electronics: repair, builds and rebuilds
electronics
in my time as a musician i realized that few things are more important than being able to understand, fix, and manipulate the gear we use every day to make art.
im good at working on: guitar and bass amps, analog effects pedals, analog rack effects, guitars and basses, hammond organs, leslie speakers, mixers, mic preamps, and other manners of analog audio electronics.
to book me for regular instrument and/or amplifier maintenance or hair-brained ideas, get in touch!
here are a couple of things i do well and also things i’ve had the chance to build and work on recently:
pedals
like most people, my first foray into audio electronics was with guitar pedals. i realized that you can do anything you want if you have basic soldering skills and can google “boss mt-2 mod”.
i’ve built and modded more pedals than i can count, and i love specking out crazy builds and building them for my friends.
want to put that big muff on your board but the switch only works half the time or the dc jack fell off the pedal in the middle of a gig? here’s the fix my pedal page.
amplifier maintenance and repair
as a musician and engineer, i have acquired some (many) amps over the years of being active. one of the joys about getting a new amp is opening it up and making sure it’s going to run the best it can when it’s in my possession.
i work on both tube and solid state guitar and bass amps. recently, i’ve worked on my own amps the most, but i’ve also repaired many of my friends amps and made repairs through my time at boss organ. if your amp needs some love, you know what to do.
instrument maintenance and repair
maintaining your instrument is one of the best skills you can have as a musician. knowing how to care for your tools is a sure fire way to make sure your favorites stay with you for a lifetime. but if you don’t care about that i’ll do it for you.
i’ve been setting up and modifying guitars and basses since i started playing over 10 years ago. from the most mundane of check ups to putting delay and fuzz pedals in guitars.
hit up the “my guitar feels like shit, help” form if your guitar feels like shit
studio gear
most analog rack mounted studio gear are just big guitar pedals, with higher voltages. rack mounted gear needs the same love that your guitar, pedals, or amps need too but they rarely get the maintenance attention they deserve.
peavey 6505+ rebuild and mod:
i found a guy in connecticut selling a 6505+ in a road case for $400 bucks in unknown condition.
i drove down and picked it up and opened it up for the first time and found what i expected.
there was no fuse or fuse holder in the amp, and the ribbon connector that carries the heater current/voltage had obviously melted and and shorted, and then started popping fuses.
i rerouted the heater taps directly to one of the power tube sockets, hard wired the remaining connections where that ribbon cable used to be and got the thing working!
eventually i would make a series of preventative repairs (including recapping the high voltage and low voltage power supplies, rerouting the heater supply, hardwiring runs to replace shoddy ribbon cables) and modifications to the amp.
the green channel got the bulk of the work, there were some values changed on the pre gain section to change the frequency response and increase low end feeding into the front. i started with an anemic and simple sounding “clean” sound and ended up with a beefy, slightly scooped and shimmery clean sound that was surprisingly versatile and great for low tuned instruments.
the red channel also got a fair amount of changes too. firstly, i increased the value on the input cap to help more low end feed into the front of the gain stage, this allowed for more thickness and a slightly fuzzy, more “vintage” sound. i adjusted the mid frequency point on the mid pot to be lower in the frequency rage to help further voice it to be more thick and sludgy.
while probably not entirely necessary, i added a choke to the amp as well and replaced the big 10w power resistor on the power section board. it didn’t make a noticeable difference to the sound, but it does operate pretty significantly quieter than before.
i then recapped another handful of ic brand electrolytics to some more historically more reliable caps, and after getting the amp sounding the way i wanted (after taking it in and out of the cabinet way too many times, i biased it up and its been running like a champ ever since.
without a doubt the best and baddest sounding 6505 i’ve ever heard.
my time at boss organ (somerville, ma)
starting in december of 2024, i began helping out tyler over at boss organ in somerville, ma. i hadn’t worked on organs or leslies before, but i was ready for the challenge and i was eager to learn from a true working professional.
over my time working there, i learned how to do quality work, be efficient and how to analyze problems, and solve them the right way.
boss organ is one of the leading repair shops for all things hammond and leslie (and others as well), and it taught me what it means to be a successful tech.
