Synthesizer Build part-61: TRIPLE SLOTHS chaotic voltage sources.

The triple sloths by Nonlinearcircuits is a chaotic modulation source. It has 11 outputs that produce slowly changing voltages that follow a chaotic path. Great for generative patches and ambient music.

The module will fit in a Eurorack Nifty Case. I also made a layout for Kosmo sized modules.

This is a module I wanted to build for a long time and I finally got 'round to building it. This module produces random control voltages. We have 3 boards, Torpor, Apathy and Inertia. Torpor has the fastest changing voltages. It takes about 15 to 30 seconds to travel around 2 strange attractors, if you watch the plot on an oscilloscope set to X-Y display. Apathy takes about 60 to 90 seconds and Inertia takes about 30 to 40 minutes. Sloths cycles but it never repeats itself! It evolves.

Torpor and Apathy both have a potmeter. The potmeter doesn't change the frequency as you would expect but it changes the tendency of the waveform to be attracted to one or the other attractor. It nudges the waveform in a different direction you might say, that's why I labelled the potmeters 'Nudge'.

Inertia doesn't have a potmeter or a CV input. It just does it's own thing.

Torpor and Apathy have CV inputs, Most of the time a CV input signal will be added on top of the output signals of the module but it can also have the effect of changing the path of the voltages.

You can use an output from one stage to input into an other stage to get even weirder voltage paths.

We have an X, Y and Z output for each stage. Each of these outputs are taken from a different part of the circuit and the Z output is simply the inverted version of the Y output. The two extra Z outputs at the bottom are made up like this: V (Z3+) = Vz Apathy + Vz Inertia - Vz Torpor if greater than 0 otherwise it's 0V.

V (Z3-) = Vz Apathy + Vz Inertia - Vz Torpor if smaller than 0 otherwise it's 0V.

Beware that the voltages summed together can add up to + or -10V so attenuation on those signals would be a good idea.

The X outputs are the lowest in voltage. They stay between +/- 2.5Volt. It will cycle around the 0V line.

The Y outputs vary around +/- 5Volt. They will stay positive for a while and then go negative for a while.

The Z outputs are the same as the Y outputs only inverted.

With testing the Sloths on one board, I found the X output voltages of the Apathy and Inertia circuit much higher than +/- 2V. So I tried putting in voltage dividers but when I then mounted the board behind a panel the X voltages were suddenly too low. Really puzzling. 

I ended up taking out the 1K resistors to the X outputs of the two problematic circuits and putting in 10K trimmers on the copper side. That solved the problem because I can now dial in the voltages from the X outputs. I connected pin 1 of the trimmer to pin 1 of the TL074 (the signal source). The wiper of the trimpot went to the X output strip and pin 3 of the trimmer went to ground which is the strip below the output. See picture below.:

LAYOUTS:

Below are the layouts I made for this module. As always they are verified. I used them to build my module. We have a stripboard for each of the three stages and one for the extra two Z-3 outputs that mix the Z outputs from all 3 modules together.

Here is the overall layout showing all boards (Kosmo size layout further down). 

[EDIT] on Nov. 6th 2024 I made a slight alteration to the layouts. I routed the LED output through the left over opamp so that is doesn't pull down the voltage of the Z output.

There's not much room for the 1µF capacitors but it doesn't matter if the underside of the caps stick out above the resistors a bit as long as the leads are not touching other components. I put in higher value resistors as current limiters for the LEDs because the 470Ω ones recommended in the schematic made the LEDs shine awfully bright. I thought 1K8 would be better, and they are. All non inverting inputs (+) of the opamps in the TL074 are grounded so the strips that connect pin 3 to 12 and pin 5 to 10 must not be cut underneath the chip.

Here's the Torpor board:

Here's the Apathy board:

Here's the Inertia board:

And finally the extra Z outputs board:

You tap the Z inputs from the Z-outputs of the three boards.

