SSS002 build happiness

[donvan]

Erwin,
Thanks for sharing some clips. I like what I'm hearing!

[dorrisant]

Very nice!

Too many ckts to build, not enough time.

[Synchu]

Sounds great. Gotta love this amp.
Niki

[erwin_ve]

And more clips with loud volume:

[erwin_ve]

Some pics :
Here's part of my building report; I'll try to update what comes to mind and have a peek at my mistakes . Altoughn the amp is working fine, a completely new build (never done a SSS besides drawing the PCB)always has some quirks.
THe first thing I did was wiring the tonestack; reason for this is once the stand-offs are there it is difficult to reach certain parts.
After that wiring the powertube sockets and all preamp tube sockets with heaters wires. I opted to do the heater wires with the wires inside the tube socket: see pics. Unfortunatly it was pvc coating, melted, measured a short and had to do the heater wiring again, this time with teflon coating and cloth on the outside..

20200718_143418.jpg

In a ODS the transformers are put in at a fairly late stage. In a SSS in a early stage. A lot of wiring is on top of the transfomers, fe. the coax wires, therefore transformers first.
The coax is put into shape and positioned with tie wraps. Later when adding more wires on top, B+ wires, cut the tie wraps and make it pretty with a bundling the wires together, preferably with the B+ wires on top.

20200722_143421.jpg

The power switch is DPDT; CE regulations are strict in the EU, so in case my amp causes disaster it wont be the powerswitch

20200723_145247.jpg

Once all hardware is installed, the FET and rectifier/ bias are done, After that the PS filter board, with B+wires going on top of the coax to the Can cap. Ot primaries to the power tubes and OT secondaries bundled but not connected to the speaker jacks yet.

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20200724_161154.jpg

[erwin_ve]

And more:

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After the filter board, the reverb transformer and and cinch jacks (reverb pan) are connected, than the reverb board is connected. I opted to wire the tube sockets with wires soldered on top of the board, this saved a lot of hrs troubleshooting in a later stage.

20200725_145407.jpg

After the reverb board, the main board is connected.
I made a massive mistake on the tube wiring at the main board and found out after start up that on v2 and 3 the plate wires were connected, that should be the plate to the grid.
Also had a wrong resistor on the reverb board and a missing ground connection at the cinch jack(cinch failure), both found out after start up. I had to lift the board twice to find out.

20200726_132527.jpg

Than the driver board is connected, the output speaker jacks with GNFB.
and all heaters on the powertubes. Last but not least the connection from the mainswitch to the PT and the indicator light.

[erwin_ve]

And more:

[erwin_ve]

And Last:

[sluckey]

Nice sounding amp and good looking guts. Why mirror image videos?

[erwin_ve]

Nice sounding amp and good looking guts. Why mirror image videos?

THanks! Mirror video: thats what my phone does and Im not that handy with video editing on my phone.

[norburybrook]

lovely build Erwin I would expect no less from you though

May I ask how it's going to be mounted in the chassis? i can't see any mounting points.I can see pairs of 3 holes on the outside edges on the bottom but they're covered inside.


M

[erwin_ve]

lovely build Erwin I would expect no less from you though

May I ask how it's going to be mounted in the chassis? i can't see any mounting points.I can see pairs of 3 holes on the outside edges on the bottom but they're covered inside.


M

Thanks Marcus,

It is mounted on the outside edges with 2 lug anchor nuts.
I have to look for the right one tho. They look like shown on this website: https://www.aircraftspruce.eu/hardware/ ... nuts.html

[rootz]

What an astonishing build Erwin, so clean and professional looking. Love the clips too, especially the clean ones. It has that magic happening and there is nothing that comes even close to the reverb sound this amp has.

[erwin_ve]

What an astonishing build Erwin, so clean and professional looking. Love the clips too, especially the clean ones. It has that magic happening and there is nothing that comes even close to the reverb sound this amp has.

Thanks Rootz,
It certainly is the best clean amp I ever played, the reverb is very good and enjoyable! It has a bit of a ducking effect, in the decay the verb gets louder!
I might tweak the amp for more bass, even with a 4x12 cab, basically full bass now and I think it can use a bit more.
Talked to Ryan about this and there are 2 spots were the coupling caps can be increased with good results.

[rccolgan]

Very favorable results with .02uf Decoupling caps everywhere. It extends the bass. To my ears, the bass on 2 o'clock is where the bass used to sound all the way up with .01uF. It took me an extra minute to get used to hearing the lower harmonics involved as my Aqua Puss delay sounded very full beyond the original guitar frequency. I understand why .01uf was used on the original circuit as well for producing loud volumes with minimal tube distortion. So that's something to keep in mind that .02uf could get muddy when driven hard but many situations are mic'd now so likely not a big deal and the fat bottom is welcomed.