[mhammer]

Among the pedals a friend gave me for my birthday was one of these. Eager to see what I could do with it, I immediately took the back off to see what was inside. Much to my delight, it seemed to follow the basic design of a traditional analog delay pedal, a la DM-3, Aqua Puss, or AD-9. Much to my dismay, however, it used a 3208 delay chip, which has 2048 stages of delay; half of what the aforementioned pedals use. So, I ordered a Coolaudio V3205, which is a 4096-stage chip that is pin-for-pin replaceable for the 3208. Chip arrived today, so I quickly unsoldered and removed the 3208 and installed the 3205. Fired it up and beautiful analog delay of reasonable length poured out. Much more usable pedal now.

 

[NorlinNorm]

Among the pedals a friend gave me for my birthday was one of these. Eager to see what I could do with it, I immediately took the back off to see what was inside. Much to my delight, it seemed to follow the basic design of a traditional analog delay pedal, a la DM-3, Aqua Puss, or AD-9. Much to my dismay, however, it used a 3208 delay chip, which has 2048 stages of delay; half of what the aforementioned pedals use. So, I ordered a Coolaudio V3205, which is a 4096-stage chip that is pin-for-pin replaceable for the 3208. Chip arrived today, so I quickly unsoldered and removed the 3208 and installed the 3205. Fired it up and beautiful analog delay of reasonable length poured out. Much more usable pedal now.

Such a handy skill to be able to modify pedals!!

 

[sambonee]

I like delay.

Like when my wife reminds me of the "honey do list" I apply generous amounts of delay to the project. works well for me!!

 

[mhammer]

I should probably add that I can cascade the 3205 and 3208 chips for 50% longer delay than the 3205 alone, although it will involve making and installing a little daughter board with the additional chip, and identifying the insertion point on the board. Chips of the same series (30xx or 32xx) can be used in that fashion. Indeed, many current-production analog delays use multiple delay chips in series to get long delay times. I figure if I have the extra chip kicking around, and have no other use for it, may as well put it to work.

But I'll leave that for retirement.

 

[greco]

But I'll leave that for retirement.

When is retirement? Soon...IIRC

 

[mhammer]

Oct 2.

 

[High/Deaf]

I'm curious, @mhammer , when you do a mod like this, do you install a socket or just solder the new IC in?

I'd be inclined to install a socket just so I could go back if it didn't work out (that has obviously been an issue for me in the past) - spacing providing.

 

[mhammer]

I just soldered the chip in place, given that there are no higher-capacity substitutes out there that might possibly earn the same spot in future. I understand your rationale and support it, but I knew enough about the devices involved to proceed with confidence and permanence.

Mark

 

[zontar]

It's still a NPD.

Glad you could mod it to suit you better---
Enjoy!

 

[mhammer]

I got in some force-sensing resistors with the same parts order, just like this one, and I'm itching to try them out. IT actually doesn't take all that much pressure to make them change resistance, and the resistance range is a useful one.

What could you do with them? Well, given the adhesive backing, imagine having a pad to the side of the stompswitch that parallels the speed control on a phaser or chorus or tremolo. You set the speed to the default rate, and when you feel like it, push down a little on the pad to accelerate the LFO. Or maybe it gets placed in parallel with the Delay time or Feedback pot on a delay pedal, and stepping on it changes the delay time. Or maybe one has a simple overdrive whose intensity is set by a single resistance, like so many op-amp-based overdrives. Set the unit for modest gain and press down a bit when you want the gain to be increased to add some more serious bite to the overdrive tone.

I'm really intrigued by the possibilities. The limitation is that it can only be used to deliberately reduce a resistance. If what you want to do idemands that a resistance be increased, you're outa luck.