I didn't make any layouts with just the cuts and wirebridges because these are such small boards that you can easily see where the cuts need to be made and where to put the wirebridges.

Do be aware that the Apathy board has an extra cut in it above the TL074 chip. All boards differ from eachother slightly so do pay close attention when working on them.

Here is the Bill of Materials. There are some very high value resistors needed for the Inertia board and I used Bi-polar capacitors on all boards so you need to order these new instead of putting them together by putting capacitors in parallel. I did leave room to do that at the top of the stripboards but it's easier to just order Bi-polar caps. I did have to make my own 100M resistor by putting ten 10M resistors in series and I used three 33M resistors in series to make the 68M resistor. My local electronics store didn't have them. I only had the 2 Watt versions of those so they took up a lot of space. I should have just used six 10M resistors in series for that one too. For the 1µF caps I ordered ten 1µF WIMA MKS box capacitors with 5mm distance between the legs. They are not polarized and work very well here although they are a bit bigger than round 1µF bi-polar caps, but it fitted well enough.

KOSMO SIZE LAYOUT:

Here's a layout I made later just in case you want to build this for a Kosmo sized setup. In that case you can have all three Sloths on one piece of stripboard and it gives you a little more space to place the capacitors too. Again I made a slight alteration to the previous version in that the LED output is now routed through the left-over opamp so it is buffered and can't pull down the Z output voltage.

This layout is also verified. I've just finished building this version too.

Use the extra Z outputs board posted above to add to this main board.

Sloths one board with extra Z outputs board. Cuts and wirebridges.

SCHEMATIC:

Because this is a kit that Nonlinearcircuits is selling to create income, I'm not going to post the schematic here. Instead I'm going to link to it on the Nonlinearcircuits website, because I don't want to negatively impact their revenue.

The link opens the Triple Sloths page and if you scroll down you'll find a green button marked 'build instructions' and if you click that you can download the PDF which also has the schematic in it.

--- CLICK HERE ---

If you do not want to build it on stripboard you can order the complete kit from nonlinearcircuits instead, with PCB's. That module will be 8hp wide. The one I made is 14hp wide because I needed more space to put three stripboards vertically behind the panel. The kit does require you to solder SMD parts unless you get a singel 4hp Sloth module which is through hole.

You can have a look at the schematic for the Torpor circuit in this Falstad simulation I made:

--- CLICK HERE ---

DIY BI-POLAR CAPACITORS.

If you are having trouble finding bi-polar capacitors, you can make your own. Below here is the schematic for a bi-polar cap made up of polarized capacitors.

The equivalent value of a cap made like this is the same as the value of one of the polarized capacitors, provided you use two caps of the same value. So for instance if C1 is 100µF and C2 is 100µF then the equivalent value of the bi-polar capacitor you created will also be 100µF because each of the two caps is used for one phase of the signal. One for the positive side and one for the negative side.

It might be a good idea to use Schottky diodes for D1 and D2 because of their lower voltage drop and I can not guarantee this method actually works. I just thought I'd mention the option but I haven't tried it myself.

 

Bi-polar capacitors are used a lot in audio speaker cross-over filters, so that is one place where you can start looking if you want to buy them new. I tried to Google them and had no problem finding them online. Just use the search terms: bi-polar, bipolair or audio capacitors.

OSCILLOSCOPE SCREENSHOTS:

Below are some screenshots I took during testing. You can see the random voltages at work. Yellow is X and blue is Y. You can see that Y has a higher voltage than X. The last one shows what happened when I put a triangle wave on the CV input of the Torpor module. The signal was added on top of the voltage. The first three screenshots below were are from the Eurorack version with the separate boards.

Here are some screenshot I took when testing the Kosmo sized stripboard with all three Sloths on one board. These are taken from the X outputs of the three boards.

