update on the NOCTURNE..those keeping score

I think I may have 50'-60' of cable if you add all of my cables up. I usually go for the 10'-15'...and mine are black.

so does the 301 change the guitar impedence from high to low, or vica versa, or what?

I'm using an adjustable buffer right now that has a "drag" control for variable adjustability of the impedence... Radial Bigshot PB-1... if I turn this down, is it similar to what the 301 is doing? I know if I turn it down, it "dulls" the signal... especially the high end... somewhat, sort of like going thru a pedal with a crappy buffer (like my beloved Dan-Echo). If I crank it up, I can get the same sound as plugging straight into the amp, even after going thru 8-10 pedals. And If I use the buffer alone & crank it up, it ADDS high end.

" Drag control, a variable load correction circuit that lets you dial in the perfect impedance to match the original tone and feel of your guitar and amp combination"

http://www.tonebone.com/re-bigshot-pb1.htm

ruger9 wrote:

so does the 301 change the guitar impedence from high to low, or vica versa, or what?

I'm using an adjustable buffer right now that has a "drag" control for variable adjustability of the impedence... Radial Bigshot PB-1... if I turn this down, is it similar to what the 301 is doing? I know if I turn it down, it "dulls" the signal... especially the high end... somewhat, sort of like going thru a pedal with a crappy buffer (like my beloved Dan-Echo). If I crank it up, I can get the same sound as plugging straight into the amp, even after going thru 8-10 pedals. And If I use the buffer alone & crank it up, it ADDS high end.

" Drag control, a variable load correction circuit that lets you dial in the perfect impedance to match the original tone and feel of your guitar and amp combination"

http://www.tonebone.com/re-bigshot-pb1.htm

I dont want to say sh%t either way about how what works and why, until I have this pedal done... Just know its not that big of a mystery,but I'm afraid of crosss posting over at grinch pages plus
billy is about to put out a series of amps and pedals.

I'm not trying to or implying that I "know" the "know"... I share this:

The lower the output impedance and the higher the input impedance, the more aggressive in the mids and highs the signal is going to tend to be. This is due to inductive and capacitive reactance.

Inductive and capacitive reactance is the reason that long guitar cables suck tone. The longer the cable, the greater the apparent output impedance of the guitar, the lower the ratio between input and output impedance, and therefore the duller the signal tends to be..

A guitar tends to be a high impedance input into a preamp, but filtertrons are different animals when it comes to "inductors"...add the
long cables and you are creating what is mentioned above.

the re-301 input 3 is a high Z input, that has variable resistance input settings. ...BUT because of the component values, choice of opamps,caps,etc.. IT becomes a unique preamp...

very different from say my LR BAGGS CLASS A PREAMP that when bypassing the EQ is doing the same nice job your PB-1 is...
Problem is (but not a problem at the same time) this design is FAR too
clinical.

ITs like an engineer taking a Mic (an inductor) and amplifying it with
say a "GRACE 201" preamp. Very transparent and VERY clinical... I guess they call it "uncolored".. Thats what my LR BAGGS "preamp section" will do well.
Do that same thing with say a UA 610, Joe Meek, or even my vintech
1272 mic pre and it would instantly be called "colored" because it instills a signature sound with distinct EQ spectral artifacts, for lack of better words.

The 301 is doing just that as a mic pre for a specific guitars "inductors" or pkups.

my conjecture, my madness and hopefully soon, my creation for your
guitar rig. if it all works out right.

Thanks for the explanation Tavo. I totally get the "clinical" thing. When you are going thru alot of pedals you WANT "clinical", it serves it's exact purpose in that application. But we're talking TONE here with the Nocturne. We WANT a certain "coloration." Because we are Setzer freaks.

I knew BZ was coming out with some amps (the demos sound fantastic, BTW), but I didn't know he was also coming out with pedals...

HELLO FRIEND
you speak about a pedale stompbox which imitates the slap back of brian to setzer? hihhi you also make a delivery for the France?
ELVIS
ps
think of you that brian setzer in his young years used an analogique delay boss?

A lot of science involved...I didn't fare too well with the semantics of science...but some how passed through honors physics as a junior in HS

The Nocturne still sounds like a good idea to me.

I didn't know Billy Zoom was making pedals, either. I know he has the Trem and reverb unit and his amps (which a couple of them look pretty sweet).

ruger9 wrote:

Thanks for the explanation Tavo. I totally get the "clinical" thing. When you are going thru alot of pedals you WANT "clinical", it serves it's exact purpose in that application. But we're talking TONE here with the Nocturne. We WANT a certain "coloration." Because we are Setzer freaks.

Its going to be hard to change up cables, because I love George L's and
I like that my cables are only 15" long and low cap/ loading. I love
having 7 pedals on my board...

