosure designs, we plan to build this into a portable instrument box.

Mayapple Flower in our Shade Garden

A photo of a Mayapple flower growing in our shade garden. These plants were transplanted from my grandfather's house; this was the topic of his last research project. The article published in the American Journal of Botany can be found by clicking on the title of this post.

Push Button Circuit Schematic

This is the circuit D3 designed for the new push button shown in the earlier post. It provides logic and timing for the blue blinking sequence (earlier video) and control lines for indicating charging (red solid) and errors (blinking red).

Push Button Switch

This is a new switch with blue and red led lighting that just arrived. D3 built a circuit to blink with a slow-on slow-off pulsing mode as seen in this video. This will be used to turn our speaker systems on/off. Working today on new functionality, the circuit design now has a start-up sequence that blinks 5 times when the button is pressed and then stays on. It also has a control line that turns the color to red and blinking that will be used as an error or out-of-range condition indicator.

Power Supply Failure

Not every supply works as we would like.....

Air Deflection Fin Design

Improved fin design for seagull whacker.

Seagull Whacker

One end of the frame to support a dual seagull-whacker.