This is over a timespan of 2 minutes. Yellow is Torpor, blue is Apathy and purple is Inertia. You can see the voltages are not all within +/-2V so I experimented with putting in voltage dividers but that didn't work out well.

This one is the same as the one above only with a timespan of 4 minutes.

Again you can see here that the voltage of the Apathy and Inertia X outputs is much higher than the Torpor X output. I don't know why this is the case because I checked and double checked. I switched IC's etc. but I couldn't find anything wrong.

Here's a series of three screenshots with the X,Y and Z outputs of each circuit after I put in the voltage dividers but before the board was mounted behind a panel. Here's the Torpor:

Apathy X,Y & Z:

Inertia X,Y & Z:

You may notice that there's not much difference over time in the waveforms, especially the last two but that occurs over time and in very small amounts. Try experimenting with feeding slow LFO signals into the CV inputs of Torpor and Inertia. You can use one output of Sloths to go into the CV input of another Sloths.

Z3 plus output:

Z3 minus output:

PICTURES:

Here are some pictures I took when building the Kosmo version:

I made the 100M and 68M from 10M resistors in series. I put small pieces of heatshrink tubing on the soldered ends where the resistors connect to eachother to prevent accidental short circuits. Then I hotglued the resistors in place. 

I didn't have a 39µF bipolar cap so I put in a 22µF (in the Inertia part) and added two polarized 10µF caps with diodes attached like I showed earlier in the article. I'm not sure if it has an influence. The capacity meter doesn't pick up the extra capacity because of the diodes but at least it is working normally.

With the 100M resistor made up of ten 10M resistors in series I added a center tap point that I connected to a copper strip that was not in use. I wanted to add a switch so I could half the resistance to make the Inertia part of the circuit work a little faster if I wanted to. That didn't work out though. It did go faster after closing the switch but the output voltage also shot up way too high. So do not replicate my experiment.

Here you can see how I mounted the Z outputs board. It is just floating. The main Sloths board is mounted by putting two sets of copperwire through the ground strip at the top and twisting and soldering them together and then soldering them to the ground connection wire or the sockets. The socket grounds are all connected together with one copper wire going through all the ground lugs of the sockets.

Here's a look at the finished panel mounted in the synth:

Below are some pictures from building the Eurorack version.

Here you can see the 'Inertia' board with the 100M resistor I had to make from ten 10M resistors in series. I made the 68M from three 22M resistors. These were big 2 Watt resistors. In hindsight it would have been better to have used six 10M ¼ Watt resistors in series.

Here are the three boards together. I soldered powercables to them for testing. When they were mounted behind the panel each board got power from the board beside it with simple daisy chained wire connections. You could use pinheaders but you'll need the extra high version.

One thing I noticed when testing, which is important to know, is this: I connected the Torpor module to my bench powersupply and it would only produce sinewaves but they weren't random. This turned out to be a fault in my powersupply. When I connected it to my synthesizer powersupply it worked normally.

Here you can see the backside of the module. Three boards tucked in together with the extra Z outputs underneath. The two outer boards are connected to the faceplate through the potmeter that is soldered straight to the stripboards. The Inertia board has no potmeter and it is mounted inbetween the two others and secured with hot glue.

Wiring these stripboards up was very time consuming. It took me almost a whole day. Because there is almost no access after the boards are mounted behind the panel, you have to solder the wires to the boards first. Put in all the sockets and ground them all. Then put in the boards and solder the wires to the sockets. To save space I soldered three wires to a Female Eurorack powerconnector and soldered the wires to the Torpor board. The other three boards get their power from the board to the left of it with again three wires. Be careful that non of the components touch the copper strips of the neighbouring boards. I put in gaffa tape and hot glue to protect some areas from short circuits.

Here's the finished module with the faceplate made with the waterslide paper method. Again I made a mistake. I forgot the two CV inputs. Well, there was room enough to put them in they are just not labeled. I called my module Sloth, not Sloths for no reason really :-D

Btw, these knobs are temporary. The ones I'm going to use are slightly larger but they are still in the mail.