I wont be using those shite pro co cables though. I think I am going to start making cables using the thicker gauge George L w/ neutrik
heavy duty silver soldered jacks. I wont feel so bad running dual 25ft cables then.

good speaker cables make such a big difference too. When I started
making these 12gauge oxygen free copper cables I was so blown away by the improvement in finger dynamic response to my speakers!
now there's a new technology in speaker cables that is suppose to be even more killer for the booteek ear.. super expensive ($135 for 3')
but rad:
ELEPH Speaker Cables



Our new
dynamic arc ultra (TM pending) cable was designed to be the toughest,
best sounding cable in the world. It was made for the serious musician
with a critical ear. Just holding this cable in your hands lets
you know this is a serious cable.

Its acoustic
performance can be described as a nice balance between speed, feel,
and top-end. this gives enough tracking ability for quick players,
a warm midrange, and sweet treble response and superb feel. The
dynamic arc ultra is suited to practically any style and never fatigues
the listener. Compared to other cables, the dynamic arc ultra gives
exceptional bass tone and increased accurate articulation in the
upper frequency ranges.

Its like
a whole portion of your guitar's personality magically got uncorked.
It will give a whole new dimension to your gear and your playing.
It enables your gear to produce exciting new musical dynamics you
didn't know it was capable of. The over-engineered design and build
quality ensure that you never have to worry about your interconnects
letting you down. We take tone to a new level (tm).

-Triple
strain relief
-All metal satin nickle diecast shell
-Translucent 6000 PSI tear resistance protective outer armor
-Triple carbon/braid shielding
-All contact surfaces atmospheric oxidation/contaminant cleaned
and lubricated with audiophile grade metal preservative
-Hand soldered using premium grade silver alloy solder
-18-AWG stranded, oxygen free copper conductor
-Available in red or black

Those soild cables are pretty sweet, but man would I feel dumb if they were to crap out for that price. I was pretty mad when a six month old monster cable chord crapped out on me.

Right now I'm running a George L 10' from guitar to pedals-mish mosh of EB and monster on the board and another 10' George L to the amp.

I don't think I could spend the BIG money on cables...unless I was a studio guy. Those Lava cables seem pretty cool though.

I'm Incinerator wrote:

Those soild cables are pretty sweet, but man would I feel dumb if they were to crap out for that price. I was pretty mad when a six month old monster cable chord crapped out on me.

Right now I'm running a George L 10' from guitar to pedals-mish mosh of EB and monster on the board and another 10' George L to the amp.

I don't think I could spend the BIG money on cables...unless I was a studio guy. Those Lava cables seem pretty cool though.

Nocturn cables will be affordable and booteek

tvthewiredturtle wrote:

ruger9 wrote:

I love George L's and I like that my cables are only 15" long and low cap/ loading.

Is it .225 or .155 ?

tvthewiredturtle wrote:

I'm Incinerator wrote:

Those soild cables are pretty sweet, but man would I feel dumb if they were to crap out for that price. I was pretty mad when a six month old monster cable chord crapped out on me.

Right now I'm running a George L 10' from guitar to pedals-mish mosh of EB and monster on the board and another 10' George L to the amp.

I don't think I could spend the BIG money on cables...unless I was a studio guy. Those Lava cables seem pretty cool though.

Nocturn cables will be affordable and booteek

Glorious! usually those words aren't used in the same phrase

How's Nocturne coming up?

Just keeping score here...





And in the other news;
Paul Cochrane's cool Timmy pedal cloned by Danelectro ?

knudi wrote:

tvthewiredturtle wrote:

ruger9 wrote:

I love George L's and I like that my cables are only 15" long and low cap/ loading.

Is it .225 or .155 ?

that is only the insulation jacket gauge and doesnt have anything to do
with the wire gauge. Its a personal preference.. you either get to go nuts with spaghetti thin tangles, or heavy ass thick and never able to
roll it up... labor of love in two choices.. I've been happy with the
thinner jacket for yrs... btw. white does not stay white, ha..black is best

ossi wrote:

How's Nocturne coming up?

Just keeping score here...

Funny you should ask, as I FINALLY have my prototype together and
running...here's a sneak peek of ..well, the engine.
please keep this photo on this private forum and do not cross post it..yet.. after "yet" then its all go!

So, how does it sound "out of the box" ??

Do the Radio Shack batteries sound better than Duracell? What does Setzer use?

N

Nikko wrote:

Do the Radio Shack batteries sound better than Duracell? What does Setzer use?

N

funny funny... right now the box uses a positive tip on the hot lead, so a boss adapter doesnt jive. I want to be able to bump this up to
18V and may just go with the dunlop 18v adapter.
Been remodeling the "shop" to accomodate production..

ps. and yes the old carbon 9v radioshacks were AWESOME for
fuzz pedals because they only registered like 7.8volts which is
sweet for heavy distortion and fuzz. makes your solo lines violin-esque if you have a good vibrato technique and multi-tap delay.
low voltage would be terrible for the nocturn though, wanna keep maximum headroom. right now at a full -50db setting it makes the
normal channel of a bassman clip with the amps volume at 4 and treble at 7oclock. Even more amazing is the vol. kit on the gretsch's master.
a tiny 1/8 and it cleans up with very sensitive string touch.. bitchen for
setzer's pick in palm finger style travis picking.

