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Just finished building the Green Pony. I get the LED status light to turn on when plugged in and sound through the pedal when bypassed, but when activated -- no sound.

I checked over my solders, and loose cables, all is good there. I tried it without the back on, and the back isn't the issue.

When i flip the toggle for the clipping toggle, the LEDs do not light up.

The IC chip for the charge pump looked like it wasn't seated, so I checked to see if it was and it was super hot. Finger burningly hot.

The instructions for the build do not have any instructions for seating the IC chips, but I looked at the picture and figured it out, I think.

Should that charge pump IC be super hot?

I will be testing for continuity later today and see if there is anything else that might be the culprit.

Any other ideas?

Let's see some photos, please--large, well-lit, well-focused shots of both sides of the PCB and all of the jack and switch wiring.

BTW, that hot charge pump is a strong indication of a power short to ground somewhere.

_________________
“My favorite programming language is SOLDER” - Bob Pease (RIP)

My Website * My Musical Gear * My DIY Pedals: Pg.1 - Pg.2

Switch



Solder side 1


Solder side 2


Circuit side 1


Circuit side 2


I couldn't find any continuity errors with my multimeter. I cleaned in between the charge pump with a knife to make sure there weren't any solder bridges.

I'm stumped!




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See cropped & marked up photo below--is that a wire strand shorting leg 3 of the volume pot to ground?

_________________
“My favorite programming language is SOLDER” - Bob Pease (RIP)

My Website * My Musical Gear * My DIY Pedals: Pg.1 - Pg.2

That was a stray braid, I removed the wire and re-soldered it in so there was no stray.

Put the pedal back together, but still no sound when engaged.

Charge pump is still super hot.

Is there a chance that the charge pump IC is defective?

I should have noticed this before, but your top 4558 is installed upside down. It may well be fried & internally shorted, causing the charge pump to run so hot. If you have another 4558 handy (actually, any general purpose dual op amp like a TL072, NE5532, OPA2134PA, etc. should work there), I'd install it in that spot (dot or notch UP) and retest the pedal.

_________________
“My favorite programming language is SOLDER” - Bob Pease (RIP)

My Website * My Musical Gear * My DIY Pedals: Pg.1 - Pg.2

I had an extra couple 4558's for another build kicking around and swapped it out.

It worked!

Output seems a bit low-ish, but not unbearable...

and should the two internal LEDs go on when they are switched over? (because they are not)

Thanks in advance for your sage advice.

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Yeah, those IC's definitely don't appreciate being stuck in there upside-down. Sorry I didn't check for that before my first response.

Is the charge pump maintaining a more reasonable temperature now? You might want to check the voltage difference with a multimeter between pins 5 (black probe) and 8 (red probe) to see if you're getting 18VDC. If it's much lower than that, the charge pump could be damaged and in need of replacement. Hopefully not.


Please quantify what you mean by "a bit low-ish."


With the Drive pot set all the way up and a good hot humbucker input signal, you should be able to see the LED's flicker, at least on the initial attack of a chord or note. Keep in mind that the LED's are serving as signal clippers, so they will only light when the signal magnitude exceeds their forward voltage threshold, which is somewhere around 2 - 2.5V. And that is a very hot guitar signal.

_________________
“My favorite programming language is SOLDER” - Bob Pease (RIP)

My Website * My Musical Gear * My DIY Pedals: Pg.1 - Pg.2

The temp appears to be fine, I had it running for a few minutes, and it was not fingerprint melting hot.

I will check the voltage later.

RE: the low-ish output, I would have assumed that the level knob at 12:00 would be parity with the un-effected signal, parity seems a lot higher, like at 3:00...

I just wanted to make sure that the LEDs should not be on and lit when they were engaged.

The voltage difference is right @ 18, so that is fine.

At what Drive pot setting? Keep in mind that the Drive pot sets the signal amplitude near the beginning of the circuit and the Volume control near the end, so they will both affect the final output volume.