When you start designing your panel layout make sure to offset the sockets a little from the potmeter positions. Don't put them straight underneath the potmeters because the stripboards will touch them. Put them slightly to the left. I did make that mistake and I had problems getting the boards to fit. 

And like I said before, don't forget to put in the CV inputs. ^_____^

DEMO VIDEO:

First a little demo I filmed myself with the following patch: Sloths Torpor X output goes into the 2hp Tune quantizer which turns the voltage into random notes following a chromatic scale then the 1V/Oct signal from the 2hp goes into the Digisound 80 VCO and from there into a 2164 Lowpass filter which has the cutoff controlled by Sloths Torpor Y output. Although that didn't come out very pronounced.

Here's a little demo of the Kosmo sized Sloths in action with the Torpor and Apathy X outputs controlling the filter cutoff of the TH State Variable Filter and the Lowpass Gate.

Here's a cool video I found on YouTube explaining how this module works:

Okay that's another one done.

If you have any comments or questions about this module then please put them in the comments below or in the special Facebook group for this website. Beware that comments are moderated and don't appear until I approved them.

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Synthesizer Build part-60: 4046 WAVESHAPER by Barton Musical Circuits.

This is the Barton Musical Circuits BMC33, 4046 Waveshaper from 2015. Not to be mistaken for a wavefolder. This module divides and multiplies an incoming signal by x8, x4, x2, x1, /2, /4, /8 and then you can mix these signals back together to create really awesome timbres. It's a Eurorack friendly design.

The finished module

This analog circuit uses a CD4046 PLL (Phase Locked Loop) chip in combination with a CD4040 binary counter to create new timbres and waveshapes. It outputs only squarewaves. It's a really simple concept. You take a VCO signal, turn it into a squarewave by means of an opamp comparator and then multiply the signal x8, x4, x2 and x1 while also dividing it by /2, /4 and /8. Now you have 7 signals each an octave apart and each have a potmeter to set their respective levels which go into a little mixer and are output as one new signal.

It has a Slew switch which changes the capacitor of the filter inside the PLL chip, the CD4046. With higher capacitance the tuning will be more stable (especially at lower frequencies), but the tracking of the notes is slower which you can hear as a sort of glide or portamento effect between the notes. It makes a real difference. Makes it sound more SH101 or Acid like if you rapidly change notes. Some of the sounds it can produce can sound like what you get from a wavefolder although that's a completely different concept. The waveSHAPER can produce a lot of other sounds too.

You can alter this circuit and add CV inputs for each of the controls but I didn't do that. I saw a video by Analog Output who did this and he used little VCA's made with logic chips but that will only switch each channel on or off as far as I understood. Anyway, I'll leave the alterations up to you the builder of the project.

Btw, the output volume or amplitude of the output signal can be quite a bit higher than the input signal but it won't damage anything. You could add a overall level control on the output but that would make the faceplate design too big for my taste.

Here is the schematic I used for my layout design:

There is a PDF file available on the Barton Musical Circuits website which contains this schematic plus a lot of extra info. You can download it by --- clicking here ---

If you want to hear what the module sounds like, there are two demo videos further down the article.

LAYOUTS:

Here are the layouts for this circuit. They are verified as always. I used a piece of stripboard that is 24 strips by 30 holes wide which makes it small enough for Eurorack but it will be 6 centimeters deep so it won't fit a Nifty Case for instance.

Wiring diagram:

Stripboard only:

Here are the cuts that need to be made and wirebridges to be soldered in first:

And finally the cuts as seen from the component side. You know the routine but I'll repeat it anyway; mark the cuts with a black Sharpie or Edding felt pen and then stick a pin through the marked holes and mark them again on the copper side. Then you can cut the strips at the marked locations using a sharp hand held 6- or 7mm drill, or whichever method you prefer.