Its got a way to go though, I want it to have wow factor for the average plug and play guy. Right now it would only make sense to those familiar with setzer's rig. All to say right now it does what its suppose to with about 30% more gain on tap but because it colors the signal just like the re301, your average booteekphag will poop on it because its not
a transparent boost box....but thats my point, an RE301's preamp is
not transparent AT ALLLLL... Its a very warm and articulate analog preamp that colours the guitar signal to make the lows more woody and the upper mids more twang-jangly... ala setzer. ..and its not a freakin
boost box. its a preamp.

BUT.... to be marketable I think I am going to have to design a mix
control between the bypass signal and effected signal kinda like
Barber does with his awesome compressor. This will also aid in helping
a cat that cant afford a gretsch or care for one, to still put some
hep in his step.

That mix control sounds like a good idea.

And please PLEASE... if at all possible, make it center negative, so a std boss adaptor will work... I've had more great pedals give me more headache over their power requiremetns. ESPECIALLY if we're going 18V, please make it center negative.

Okay here is a demo of THE NOCTURN amp effect I am building

[flash] http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=57541589 [/flash]

Well done TV! I look forward to adding one of those to my set up!

Ohh Tavo....

The Nocturne sounds as sweet as you do!!
Postage and handling to Oz? You need a distrubitor/agent here??

Cheers Pete

P.S. Nice t-shirt!!!

Sweet!

Question: in the demo you ran delay -> preamp. Does the 301 go delay -> preamp, or preamp -> delay? (I thought it was the latter.) And, does it make any difference?

Cool stuff Mr TV !!!

Thanks for the great demo - it sounds excellent

I can't wait until they are available

ruger9 wrote:

Sweet!

Question: in the demo you ran delay -> preamp. Does the 301 go delay -> preamp, or preamp -> delay? (I thought it was the latter.) And, does it make any difference?

the tricky thing with this WHOLE enchilada is that I'm attempting to give the guitarist just the "beginning" and "end" of the RE-301 Space
echo unit because its a GIANT box of effects. It has a full
analog chorus with those awesome mitsubishi Bucket brigade chips from the Roland CE-1 pedal, its got a real american spring reverb
tank complete with the little pkups on either side of it, its got
a full mechanical tape delay effect complete with multiple heads
(that have to be cleaned and de-magnetized on a scheduled maintenance) and they all then pass through a basic EQ circuit.

You could almost call it a recording channel strip with built in processing to a certain degree..sooo.

I had to focus on "why does setzer prefer this unit, to get his inspiring
sound"... its not all the gobblitygook effects, its the pre amp part
of the unit and its recovery section..just like the input gain of a mic
pre and output gain. sooo....
We made the front end of the RE-301 and the back end of it with a little
bit of EQ in the middle.
Basically if you plug your guitar into the RE-301 and dont turn anything on other than adjust the input level and then the output level, you get
the sound/feel/mojo of the UNIT.

now if you DO turn on ANY of the effects (chorus, tape delay,reverb) then the affected tone/ wet sound has a bass and treble attenuation
control and THAT does change up the process signals tone..but

I didnt want to mess with that. I did think about putting in an effects loop that sat right in the middle of the input gain section and the output gain sections but ahh... what for. I'm going for affordable and
convenient..

Which means the delay needs to sit in front of the Box, not after or
your delay effect gets HAMMERED by the Nocturn.

Realize in the video, I ONLY have the normal channel volume
at like 2 1/2, just under 3... Setzer blazes the amp at 5-6.
I also keep the treble at 6 and the presence at 8 with this Nocturn
because I dont run 50 FEET of guitar cable like Setzer does to
do the capacitance loading trick which allows him to make up the
brightness by diming his treble and presence on his amp..which in turn adds MORE gain to his sound making more of a clipped sound in the BSO than in straycats.

So I have a sh$t load of gain on tap and a tone control that lets you
"add" some treble in at lower settings.
I'm going to market it as an effect for your amp, not a pedal.. This way
the thinking is not "hey I'll throw this into my pedal board, next to all my drive boxes". Its a preamp for the amp, not an effects pedal for the guitar thus I think it should go after Delay and reverb effects.

caveat: you can put it in front of your delay but you get really wild
cavern screams from the delay slapback thats more akin to some of
Edge's early delay sounds from the Deluxe memory man when you have its input gain levels too high. A cool sound in and of itself for
sure but not SETzer's sound or groovy rockabilly guitar amp goosing.

here is a close up of the PCB inside the RE-301 space echo (bigger
picture of the unit on your thread about the 301)

Tavo, you're a genius!!!