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It's been promised long ago, but was delayed for various reasons, but as we say in France : "tout vient à point à qui sait attendre" (Time brings everything to those who wait), so now the building instructions in english for Jean-Claude's echo box are available at last !



It's not quite a DIY echo box for dummies as you'll need first to make the printed circuit board, which isn't a task for beginners. So if you plan to make one and don't have enough experience in electronics building for that, better search fo the help of someone with enough experience.

The JCechoFDS isn't a general purpose echo unit, it's only intended to emulate the first two echo units used by Hank Marvin during the early years (Meazzi drum echo units). It does'n provide storage for multiple echoes settings, but neither did those Meazzi echo units. At this time Hank used only one setting for a whole concert, as I watched it myself when attending a Shadows' concert at the Paris Olympia in early 1961.

The JCechoFDS doesn't provide only the proper echo pattern and timing, it also features an EQ circuit for proper Meazzi tone, and a W&F emulation circuit, as W&F on the Meazzi echo units played a part in their sound.

Here are two demoes of the JCechoFDS :

Gonzales (echo pos. 2)

Wonderful Land (echo pos. 1)

Both recorded by "Paulo" using a Strat and a miked Vox Pathfinder amp with no other effect than the JCechoFDS.

For those interested in building the unit, send me a PM with your email adress, and I'll send you a zip file containing the building instructions (Word format), list of components (XLS format) and printed circuit board (LAY format).

The overall cost for components, inculding the 1U rack case (but not counting the PT2399 chips) is around €160 (£130).
The PT2399 chips can be found for less than £3 each.

Didier

PM sent Didier.......

ecca wrote:PM sent Didier.......

Doc sent,

Didier

Didier wrote:It's been promised long ago, but was delayed for various reasons, but as we say in France : "tout vient à point à qui sait attendre" (Time brings everything to those who wait), so now the building instructions in english for Jean-Claude's echo box are available at last !



It's not quite a DIY echo box for dummies as you'll need first to make the printed circuit board, which isn't a task for beginners. So if you plan to make one and don't have enough experience in electronics building for that, better search fo the help of someone with enough experience.

The JCechoFDS isn't a general purpose echo unit, it's only intended to emulate the first two echo units used by Hank Marvin during the early years (Meazzi drum echo units). It does'n provide storage for multiple echoes settings, but neither did those Meazzi echo units. At this time Hank used only one setting for a whole concert, as I watched it myself when attending a Shadows' concert at the Paris Olympia in early 1961.

The JCechoFDS doesn't provide only the proper echo pattern and timing, it also features an EQ circuit for proper Meazzi tone, and a W&F emulation circuit, as W&F on the Meazzi echo units played a part in their sound.

Here are two demoes of the JCechoFDS :

Gonzales (echo pos. 2)

Wonderful Land (echo pos. 1)

Both recorded by "Paulo" using a Strat and a miked Vox Pathfinder amp with no other effect than the JCechoFDS.

For those interested in building the unit, send me a PM with your email adress, and I'll send you a zip file containing the building instructions (Word format), list of components (XLS format) and printed circuit board (LAY format).

The overall cost for components, inculding the 1U rack case (but not counting the PT2399 chips) is around €160 (£130).
The PT2399 chips can be found for less than £3 each.

Didier

Wonderful Land sounds 'Spot On'

I agree that sound is great on Wonderful Land as Keith said spot on. Was any studio EQ done on the files or are they straight off the unit as recorded no EQ ?

roger bayliss wrote:I agree that sound is great on Wonderful Land as Keith said spot on. Was any studio EQ done on the files or are they straight off the unit as recorded no EQ ?

Jean-Claude's JCechoFDS unit has a specific EQ circuit in adition to the delay circuits and W&F emulation circuit. This EQ was designed by Jean-Claude after analysing Hank's guitar sound spectrum on early recordings. No other EQ was used.

Didier

I have to agree with the previous post.

Wonderful land sounds fantastic.

I know that a lot of the sound is in the hands of the player, but having the right gear also helps.

Regards

Kevin

What is the difference between this and Piet's etap?

AlanMcKillop wrote:What is the difference between this and Piet's etap?

These are two different designs. Piet's etapt2-hw is simplier than Jean-Claude's JCechoFDS, and easier to build, as it's delivered as a kit which includes the printed circuit board. It also offers a wider range of echo unit emulations, but as far as I know, it doesn't have EQ and W&F emulation as the JCechoFDS does.

Didier

Didier wrote:

AlanMcKillop wrote:What is the difference between this and Piet's etap?

These are two different designs. Piet's etapt2-hw is simplier than Jean-Claude's JCechoFDS, and easier to build, as it's delivered as a kit which includes the printed circuit board. It also offers a wider range of echo unit emulations, but as far as I know, it doesn't have EQ and W&F emulation as the JCechoFDS does.

Didier

eTap2hw comes with W&F for each emulation. It's build around the same flanger mechanism as the Alesis Q family and fine tuned during the 'early adaptor' sessions for each individual emulation. EQ is used in a fixed sense to provide a correct sound fingerprint for each emulation. However, it is assumed that the user adds a graphic equalizer to adjust the total sound chain, if required, for stage performances. Another key element in eTap2hw is the use of a two FET input stage providing a harmonic content enrichment expected from tube base vintage echo equipment emulations. Obviously, tape emulation including magnetic saturation are part of the DSP code while most of the sound processing takes place through the analog components on the motherboard.

Kind regards

Piet