Here is the bill of materials:

PICTURES:

Here are some pictures from the build proces. It was pretty straight forward and the layout turned out to be faultless but I made some silly mistakes when wiring it all up. I had the wire that grounds all the potmeters and sockets soldered to the -12V connection instead of the ground and I had the input and output reversed. Can you believe it? After 60 projects I still make these mistakes. It goes to show never to let your guard down and keep working precise and don't rush it, which was my problem.

Wirebridges put in and cuts made.

Stripboard built up. As you can see I did not include the 10µF capacitors over the power rails. They are in the layout but I usually only include features like that when I have problems with hum or ripple on the voltage lines. With this design you can leave them out. I put in 1µF caps over the outputs because I misread the schematic at first. The dot before the 1 is very difficult to see but it makes no difference for the working of the module.

You don't really need to include 100nF bypass caps over the chips although you can include them if you want. They're not in the bill of materials.

Here's the panel design I made for it. I really got a taste now for using waterslide paper to make these panels. It looks so professional. Only I made a mistake.... 

I made a typo. The plus signs should be multiply signs. Aaaargh!!! Oh well, I'm not making a new one. ^___^  It came out looking great. The faceplate is 10hp or 5 centimeters wide.

Front and backside view:

The module on the test bench. In the image at the top of this article you can see the finished product with knobs on the potmeters. I found these beautiful small aluminium alloy knobs on ebay. Here's a link to that item:

--- CLICK HERE ---

OSCILLOSCOPE SCREENSHOTS:

Here you can see how all these squarewaves of different frequencies are summed together and output through the mixer stage. Note how much higher in voltage the output signal is (in yellow) to the original signal (in blue). Both channels are set to 5V per division.

VIDEO DEMOs:

Here's a good demo video I found on YouTube by username Midiverse - TV. Although playing music inbetween the demo bits is not a good idea in my opinion:

And here's an other one by youtuber: Boogdish:

Okay that's it for article number 60. SIXTY!! I can hardly believe it. This site has become quite an archive for synthesizer projects and a lot of people seem to really enjoy it. Last month we passed the one million all time views!!

If you have any questions or remarks about this project then please put it in the comments below or post in the special Facebook group for this website.

Synthesizer Extra's No.5: PROFESSIONAL LOOKING PANELS using WATERSLIDE PAPER.

 An easy way to make your panels look really professional.

I've been doing this hobby for over 4 years now and all that time I always used black powdercoated aluminium to make my panels from and I always use a white acryllic pen to write all the labeling etc. 

It works fine but it doesn't look very professional.

For a long time I've seen people using waterslide decals to apply to their panels and it looks very slick. I wanted to try that myself so I ordered some "Water-based ink jet water transfer paper". That's what is says on the label. You can order this from AliExpress or your preferred webshop. If you Google it you'll find lots of sellers.

Make sure, if you use an inkjet printer like I do, to order transfer paper suitable for inkjet printers. It must say inkjet on the package and it must be transparent. If you use a laser printer then there's special transfer paper for that too.

There is also white transfer paper available and i just took delivery of that too. I want to experiment with black backgrounds.

IF THIS IS YOUR FIRST TIME WORKING WITH WATERSLIDE PAPER, MAKE SOME TEST PIECES AND TRY TO APPLY THAT TO A SURFACE FIRST!

First step: Design your panel layout.

I do all my designs in Photoshop. I like working with Photoshop because you can work with layers and the centimeter markings on the side are very accurate to how it will roll out of the printer.

There are also special layout design programs on the internet, like 'Schaeffer AG Front Panel Designer' which you can download for free.  There is also a free program called Inkscape which should work very well too. You can download that by clicking here. 

I got the following link from a comment on the Facebook group. Also a faceplate designer: --- CLICK HERE ---

I have not worked with these yet although I intend to try them out soon.

You can find decal designs on the internet or make your own. Make sure you draw in dots for the places where you need to drill holes in the panel so you know where to drill them.