_________________
“My favorite programming language is SOLDER” - Bob Pease (RIP)

My Website * My Musical Gear * My DIY Pedals: Pg.1 - Pg.2

FWIW, I can only see the LEDs flicker when the room is completely dark with the gain all the way up, and even then, it's not much. And unity gain for me is around 1 or 2 o'clock with the gain knob all the way down. If that distresses you, you can switch the volume pot with a B taper. That will shift most of the action to the first half of the rotation. If you want to make it louder, you can make the 47k resistor (located next to the volume pot eyelets) a smaller value. The smaller you make it, the louder it will get, however, you will eventually reach a point where your clean signal starts to clip. Maybe try a 39k or 33k.

_________________
*patience is a virtue*

Please do not PM me. email is prefered. keith@buildyourownclone.com

So I have been able to play a little bit with it today. (Using an Epiphone Sheraton Pro)

The only thing close to unity levels is with all three knobs completely all the way up.
Level comes into an audible range around 10-11 o'clock. but only close to the un-processed sound all the way up.

Tone seems to be working fine, seems to be pretty tone-y.

Drive seems to come on and make a boost around 3-4 o'clock.

Tone toggle seems to come close to unity when it is in the fat mode. Normal and thin are both much lower in volume.

Clipping toggle seems best at the center, either LED or Si seem to suck a lot of volume.

I built this without the FET mod, just regular old build.

Could I have fried the other IC?

Yes, you should swap the other IC as well.

_________________
*patience is a virtue*

Please do not PM me. email is prefered. keith@buildyourownclone.com

Just went through your photos and I believe I see your problem--you have systematically switched the four 1K resistors (brown-black-black-BROWN-brown) and the four 10K resistors (brown-black-black-RED-brown). Additionally, you switched the 220ohm resistor (red-red-black-BLACK-brown) with the 2.2K resistor (red-red-black-BROWN-brown). Correct all of these resistor placement errors and see how the pedal sounds at that point--I'm betting that the other IC is fine. I would suggest referring to the resistor placement diagram on page 7 of the instructions while making these corrections.

_________________
“My favorite programming language is SOLDER” - Bob Pease (RIP)

My Website * My Musical Gear * My DIY Pedals: Pg.1 - Pg.2

Ugg. Unsoldering all that was no fun. Resoldered everything and output is still the same. Feeling pretty bummed.


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Day-um! Thought for sure that would take care of the problem.

Could you post a couple of new photos, so we can see the pedal in its current condition?

_________________
“My favorite programming language is SOLDER” - Bob Pease (RIP)

My Website * My Musical Gear * My DIY Pedals: Pg.1 - Pg.2

I may just wrap it up and use it on 10. I liked the sound. I'll take pics tomorrow. It's uglier now from the unsoldering. (It's my second pedal and 3rd soldering project)

Maybe I'll just get another pcb and start over


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Here are the pics.





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Okay, what is the process for testing this with the signal tester?

Please be gentle and remember I'm a newbie......

The build instructions should explain how to connect the probe. You'll need to use both the schematic and PCB map for the green pony located here viewtopic.php?f=50&t=39384

You don't really need to be able to fully read a schematic to see that the signal travels in a linear path from the input jack to the output jack. So what you are doing is following that path with the signal probe and seeing where the signal dies.....well in most cases. In yours, you're testing to see where the signal drops.

You don't need to test every single point along the path. Only the major points like the ins and outs of the semiconductors. So you'd want to test the input or gate of Q1(middle eyelet) and the output or the source of Q1(eyelet closest to the drive pot). At this point, your signal should be pretty much identical to your bypass signal. Then test pin 3 of IC1. Up to this point your signal still should be identical to your bypass signal.

Then test pin 1 of IC1. Be aware that it is going to be very very loud at this point, so you should turn down the volume on your amp. This should sound like what you would expect the pedal with the volume on 10 to sound like.

Then pin 7 of IC2. Then pin 1 of IC2. Same thing. It should be very loud at these points.

Then pin 7 of IC1. The volume pot now has control, so you should be able to manipulate the overall volume.

_________________
*patience is a virtue*

Please do not PM me. email is prefered. keith@buildyourownclone.com