Fender Vibratone

[woodyc]

...If you want to see a professional and trustworthy design to control a Leslie, by the way, look at how Leslie themselves do it...

Juan,

For a specific organ or other application I would probably do something different, but for a general purpose Vibratone-type device, I think my design has several features that are a significant improvement over the original...

- It is simpler to use.
- It uses a cheap currently available footswitch (no peculiar cables or obsolete connectors.)
- The relays pull less than 1/5 the current of the original, switch quieter, and don't require shock mounting since they are DC and don't buzz.
- Neither motor is left running continuously during periods where you don't need the effect.
- The LEDs permit a musician to see at a glance if the effect is on and which motor is activated before they start a song.

These improvements may be amateurish, but I like them.

[J M Fahey]

Fine.
I didn't say it was wrong or wouldn't work, far from it. Or did I?
I am a minimalist myself, and if somebody says so (in fact, everybody does ) , rather than pissed off, I like it .
As of the word "amateur": *I* am an Amateur Photographer; an Amateur Chemist; an Amateur Shooter ; ......... ; etc. (Include 1000 other activities on the dotted line).
Should I feel bad if somebody said so?
And by using that word I meant: it looks like what an Amateur would build; not like a Commercial product.
Different worlds.
If you make 100 or 1000 units, saving a couple bucks on each means a lot; and justifies PCB design (which will be needed), giving extra considerations to Electrical Codes, etc.; while on the contrary a couple units justifies spending a little more in parts and saving on everything else.
And what Steve Conner said is exactly what I found:
1) those relays need reverse biased diodes in parallel with the coils, to (almost) eliminate pops and clicks.
2) failing that, the long unshielded cable going to the actual footswitch will introduce pops into nearby instruments.
3) I'd add, say, a .1 ceramic cap across the jack contacts.
4) the "PTP" design and construction makes it easier to keep live and control wiring separate.
5) may seem a minor detail, but no commercial builder would have used a split secondary , "full wave" rectified supply, when a single winding, bridge rectified one would have been somewhat cheaper and easier to find a transformer for.
6) those Omron Relays (excellent choice, by the way), need 75mA per coil, a grand total of 150mA ... and 12Volts ... yet the designer specified 1N5408 , 3 Ampere, 800Vpi diodes.
4 humble 1N4002 would have been more than enough, or a small bridge such as W002.
7) fitting 130 V varistors across the motor contacts would have been good.
8) Leslie avoids a lot of problems by providing "Zero-crossing" (well, almost) motor triggering , *and* driving/isolating them with relays.
Maybe they are not *that* dumb after all

That said, please let me clear that my comments were honest, straight and to the point, and of course, never meant to be insulting, but if you feel they are so, feel free to erase whatever part of my answer you think would help.
My humblest apologies.

[Enzo]

I don't get the AC vs DC when it comes to shock mounting. The reason one shock mounts a motor is to prevent it from conducting mechanical noise into the wooden cab frame. That would make such noise louder if screwed solidly.

Squeeze off a few revs with your power drill. Now hold the drill solid against the door to the room and squeeze again. I bet it is a lot louder.

[woodyc]

I don't get the AC vs DC when it comes to shock mounting...

AC relays tend to vibrate mechanically on account of the pulsing current. DC relays don't.

[twiggybush]

Hi Woodyc, I came upon this thread because I'm dealing with switch popping myself. I just finished cobbling my clone together today. My 15" foam rotor with dual clutching motor came out of a Lowrey organ I purchased for $10. $20 for pine boards and I'm happy. My cab looks very similar to yours but I just painted it black. I wondered why your beutiful cab has no top port and has an upper port on the grill face?

[woodyc]

...My cab looks very similar to yours but I just painted it black. I wondered why your beutiful cab has no top port and has an upper port on the grill face?

I'd love to see what you did.

I made the one in the pic for a harp player who wanted to be able to put a combo amp and a beer on the top surface. It doesn't have much effect on the overall sound.

[twiggybush]

Here's a pic. The cab measures 25x21x16". I made a 4" shelf in the bottom for all the cords and pedal accessable from the rear. I put in a 12" speaker. I recessed the ports and hot glued some nice black screen that I cut from a waste basket. My foot switch box is from an outdoor outlet extension ring with aluminum .125 flat stock top and bottom. I had most everything including the speaker so I spent about $30 on this project. In the background is the donor Lowrey TLO-R. That organ happens to be the Baba O'Reily organ. It still works and hooks up to the Vibra-clone. I wanted to use this on my Hammond organ and guitar as well. It sounds amazing. The cab was a bit more time consuming than I anticipated. I'm undecided about the grill face at this time. To port or not to port. I'm thinking psychedelic yard goods. This is for my home studio use only so 120 volt switching is where it sits for now. For anybody interested in doing this I'd suggest forget about sewing machine and ceiling fan motors. In my area their are a couple free(ish) organs on C list per week. Look for the side vent on the organ as to being a clue that it has a rotary speaker

[woodyc]

Here's a pic...

Nice job. The bottom compartment and waste basket grilles are nice innovations, and the fabric will no doubt make it look really sweet.

My only suggestion would be to go with another slot along the bottom behind the fabric -- the idea being to have as much open area as possible along the travel of the rotor opening.

[gbono]

Juan,

If you have a more "professional" and "trustworthy" design for for controlling a leslie, please share it.

Your insults aren't really all that helpful.

So your design has CSA/VDE/UL approval?

[Katmol]

Hey woodyc,
Could I get a few pictures and a wireing diagram of your footswitch for the Model 16?

I did the same relay thing to a Leslie 16 last week, and took a pic this time.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]20285[/ATTACH]

Its not hard or expensive and makes Vibratone-style leslies more flexible (i.e. not requiring 4, 5, or 6 pin connectors, a dangling crossover, et cetera.)

If you mount the box next to the motors like this, the existing motor wires are just long enough to get to the relay. And 12VDC is convenient since you can use a standard footswitch with LEDs. I use the left button for on/off and the right for fast/slow. The only other mod is to put a jackplate on the leslie somewhere to plug the speaker into your amp.

If anybody else has modded these, I'd love to see what you did.

[woodyc]

sincere apologies but I keep getting requests to re-post this...

[Katmol]

Quick qusetion,
Can you use a Fender Leslie 16 or Vibrstone with it laying on it back or face?

[cyclone]

here's mine made from 70's lowery guts. I repurposed the footpedal and xformer for the ss amp as a chassis and supply for the relay. Mine is single speed so I paralleled a latching and momentary switch in the footpedal as a truly amateur 2 speed speed control. I put a 10" speaker on the Leslie (was 8") and I added a 10" dry monitor speaker on an angled mounting board in the bottom of the cab, its more useful as a standalone (but massive) 2x10 guitar cab. I have no crossover in it. I covered it in about 3 yards of purple levant with grey piping and basketweave grillcloth, hard to tell from the pic.

There is no replacement for a physically rotating speaker element, no pedal comes close.

[vibraesq]

Thanks a lot! - very very helpful!