One tip I can give you is to make your panel design just a little bit smaller than the actual panel. Just a millimeter on the sides and have it start and end inbetween the holes in the panel where you screw it into the synthesizer case. That way the lacquer you apply later will seal those edges and prevent them from coming loose, which can happen if they are exactly on the edge of the panel. 

Here's a picture to illustrate that point. You'll see in the light reflection on the top how the lacquer forms a protective layer over the edge which runs just under the mounting hole:

Btw, that panel had a typo in it, the plus signs should have been multiply signs but I still used it because it came out so well. This was the second panel I ever made using this method and it went perfectly.

Here is my first design for the Digisound-80 VCO, made in Photoshop and printed on A4 paper. (feel free to use it if you want):

I drew in the Octaves and Freq Fine control markings after measuring on the VCO where they should go so they actually indicate where the different octaves are and on the fine control where the notes are within the octave. However I used a 2M7 resistor for the fine control, not a 3M3 as recommended so my fine control covers a little more than the normal half octave. Note the dots that indicate where to drill the holes for the potmeters and sockets.

Step two: Prepare your waterslide paper.

Now print your design onto the waterslide paper. Make sure you print out as many of your designs as you can fit on one sheet of paper. Copy and paste them next to eachother. You can only use an A4 size paper once so if you make a mistake you will have a few others as back-ups. It's a shame to have to throw away 2/3rds of your waterslide paper unused.

Here's how I printed the design of the envelope follower panel. Four on one A-4 piece of waterslide paper:

Now cut the design out with scissors. I use one of those paper cutters with a rotating knife on a rails that you can put the paper under. It guarantees a straight cut. Round off the edges a little with scissors. Make sure you cut it a bit smaller than the panel size so that the waterslide paper doesn't sit right at the edge of your panel. It will come loose over time if that happens.

Now apply a few thin coats of clear acryllic lacquer onto the paper. You can of course also do this first before you cut it out. Make sure there's no dust or hairs on the paper and let it dry a few hours and apply a second coat. These coats not only protect the ink they also make the paper stronger when applying it to the panel. 

If you use a laserprinter that uses toner then you don't have to apply the lacquer. However inkjet prints are not waterproof so they must be protected with lacquer. Make sure it is well dried before moving on.

Step three: Prepare the panel.

Take the design you made and print it out again but this time on a normal piece of paper. We are going to use this as a drill guide, to drill the holes in the right place. 

Take your panel material, in my case white powdercoated aluminium, and apply the printed design to the protection layer of the panel with doublesided tape. You can use other methodes but I find this the easiest to do. Usually the panel material will have a protection layer against scratching, if it doesn't have that just put some paper tape on it first. The kind you use to tape off edges when you paint a door for instance. Stick your design to the panel and make sure it can't move.

Now use a very thin drill to make the first pilot holes. I used a 3,3mm drill the first time but that was too big and I couldn't place the drill accurately enough which caused me some problems when I put in the potmeters. 1,5mm will be better. So make sure you drill very accurately. Then drill the holes to the right size and take off the paper/protection layer. Make sure you de-burr the holes you just drilled. There must be no upstanding edges around the holes because that will cause air pockets under the waterslide paper or it will tear the design when you apply it to the panel.

Step four: Apply the waterslide paper to the panel.

Now take a nice big bowl and fill it 2/3rds with slightly luke warm water. Put one drop of washing up liquid in in the bowl and then add the water. This decreases the water surface tension. If the water has gone all bubbly, just scoop out most of the bubbles with your hand. 

Put the waterslide paper into the bowl. It will immediately curl up. Carefully roll it out with your fingers under water and make sure it is completely in contact with the water. The paper will straighten out. Keep it under water for about 30 to 35 seconds and then take it out.

MAKE SURE the image doesn't come off while it is still in the water!! Or all the glue will wash off. That's why I say 30 to 35 seconds in the water is about right.

Put a little water on the panel with your fingers to wetten it a little. Make sure the panel has been de-greased and free of fingerprints. (A little alcohol does wonders in cleaning the surface beforehand).

Now take out the waterslide paper and place it over the panel. Grip it carefully with your fingers on the top side of the panel and then rub the bottom side between your fingers in such a way that the bottom layer slides out from under the image layer. Your thumb stays in place while your fingers slide the backpaper downwards. Slide the back layer down from under the image layer. It is important that you don't move the waterslide paper too much once it is applied to the panel because this will impact on the stickiness of the paper. The slippery stuff underneath the image layer is actually the glue so you need to make sure this is not washed away by too much movement.

There are special 'decal setting solutions' available for purchase, that will cure the layer and make for a good bonding between panel and image layer. I don't own any of that myself but I might try this later, however you don't really need it. 

Now carefully squeeze out the water underneath the waterslide image by using the backpaper as a squeegee. Carefully move it over the image layer and squeeze out any water underneath. (Use the slippery side.) Be careful not to crease or tear it! This takes a bit of practise but it doesn't have to be perfect. The image layer may still look a bit rippled but that will disappear when it dries up. Make sure there are no folds though. When the water has been squeezed from under the paper, you can use a fine cloth to dry the surface of most of the water. Be very careful though. If you don't trust yourself, leave the water on top. It will evaporate anyway. I put it on the central heating in my room and it was dry within an hour. 

Here's how it looks freshly applied after I went over it with the backpaper to squeeze out most of the water. It's still very wet and a bit wrinkly but that doesn't matter:

After an hour on the central heating the layer has pulled itself tight on the surface and it's completely dry:

(This is from project 62 and it's my most perfect panel to date. No crease in sight.)

Step five: The final touches.

When the panel is dry, cut out the parts that are covering the holes you drilled with a very sharp knife. Take your time with this, don't rush it. You can ruin it otherwise. Use a very sharp knife to clear the holes and make a scissor action (cut) against the metal of the panel holes, so you don't pull on the image layer. Pull out the bits you cut out, from the underside of the panel with tweasers so you can't rip off the decals by accident. 

After that you must coat it again with a few thick layers of clear lacquer and when that is dry you can put in all the knobs, switches and sockets. Be liberal with the application of clear lacquer. For my last two panels I put on one really thick layer. Because it stays flat all the time you don't have to worry about the lacquer running. The thicker the layer the better when putting in the components because it will prevent the waterslide decals from tearing when you screw things down.

When you put in anything that needs screwing down, and that's everything, make sure there are rings underneath so the screwing action doesn't cut into the waterslide material. This is a bit problematic with sockets because they don't come with rings, so be careful when you tighten them. (The thick layers of lacquer really helps prevent this) You can hold the screw and turn the socket or potmeter from behind the panel, do what you think works the best for you. Most of the time you will damage the layer slightly by putting in the potmeters, that can't always be helped but if you put enough lacquer over it the damage will be minimal and covered by the knobs you put on the potmeters.

And that's all there is to it. Anyone with a computer and a printer can do this. I do advise to make a practise piece first and use it to hone in your skills. I went directly to making a panel and although it looks okay there are some creases here and there that are visible when the light hits it, but here is my first result:

VIDEO TUTORIALS:

I found a few video tutorials on YouTube that show the proces from beginning to end. These are all about guitar pedals but it works the same as with synthesizer panels. 

I urge you to watch these before you start, so you have a good idea of what's involved.

--- CLICK HERE FOR TUTORIAL ---

--- CLICK HERE FOR ANOTHER TUTORIAL ---

Okay that's it for this one. I hope this is of use to you. If you have any questions or remarks please put them in the comments below. They won't appear directly, comments are moderated, but everyone of them is answered by me. You can also post your questions in the Facebook Group for this website.

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