Weee Ordered my Rob Keeley DS-1

mirv

Ordered it earlier. Can't wait. Weeeeee.

feylya

Cool. Let us know what it sounds like. Might do it to mine, noisy wee bugger. Did you get the SEM or the Ultra?

mirv

The Ultra. €104.50 including shipping, so its pretty much a twenty note over the price of a DS-1 in our inflated Dublin price, so I may as well have. I need it badly for changing sounds as I've a single channel amp.

I can have a extra 'channel' by dialing my rhythm pickup's volume low and the treble pickup high, and with the DS-1 Ultra, I'll have another channel, albeit properly.

feylya

Did you order that from the American site? Apparently Boss have gone quite crazy in the past when American retailers have sold their pedals out of the country. That way they can charge $40 in America and still get €80 from people over here.

mirv

Boss' sales tactics aren't that bad. Irish stores compound it however, thomann and musicstore have the DS1 for 55 or 60, and the Irish stores jack that up even higher.

I don't mind anyway, For the price I'm getting it, it's like buying a normal DS-1 from an expensive store here except with Keeley mods. Apparently the SEM is very quiet, and the Ultra even more so. I could do with less buzz, especially when I'm playing in front of the computer screen with gain on max.

feylya

The buzz comes from the pickups when you're in front of a screen, not the gain. You could play completely clean tone and it'd still buzz. Yeah, they are supposedly quieter. It's to do with the metal film capacitors he puts in. Must get me a few of them. And a nice blue led for the check light. And the red led for the clipping. Mmm, yes.

mirv

I know that much about guitar noise . The noise is exaggerated by the gain is what I meant. I could play clean and barely notice it compared to with gain, and the master volume down so that overall the playing volume is the same, but the noise is far more noticable.

A workaround is switching to the middle position on my guitar, which is equivalent to a four-singlecoil humbucker which almost gets rid of any noise, despite having gain on high, and sitting in front of a monitor.

feylya

Or use EMG's and turn the screen off Anyways, let us know how that things sounds when you get it.

mirv

I could bring it into town in Dublin someday if you'd like to drool over it. I'm sure the music shops would be willing to look at it too, to compare to a bog standard ds-1.

feylya

Thanks but I've never in Dublin. Stuck in Dundalk. Yeah, the music shops might like to have a look. That is, if they're anyway good, unlike this god forsaken place. Barely even know what a DS-1 is!

Antisocialiser

wanna educate the nubs lads? Im guessin its some sort of mod on the pedal :S

feylya

Basically the circuit is changed and improved. More volume, better bass, different tone, more tube like.

Antisocialiser

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2371895850&category=22669 goin cheap here if anyones interested

feylya

Excellent. Never liked the cool knobs he puts on it though.

mirv

Touché, he includes the original knobs in the package as well, so you have a choice between two sets of knobs, mix and match! No more ugly keeley knobs for me!

feylya

Ah, isn't that nice. So what does it sound like then?

mirv

Don't know. He mailed me saying its just finished being built, and will ship tomorrow. It's standard airmail though, so it might be a while.

feylya

Cool. He seems to be a nice bloke. Emailed him asking for schematics of what he changes. He didn't have any but he told me what he did change. Which was nice.

Don1

I wonder would he hotrod my GT-6?

mirv

GT-6 showoff! My pedal arrived today or yesterday, but I have to pick it up from the post office cos I was in college when it was meant to be delivered. Super yay!

Giblet

I flung my DS-1 after getting my Marshall, nothing quite gets the Marshall gain.

mirv

Was it a Keeley DS-1 though? You're talking about two VERY different pedals according to harmony central.

feylya

So what do you think of the DS-1 now? Is it much better than a stock one? I've gotten the schematics for it so I might do the Ultra mod if it's a big difference.

mirv

The Ultra mod is more gorgeous through a tube amp. Dunno about tranny amps though, distortion generally always sounds tinny and harsh. The stock DS-1 is far scratchier, with an almost unusable tone control. It's a lot less warm, and more fuzzy sounding than my DS-1's SEM channel. The Ultra channel is mid's heaven, it's just like a good tube overdrive/distortion/crunch/liquidy gooey lead when pushed through a tube amp depending on your gain setting on the pedal.

feylya

So it's good then eh? Did you get the SEM or the Ultra? Now, where'd I put my soldering iron...

mirv

The Ultra. Mid boosts rock.

feylya

So, should I do it?

mirv

Hell yes. If done right it'll make the DS-1 much more viable a pedal. You've got ultra solid state gain with your chan harley benton amp anyway, so even if you screw up the mod you wont lose much.

feylya

Right then, I'll be doing that once I find somewhere that does the film capacitors. Cheers.

Giblet

I've used a DS-1 with some guys Strat who had TBX controls, and with a small turn of the tone on the fender, the DS-1 went from sounding like it's usual crappy self, to having tons of tone and body. Maybe thats all you need, some TBX's dropped into your guitar instead.

feylya

TBX's??? Doing what now? I'll just stick with my stock EMGs.

Giblet

TBX, replace standard tone controls on a guitar, jesus maybe you should move on from EMGs eh feylya

Treble/Bass/ CUT

feylya

NO. My EMGs stay. What would Doctor J think if I got rid of them?? No, I think I'll just replace the caps in my DS-1. I think I have all the right ones around here too

Giblet

Meh, I could fling a few thousand your way from my vast collection of unused electronics gear from college

feylya

Hey, if you've got some metal film capacitors, I'll gladly take them off your hands.

Here's a nice quote from robertkeeley.com

BOSS DS-1 Distortion Mods By Keeley Effects The SEEING EYE MOD

These are the mods that we have come up with. Mostly they try to give the pedal a more high fidelity sound and make it a little more tube like by use on one LED in the clipping section instead of two (commonly seen as a mod). We use metal film caps available from www.digi-key.com




C1, C5, C12change to 0.1uF metal film (104) C2, C8, C9, C14 change to 1uF metal film (105) C7 220pf silver mica or monolithic

In the DS-Ultra mod we change C11 to a 0.047uF metal film or better and lower R13 to 2.4Kohm. As well as changing C3 and C13 to 0.1Uf metal film or better.

D5 change to 3mm red led (the power LED that we take out!) In the D-Ultra mod we switch in another LED in series with D4.

R39 20K R14 1.5K R35 2.4K if you change the power LED to a 5mm Yellow LED

Add 47pf cap across clipping diodes, see second picture little green dot in the center. 7/64 drill bit needed to drill out 3mm LED for the SEEING EYE PART!

Giblet

Show me a pic of the ones you want, and I'll bung a few in an envelope for ya FOC, don't forget the values of them too:D

feylya

A pic eh? Well, I was talking to the father earlier who is bloody good with electronics and he was saying they were just bead types. I'll see if I can find a pic.

Giblet

Well I have square metallized film, and bead. I'll just shove 10 or twenty in an envelope, PM me your address along with the values.

feylya

Cool Giblet, very appreciated. PM sent.

feylya

These are the beasties I believe.

feylya

Mirv, is there any chance you could send me a photo of the wires coming from the Ultra mod switch? I have the schematic for the circuit but it doesn't show a switch. Perhaps the LED is across the switch?