Hey guys, haven't been here in a while or played around with electronics and electric guitars for couple years. Been on an acoustic odyssey lol. Feel like I'm starting from scratch again. Dragged out my MIM strat and red knob superchamp..thats downstairs in the man cave and too loud for the living room.
I was wanting to build myself a small stereo coffee table guitar amp. I have seen plenty of cheap amp boards on ebay, pre soldered with surface mount components with stereo 3w output. That would do me, anything much louder would annoy the missus, and we don't want that and I don't want make a real amp with power transformer..i don't do AC.
I need a preamp...but before I get to that stage I have some really obvious things that I don't know/ forgotten.
1. Could I just use an effects pedal as a pre?
My intuition says no because guitar amps have an input stage ( i remember that part)
2. Would pedals work directly into a line level inout if i placed a DI box between pedal and amp? What would it sound like? Would a cabsim pedal or amp in a box work?
3. Is there a schematic on here or elsewhere that gives a simple clean channel, with maybe basic tone controls that you could point me to, that may be suitable for these ebay amps. Fetzer valve was one i used in the past and I remember Phil(Phat) had some great preamp designs floating around here. Would there be a way to modify one of those to work with the ebay amp?
4. Should I stay away from those chinese prepopulated boards on ebay, and build a proper deigned practice amp? If the latter option, Which one?
5. If it was Ok to have a preamp board ( that i would perf) and the ebay amp side by side in a box, and i didn't need a D/I circuit in between, could I use a single 9/12v wall wart to power both boards, or would I need a seperate supply for both pre and power amp?
Am i barking up the wrong tree with the D/I box..i just remember having a need for a DI box when plugging into my mixer years ago..sounded terrible without it, and it had line level inputs. When it comes to electronics I know enough to be dangerous. I can solder ok and use a dmm. I used to build pedals 10 years ago, then had sporadic forays back into electronics but only limited understanding. Sorry for the dumb questions, and rambling in advance
Looking for your input
steve
I was wanting to build myself a small stereo coffee table guitar amp. I have seen plenty of cheap amp boards on ebay, pre soldered with surface mount components with stereo 3w output. That would do me, anything much louder would annoy the missus, and we don't want that and I don't want make a real amp with power transformer..i don't do AC.
I need a preamp...but before I get to that stage I have some really obvious things that I don't know/ forgotten.
1. Could I just use an effects pedal as a pre?
My intuition says no because guitar amps have an input stage ( i remember that part)
2. Would pedals work directly into a line level inout if i placed a DI box between pedal and amp? What would it sound like? Would a cabsim pedal or amp in a box work?
3. Is there a schematic on here or elsewhere that gives a simple clean channel, with maybe basic tone controls that you could point me to, that may be suitable for these ebay amps. Fetzer valve was one i used in the past and I remember Phil(Phat) had some great preamp designs floating around here. Would there be a way to modify one of those to work with the ebay amp?
4. Should I stay away from those chinese prepopulated boards on ebay, and build a proper deigned practice amp? If the latter option, Which one?
5. If it was Ok to have a preamp board ( that i would perf) and the ebay amp side by side in a box, and i didn't need a D/I circuit in between, could I use a single 9/12v wall wart to power both boards, or would I need a seperate supply for both pre and power amp?
Am i barking up the wrong tree with the D/I box..i just remember having a need for a DI box when plugging into my mixer years ago..sounded terrible without it, and it had line level inputs. When it comes to electronics I know enough to be dangerous. I can solder ok and use a dmm. I used to build pedals 10 years ago, then had sporadic forays back into electronics but only limited understanding. Sorry for the dumb questions, and rambling in advance
Looking for your input
steve