Wow, that is really nice. Good work--I don't see any issues from a quick scan. I notice that you are using a 47nf cap on the other side of the tone pot--that should give you a bit more tone range than my stock version.

Let me know when you get it built!

-dano

Quote from: trevize on October 05, 2006, 06:11:06 AM
this is my pcb layout (not yet verified) with pcb mounted pots to semplify wiring. what do you think?

I'm thinking about makeing a better preamp for the noisy cricket and make a preamp out. It will become a bedroom head or a portable preamp in the same enclosure

in this version j1 and j2 are a jumper. if anyone is interested in testing the layout i can post the pnp image.

Quote from: Stompin_Tom on October 04, 2006, 09:35:48 AM
How's that tube cricket coming along, dan-o? I'm curious to see what you put together... and how it sounds!

I think it is going to kill me I've been working on it for weeks and the tube preamp section is giving me fits. I figure I'm close though--when I can get it stable it sounds really nice.

The Pico Cricket is essentially the same circuit as the Noisy Cricket but with fewer parts. It is based on the Smokey amp which has no controls. I added a gain control which is essentially a 1K linear pot connected across pins 1 and 8 of the LM386. I'll give the schemos a quick check and see if I can make it clearer.

<Edit: yep, I didn't have the schematic that showed how to wire the gain pot. Whoops Take a look at the http://www.beavisaudio.com/Projects/NoisyCricket/index.htm page now and check out the Smokey Tone Gain Amp schematic. >

Holler if you have any questions! :tu:

-dano
www.beavisaudio.com

I've been building my Noisy Cricket amp for a while now and have received some real good feedback from folks regarding the tone. It is based on runoffgroove.com's Ruby and adds a tone control and a grit mod. I built about 30 of these for folks and they have been pretty happy with the sound. I have also retired from building for a while (too many projects, too little time).

In order to help folks who want a NC, I've posted a new section on my site that is essentially the "Build Your Own Noisy Cricket" amp. If you have built a Ruby and are looking for some mods, you may get some ideas. If you haven't built a 386-based amp yet, the NC should be a fun project.

Anyway, hope some of you fine folks find it useful:
http://beavisaudio.com/Projects/NoisyCricket/DIY/

Best,
-dano

Hey Scott,

Tinkering with 386-based amps is a lot of fun. I've made a sub-hobby out of it:
http://beavisaudio.com/Projects/NoisyCricket/index.htm

The original smokey had the JRC chip, my builds have used the NS LM386.

If you have any questions, ask away!

I've built a couple Ruby practice amps from runoffgroove.com. The Ruby is dirt simple and sounds really good. But the tinkerer in me wants more. Thanks to some great feedback at DIYStompboxes, I'm working to build a ruby that has a simple tone control and a boost. Here are two versions of my schematic. These are NOT YET VERIFIED but I'll update the thread as I make progress.

Noisy Cricket V1 (simple JFET boost and a variation of Mark Hammer's "Stupidly Wonderful Tone Control" + Stock Ruby + Gainy Mod)


Noisy Cricket V2 (boost based on the DOD250 and a tone stack from Aron Nelson + Stock Ruby + Gainy Mod)


Also, during breadboarding I've come across a mod that sounds pretty nice. This one is verified and is really simple: