Synthesizer Build part-42: 8 RANDOM GATES by Yusynth.

 Creates 8 random gate outputs from one gate input signal which can be as high in frequency as an audio signal. Lots of creative possibilities with this module.

There is an other random gates project on my website already. That one is included in the Noise Module article and it creates random pulses on one output. With this module we have 8 different outputs which trigger in a completely random order. It needs a squarewave on the input that can come from an LFO, the gate out from a sequencer, the clock pulse from a sample and hold or even the pulse wave output from a VCO. To quote the YuSynth website: "If feeding the GATE IN with a high frequency pulse coming from a VCO, each GATE output becomes an individual coloured digital noise source usable for sound effects. The colour of the noise will directly depend on the frequency from the VCO. White noise is obtained for frequencies above 30kHz".. 

ABOUT THE CIRCUIT:

The module is fed with only positive voltage so no dual powersource needed. It works fine on both +15V or +12V. You can feed the gate-in with signals that have a negative cycle to them. It will simply ground the negative part of the cycle through diode D1. The output gate signals have an amplitude of 8 Volt when powered from a +15V powersupply.

This build consists mainly of wirebridges. My layout has 37 of them. All the output stages are made on separate pieces of stripboard with just 4 strips of 10 holes. They are soldered straight to the output sockets. I did this to save space otherwise I would have had to make a separate print with all the outputs on them. This way saves space and also hookup wire. The three 100nF capacitors you can see on the layout are meant to be de-coupling caps but where they are positioned is really too far away from the chips to be effective. So instead of putting them where the layout shows them, solder them straight over the plus and ground pins of the IC's (top right and bottom left of each chip).

Here's the layout I made. First the wiring diagram:

(Last revised: 14-April-2021: Added missing 1K resistor to output prints.)

In the box, on the wiring diagram above, you can see the schematic drawing of the output stripboards. I left out the 1K resistors in series with the output in my original design. I had simply forgotten it but I have now updated everything and the 1K resistor is now included. It helps to protect the transistor against short circuits, smooths the output voltage a bit and also determins the output impedance.

The 270 Ohm and the LED together with the 1K resistor to ground form a voltage divider that determins the voltage of the outputed Gate signal. That voltage is normally 8 Volt but if you want it to be higher you can make the 1K to ground a higher value like 1K5 or lower for a lower output Gate voltage.

Here's the main stripboard. It's only 24 by 48 holes but you could try to redesign it and make it even more compact so it would fit in a Eurorack system. For instance, if you connected the outputs straight to the correct pins of the chip instead of using the wirebridges you can save about 8 or 9 holes in width. Certainly enough room to make it fit a Eurorack system. And because it's a "Random" gates generator, the correct order doesn't really matter does it?

And here's a close-up of the little output stripboard that is soldered straight to the output socket: (If you print this one, choose the A6 format to save some printer ink.)

You need to make 8 of these output prints. Some cuts are a bit hard to see but the top two strips are cut at position 5 and there's an other cut at position C8.

(Last revised: 14-April-2021: Added missing 1K resistor to output prints.)

Here's the Bill of Materials:

Here's the schematic by Yusynth. You can find the original YuSynth article by clicking HERE.

As you can see it's actually quite a simple circuit. It mostly consists of connections between the three IC's. It is mentioned on the YuSynth website that this module needs a bit of time before it starts behaving correctly. When you first start it up it will probably not fire on all cilinders and display a repeating pattern with only about 4 or 5 LEDs lighting up and after at least ten cycles this will change into a random pattern using all the outputs. However, since I changed the new CD4070 I had in there for a used vintage CD4070 from the 1980's that I had lying around, the module works good right from the start. 

The module that I built was at first prone to hanging. It would suddenly stop being random and get stuck in a 4 or 5 LED pattern. Only by changing the input gate frequency or pulling the Gate-In cable in and out a few times would I get it working again. It turned out this was also due to the IC's I was using. I don't know if it was a fake chip or if it was damaged but I changed IC-3 for an old stock CD4070 that I once de-soldered out of an organ circuit board and the problem was solved immediately.

So make sure the chips you're using come from a reputable source!

MODE SWITCH:

There's a mode switch that lets you choose between two settings. In the ON position the output stays high until it detects the next pulse, so the pulses don't have any dead time between them. In the OFF position the output pulse stops on the negative slope of the input gate pulse, so the output pulses will have the same length as the input gate pulses.

There's also an option to advance the pulses manually with a momentary switch (normally off). This switch is connected to the internal switch of the Gate input socket so it will only work when there is no cable connected to the gate input socket.

Some screenshots from the oscilloscope. The first one shows how extremely fast the risetime of the output gate signals is. Just over 123 nanno seconds! That's 0 to 8 Volt in 0.000000123 seconds. This means theoretically that it could handle signals upto 40MHz! (Agreed, this knowledge is of no use in the synthesizer world but it fascinates me personally because I also have a background in radio technology and transmitters ^___^).

Here's what the output sequence of one of the random gates looks like. A non-repeating sequence of pulses with an amplitude of 8V. 

Here are some pictures of the build proces:

Wirebridges. In this picture there's a little wirebridge missing connecting pins 7 and 8 of IC2 (CD4051).

Here's the finished print. Like I mentioned earlier, the de-coupling caps are much to far away from the chips to be effective so get some small ceramic 100nF caps and carefully solder them straight over the plus and minus connections of the chips on the copper side. I myself left it like this and it works just fine because I don't use a switchmode powersupply but a linear one, with a big transformer. 

Here's the main board with the 8 output prints. My output prints are missing the 1K resistor in series with the output sockets (I had forgotten those) but they are included in the layouts. That 1K resistor helps to make the output waves smoother. I could see that on the oscilloscope images. It also protects the transistors by limiting the current going through them should the output be shorted. (Although damage will be very unlikely even without the 1K resistors because the pulses are so short).

Finished panel backside wiring:

Frontal view of the mounted panel:

And here's a little test video showing the module firing randomly on all cilinders :)

TIP:

If you want a fast pulse train with random gaps in it, then connect 4 outputs from this module to the 4 inputs of a mixer, like the mixer/passive attenuator module on this website. At the output of the mixer you will get a pulse train with random gaps in them. It's cool to use this on the cut-off of a filter to add some random spice to the sound.

If you then set the switch on the random gates module to 'Stay high until the next gate pulse' you have sort of a random voltage generator, although there will still be random 0V gaps in the output but that makes it unique :)

You could even make a little TL072 mixer print and include it in this module. Choose how many inputs you want (less than 8 of course) and connect those mixer-inputs to whichever outputs you choose and then make an extra output socket on the panel that carries the output from the mixer and label it "Pulse Train". It's just a thought but there are many ways to adapt this design to your own needs.

Okay, that's an other one done. If you have any questions or remarks please put them in the comments below or post on the special Facebook Group for this website where we have a great community of synth enthousiasts willing to help you.

If you successfully built this module and you're using it in a cool way that others might enjoy, please make a video, put it on YouTube and contact me with the link. I'll add it to the article with full credit given.

Synthesizer Build part-35: RESONANT LOPASS GATE (Buchla 292).

 An awesome sounding combination of a Voltage Controlled Amplifier and a LowPass Filter using Vactrols. It has three modes: VCA, VCF or Both. Prepare to fall in love with this one!! 

This is one of my favourite modules on this website because A, it sounds so good and B, it's versatility.

This module is not like your conventional Lowpass Filter. It's a combination of a VCA and a VCF. It helps if you're trained a bit in your modular synthesizer knowledge to get the best out of this module. As a beginner you might be better of building some normal filters first and leave this one for later. But then again, if you're feeling adventurous, then hop to it. You will certainly learn a thing or two as I did. Plus it's quite easy to build. 

Doepfer has the Eurorack LowPass Gate for sale for around €100. It's the A-101-2. That's the same one as in this project. I also have a Eurorack sized layout further down this article.

THE RESONANT LOPASS GATE WILL RUN EQUALLY WELL ON +/-15V AS ON +/-12V. No extra changes are necessary.

A little bit of history:

When modular synthesizers were first being developed there were two people who became prominent in this world in the United States. Don Buchla on the West Coast and Bob Moog on the East Coast of the States. While Bob Moog preferred a more conventional way of playing the synthesizer by using a black and white piano style keyboard, Don Buchla chose to go an other route and developed a touch sensitive device that would react to the pressure human fingers would impose on it. Buchla didn't even like to call his instruments synthesizers since that name connotes imitating existing sounds and/or instruments. His intentions were to make instruments for creating new sounds. He wanted unrestrained artistic expression un-bound by the conventional chromatic scale used in western music. A completely different approach to modular synthesis but one that sounds out of this world if you get it right. However, piano style keyboards are instantly recognized by musicians as something they can work with, and therefore the Moog system became the most widely adopted system in the world. This module is one from Don Buchla's stables, in fact the first one from his design philosophy on my website. (Hopefully not the last one because I really like the West Coast approach.) The addition of the resonant feedback loop and the refinement of the original Buchla design goes to the credit of Thomas White. The module I built is the Thomas White version as presented on the website modularsynthesis.com. Click here to visit that webpage. 

Here's the link to the NatualRythmMusic website which features the same project.

(I'm not associated with any of those websites.)

Resonant Lopass Gate:

To be honest with you, I had never heard of Resonant Lopass Gates before I held a poll on Facebook to see what people would like me to build for future projects. This was one of the options that was mentioned. It instantly intrigued me  because I didn't know what it was. So I asked for schematics, did some research and started building one. 

This module consists of three parts and there's a mode switch to switch between them. There's a voltage controlled amplifier or VCA and a lowpass filter (12dB) and the option to have both on at the same time. The VCA is nothing more than a voltage controlled attenuator and with the switch in VCA mode that is what you get. Now if you set the switch to 'Both' mode, you get that same VCA function but unlike a pure VCA not all frequencies are attenuated equally. The amplitude will change in accordance with the frequency response. Depending on the height of the Control Voltage, the filter cuts off parts of the high frequency content of the input signal. If we now switch to VCF mode we have the full function of the lowpass filter including resonance (and it can self-oscillate) and the CV voltage determins the cut-off frequency of the filter. The VCA part is no longer working in this mode but we still get a mixture of changing cutoff frequencies and changes in amplitude driven by control voltage and the CV input also affects the amount of resonance that is put on the audio signal. It's very complicated and I can't explain it very well but it makes for a very special sounding module. Because it works best with a constantly changing CV inputs, the lopass gate really shines when used in more percussive typ patches (See demo video lower down the article for sound samples) but that doesn't mean you can't use it for other purposes. It'll work equally well as a VCF module. It just begs to be experimented with.

The CV inputs can be anything from Gate signals to Envelope signals or LFO's or any combination of those. You can experiment with what sounds best. I think it's better to have signals going into both CV inputs at the same time. The CV 2 input has an inverter connected to it in the form of opamp U2-A to form an attenuverter, The more you turn it clockwise the more the CV signal gets inverted. This is one of the changes that has been made (by Thomas White) from the original design as described in the 'modularsysthesis' article in the link below here, which I incorporated into the redrawn schematic. It works very well. The CV-2 control contributes a lot to the funky sound of this module. CV-1 is the more dominant input and if it is fully opened up it will somewhat suppress the working of CV-2 so you need to find the right balance between the two CV's.

Here's the schematic drawing that I re-made from the schematic on 'modularsynthesis.' It has all the changes that are suggested in the linked article implemented. (Click on the image to enlarge it and then right-click and 'Save as' to save it to your computer. Then you can zoom in on it.).

The schematic says to use VTL5C3 vactrols but the slower VTL5C4's will work fine too, maybe even better. It's a matter of taste and experimenting. I used home made ones myself. Somehow, slower working Vactrols make this Lopass Gate sound twice as good as with fast reacting ones. With slower LDR's in your Vactrols this module sounds really amazing. You get that snidy 'ripping the fabric of the universe' synthesizer sound from it.

C7 and C8 should be good quality, none ceramic,  capacitors. The rest can be ceramic although I myself always use film capacitors throughout the LPG. You know those green oblong ones.

I did not use any bypass/de-coupling capacitors on the two IC's but if you want them included, or if you're having trouble with noise from the powersupply, then just put a 100nF ceramic cap between the plus and ground and one from ground to minus 15V and as close to the chips as possible  You can also put some 10µF/25V electrolytic caps on the power rails to suppress any hum. The 'Deep' switch is a normal SPDT toggle switch (ON-ON). If you turn it on, the sound will be deeper with less high tones. It has the effect of turning the 'Offset' knob counterclockwise. You can set the amount with the trimmer Tp2. The MODE switch needs to be a 3 pole ON-OFF-ON switch and I have colour-coded the connections so you can easily see what goes where. The 3 by 3 diagram with red, green and blue represents the bottom pins of the switch and the colours match up with the colours in the schematic drawing. You can see it all connected in the layout below. The switch needs to have a middle position and in that position none of the 3 connections in the schematic are made, so they are all open. This is the 'Both' mode and is how it should be although it may look a bit weird at first. JUST REMEMBER: The respective functions are active if their switches are open! 

You can also use a 3 position rotary switch of course but it will have to be a 3 pole, 3 position rotary switch. I myself used a vintage 6 pole 3 way switch I had in my junkbox. I had four of them and used two of those in earlier projects. One in the Digisound 80 ADSR and one in the Steiner-Parker filter.

About the Vactrols:
The layout I made for this module worked rightaway but I did some experimenting with the Vactrols. I ordered a batch of VTL5C4 vactrols and they have now arrived but the Vactrols I made myself seem to work so well that I was at first hesitant to replace them. I have now tried them and they worked well but a bit too slow for my taste so I put my home made ones back in. I recommend you use VTL5C3's in this circuit or make your own like I did. However this is really a matter of taste. One of the videos I posted below uses VTL5C4's and it just sounds awesome so don't take my word as gospel please.

I made mine from 5mm red LEDs and LDR's that had an 'off' resistance of over 200MOhm and with a bright white LED shining on them the resistance was about 200 Ohm. I later soldered a 3mm red LED in parallel over the vactrol LED on the left to dim it a little, because I found out that sounded better. Later I mounted that LED on the front panel to have a visual indication of the working of the Vactrols. I only put a LED over one of the Vactrols, the top one going by the layout below.

I made some Vactrols earlier and used bright white LEDs in them but although they did work, the LEDs hardly came on because the maximum voltage over them was about 2,7 Volt which was too close to the threshold voltage of those LEDs. The red LEDs will shine full on with that voltage which works much better. (NOTE: because the LEDs in the Vactrols are part of the circuit and not connected directly to a powersupply they don't require their own current limiting resistors.) 

If you want to build your own vactrols using LDR's from the GL55** series then I refer you to a comment below posted by Tim who tried several LDR's from that type. He had the best results with GL5528's and GL5537's but read the comment below for his full review.

I now understand the function of the Vactrols a bit better. The characteristic filter sweep sound that we normally get from filters by applying an envelope signal to the filter cutoff is created in the LPG by the slowness of the LDR's inside the Vactrols. The LPG filter sweeps through as the Vactrols lower in resistance. So using super fast LDR's in your Vactrols would be counter productive. It sounds better if they're a bit slow reacting so you get a distinctive filter sweep.

LAYOUTS:

The picture below is the wiring diagram. The module is meant to work on a dual 15V powersupply but it will work fine on a dual 12V powersupply (Eurorack)  I built this module using two TL074 chips, not the TL084 as mentioned in the layout. It doesn't really matter which quad opamp you use as long as they're low noise types. It's up to you. As always the layout is verified. I used it to build my module and I already had confirmation from others who built this successfully. All potmeters in this layout are viewed from the back side.

Stripboard only. As you can see the components are quite spread out over the stripboard, so I'm sure you could design a smaller stripboard layout but I didn't bother with that because I now also have PCB's I designed myself, which easily fit a Eurorack setup. (see Menu: PCB Service):

Below are the cuts and wirebridges seen from component side. I marked the spot where you need to cut the copper strip between holes J3 and J4 with a vertical line, for the 500K trimpot to work properly.

As always, mark the holes on the component side with a Sharpie or equivalent and then stick a pin through the marked holes and mark them again on the copper side where the pin pokes through. Then cut the copper strips at the marked holes with a sharp, hand held, 6 or 7mm dril bit.

Bill of Materials:

The trimmers are listed as multiturn but you might aswell put in single turn (normal) trimmers because that makes tuning the circuit so much easier. There's no real need for precision here.

The layouts above are quite spread out so here is a more compact layout fit for Eurorack. I did not wire up the 3 pole switch to make it easier to view the layout. All connection points are numbered and colour coded. Refer to the other layout above if you can't work it out. The Eurorack layouts are not verified yet. I have not built a module with them but I'm sure they will work. Compare them closely with the ones above and the schematic if you're not sure. Please post a comment if you used these layouts so I can mark them as verified.

Stripboard only:

Cuts and Wirebridges seen from component side:

How to calibrate this module:

There are two trimmers on the board, the 20K trimmer directly influences the voltage that the Vactrols get so it plays a part in determining the sound. So you need to set it for best resonance, at least that's what I did. The influence it has is not that obvious though. 

The second one is for the 'Deep' switch and determins the 'deepness' or the low frequency emphasis of the circuit. It's a sort of tone control and the effect it gives is like turning the Offset knob down. You can set it to whatever you like best.

Here's a video demonstrating the sounds you can get from this module (listen with headphones to get the best effect). When I say "In 'Both-Mode' you don't get Resonance" what I mean is that you don't get self-oscillation in 'Both-Mode'. Resonance still works. When watching this video please keep in mind that I didn't yet know how to properly use this module. I'm simply turning knobs to see what happens, nothing more. Imagine what a skilled synth user could get out of this module when it already sounds so cool in the hands of a noob like me. ^____^

TIP: Try altering the pulse width of the squarewave going into the Lopass Gate. You'll get some really cool sounds that way.

The video below was made in answer to a question about running this module on a dual 12V powersupply. Here I am testing that (I have an adapter that I can put between the powercables of my modules which changes the power from +/-15V to +/-12V).

As you can hear it makes absolutely no difference what so ever.

Here's a recent video of me playing around with the PCB version of the LPG behind a self designed faceplate.  The LPG is connected to the Klavis Twinwaves mkII digital oscillator. I have the feeling it sounds better than the stripboard version but that could just be me. It sounds amazing though, listen:

A look at the PCB. Size difference:

Here's a video (not by me) from 2008 showcasing the Resonant Lopass Gate using the VTL5C4 Vactrols which are slower than the VTL5C3's. This gives a more vintage sound (according to some people). People nickname this version the Slowpass Gate. It sounds very TB-303 Acid House to me. I really love it! Decide for yourself. Here's the video:

Here's an other one I found from 2015 demonstrating a dual lopass gate:

Here are some pictures from the build proces. The two black thingies at the bottom left of the stripboard are my home made Vactrols. Everything is in place only nothing has been wired up yet in these first two pictures:

I used a vintage 6-pole 3-way switch but unfortunately I drilled the holes for the screws in the wrong place but since they were 3mm holes I put some 3mm LEDs in them and connected them to a free pole of the switch so that the yellow LED goes on when the switch is set to VCA mode and the red one goes on when switched to VCF mode and both go on when in 'Both' mode. =)

Here's a sketch of how I connected the LEDs to achieve that. In 'Both' mode they are a bit dimmer because of the 0,6V voltage drop of the extra diodes but you hardly notice that. I could have used Schottky diodes to prevent that but anyway. It works perfectly fine:

It would be very cool to have three or four of these Resonant Lopass Gates in a modular synthesizer set-up and to use them partly as VCA's with a twist. You can do some really cool things with this module, I know that. But I myself haven't figured out yet in how many ways you can use this.

Okay, that's it for now. As always, put any questions you might have in the comments below or on the facebook group.

Synthesizer Build part-25: DUAL BUFFERED MULTIPLE with LEDs.

A very practical module that replicates any voltage on the input and splits it 4 ways. Now also in Eurorack size. This is also known as a CV/Gate Expander but it's the same thing. After seeing Sam Battle's version with the bi-coloured LED's I've added a second version of my own with the bi-coloured LEDs because I think it will be in demand.  The version with LED's is half way down this article.

I have finished the case for the second stage of my DIY synthesizer so now I can continue building modules and writing about them here. So the first thing I wanted in the new case was a Buffered Multiple. I have built a number of filters that need a 1V/Octave signal but I only had one output to provide it so I designed this little circuit. You can connect anything you want to the inputs: Audio signals, LFO signals, 1V/Oct. CV, Gate signals, you name it. Any voltage presented at the input is replicated at each of the four outputs and if you need more you can connect one of the outputs of the first stage to input 2 and so get a total of 7 outputs for one input. 

I've added a Eurorack version with LED and, as a bonus, at the very bottom of this article there is a layout for a 3 x 4 Triple Buffered Multiple also in Eurorack format.

This module will work on both +/-15V and +/-12V.  Running it on 15V just means it can handle a bit higher voltages but as the average synth only uses control voltages with a maximum of +/-10V it really won't matter.

This the one module that is always in use in my synth because you always need a multitude of 1V/Oct. signals and Gate signals. It's been in constant use for 5 years now and never had a problem with it. 

Here is the schematic drawing showing one stage. As you can see it's just 4 non-inverting buffers with all the inputs connected together. The module is just two of these on one piece of stripboard. I've put 100 Ohm resistors on the outputs for some extra protection. Because there's (practically) no current flowing these resistors won't influence the output voltage. I've tried 1K resistors but they influence the voltage and bring the notes down by a few Cents. I did a lot of testing on this and 100 Ω is really the maximum. Of course you can use 1K and retune your VCO's but I want to keep it as clean as possible. If you don't feel comfortable with resistors on the outputs you can leave them out all together. In my own version I left them out too and replaced them with wirebridges. The IC's have built-in short-circuit protection anyway.

I've had some kind feedback in the comments of the Buffered Multiple not working right with Gate signals in combination with the Behringer TD-3. The Gate pulse would stay high. The solution was very simple, just put a 1MOhm resistor between the input and the Ground.  This is something I forgot but you must never leave an opamp input floating so there must be a resistor between the input and ground. I've adapted the schematic and put in the 1M resistor on the input. All the layouts are updated too.

To be quite clear because a lot of people miss read this: 

THE RESISTORS IN THE OUTPUTS ARE 100 Ω NOT 100K!!! If you put in 100K resistors you won't get much signal out at all. If in doubt put in wirebridges instead!!

Here's the verified stripboard layout. Just two IC's and some wire bridges and resistors. I recently added de-coupling capacitors for the chips because it was kindly remarked upon in the comments below that they were missing and it is good practise to include them.

Please don't forget to put a 1M resistor between between the input and ground (on both sides). The circuit needs these because opamp inputs should never be left floating. 

(Last revised 25-Feb.-2022: updated the layout and added 1M resistors to inputs.)

Stripboard only. The 100 Ω resistors can be replaced with wirebridges. In fact I would use wirebridges instead of resistors to begin with. I chose 100 Ω because that's the highest value that still doesn't cause a drop in voltage but you can easily do without them and use wirebridges instead. The resistors are there to offer some protection to the chip should you connect a live signal to one of the outputs by mistake, but most chips have internal protection from that anyway:

Bill of Materials:

BI-COLOURED LED VERSION:

Here's the layout for the version with the bi-coloured LEDs:

Wiring Diagram:

(Last revised: 11-feb-2022: added 1M resistor to inputs.)

Stripboard only. 

BOM for the LED version:

Make sure you choose the bi-coloured LED's with two legs and not the ones with 3 legs. They won't work in this set-up. They must be two-legged. You may need to alter the value of the 18K resistors according to the brightness of the LED's you're using but I find 18K to be a nice middle value. Not too bright not too dim either. I've altered my own Buffered Multiple to include the LED function and These 18K resistors work just fine with the Red/Blue LEDs I'm using. But you can use 5K6 if 18K is too dim in your case.

If you take a look at the demo video in the article about the "Really Good AS3340 VCO" you can see this Dual Buffered Multiple at work to the left of the VCO I'm demonstrating.

Below note E1 the Red light, which is positive voltage, doesn't light up but above E1 you can see it light up. The higher the note, the brighter the LED gets and it can handle voltages as high as 15V without problems. Above the lowest 2 octaves the LED shines about as bright as it will ever get. For the blue part of the light the threshold for the LED is higher, about 3,5 Volt. So it will need a tiny bit higher initial voltage to turn on, but that's not really a problem. But for accuracy it's better to use Red/Green LED's because of the lower threshold voltage of the green LED vs the blue one.

I've added 6 times gain to the LED opamp stage so that the LED will start shining at the lowest of voltages. The 510K resistor determins the Gain. The formula for calculating the gain is 1+(510K/100K)=6.1
Of course you could also use two normal LEDs; one for the positive cycle and one for the negative cycle. It's up to you.

The extra gain of the LED output stage works very well in practise. The LED has quite a good range in brightness and thus gives a good indication of the strength of the voltage present on the outputs.

Here's the schematic for the LED version. I've connected it to output 4 of each of the two sides but you can choose any output that's convenient. Because the LED is buffered it takes no voltage away from the output. This schematic drawing shows only one side because the second side is identical to this one.

This module is very useful to have in your setup because sooner or later you're going to need at least one of these, just like you need at least one mixer/passive attenuator.

Here are a few pictures of the finished product. I made a little L-Bracket (also visible on the layout) so I could mount the board at 90° to the panel.

This is the version with the LED's installed. The right LED is displaying the voltage of the Gate signal which is +5V. The left LED is displaying the 1V/Oct signal which is a bit lower and thus the LED shines a bit dimmer.

The print up close. As you can see mine has more wire bridges because I forgot that some connections can be made directly under the IC. So I did it the hard way. The first picture below is the original module without LEDs. The second one is after I converted it and added the LEDs.

Because I added the LEDs later I had to use some jumpwires on the stripboard to connect it all together.

EURORACK VERSION.

Single buffered multiple with one input and five outputs.

This is one I recently built for my eurorack case. It has 5 outputs because I added a dual opamp for the LED and that uses only one side so I had an opamp left over which I added to the outputs. I used 68 Ω resistors from the outputs to the sockets to give the opamps a little bit of protection should a signal carrying cable be plugged into an output by mistake (opamps don't like that). I didn't use IC sockets for this build because I've run out of those. I soldered the IC's straight in but that works fine and it also means bad IC-socket contacts won't be an issue so it makes it more reliable.

This layout is verified.

Here's the schematic. It's more or less a copy of the above schematic and I've put in the Bi-Coloured LED section with the 2nd opamp of the TL072. I lowered the value of the output resistors a bit from 100 Ohm to 68 Ω to be absolutely sure there's no voltage drop but you can use wirebridges instead of resistors too. The output resistors serve as a short circuit protection but opamps have that protection built-in nowadays. If you want de-coupling caps then put some 100nF ceramic caps over the power pins of the chips to ground as seen on the layout.

Here's the Bill of Materials for this version. The list has 100 Ω resistors instead of the 68 Ω in the schematic. Either of the two will work fine, even wirebridges work fine:

Here are some pictures of the finished eurorack module. It's 6hp wide (3cm) and 5cm deep. I used hot-glue to connect the stripboard straight to the back of the panel and next to the output sockets to which the stripboard is also glued for some extra support. Works very well and it's very sturdy. I soldered the power lead straight to the stripboard and also secured it with some hot-glue. 

 

As you can see in the last picture there's one ground wire going through all the ground lugs of the sockets and the cathode leg of the LED. From there a copper wire connects it straight to the ground of the circuitboard. Don't rely on the conductivity of the metal front panel for grounding. Always connect socket grounds with wire to the circuitboard.

TRIPLE BUFFERED MULTIPLE.

As a little bonus for you, here's a Eurorack friendly version of a Triple Buffered Multiple. So 3 inputs and 12 outputs in total (no LEDs). If only one of the three inputs is used the signal comes out of all 12 outputs. If you use more then one input the signal gets divided up over the outputs. (See text on layout).

This module will run fine on either dual 12 or 15V so also useful for Kosmo sized systems.

If you want LEDs on this module you can choose to connect a Bi-Coloured LED to outputs A4, B4 and C4 and mount the LEDs next to those particular sockets or leave those 3 sockets out. The LEDs will probably pull down the voltage a bit on those outputs (but not on the rest.). Use a 15K resistor as a current limiter in series with each of the LEDs. Add decoupling caps if you wish over the powerrails nearest to each of the chips. A 100nF from + to ground and a 100nF from ground to - for each chip so 6 caps in total. There's enough room for that above each chip. You can use normal ceramic type caps.

I left in 6 empty strips at the bottom so you can hot-glue the stripboard to the back of a Eurorack panel and use the side of the sockets for extra support, so the components will stick out above the sockets (or below the sockets, which ever way you look at it ^___^). If you have an other way of mounting it and don't need the extra empty space then just saw it off.  

Okay, that's an other one done. Number 25! A bit of a milestone for my synth build :)

If you have any questions or comments just leave them in the comments below please. 

See you on the next one!

Synthesizer Build part-8: 8 STEP SEQUENCER.

A simple 'Baby 8' type Sequencer made with the CD4017 chip. Easy to build and fun to use. No DIY synth should be without one of these.

EDIT: There is now a new and improved version of this sequencer available on this website. I redid the design and included some extra features like external clock input and a CV Offset control. This makes the sequencer much better to use and it is no more complicated to build than this original design. So please go over to project 49: 8 step sequencer version 2 if you want to build this 8 step sequencer.

This sequencer is one of my earlier projects and of my own design although it's more or less put together from bits of other designs like the 'Baby 8' but it works fine for me and is really easy to make and easy to tune although to build it is quite time consuming and repetitive work because a lot of steps have to be soldered eight times. I found it rather tedious work but very worth while. 

A NOTE FOR BEGINNERS: A sequencer does not actually produce any sound itself. It produces a stepped control voltage that can be routed into the CV input of a Voltage Controlled Oscillator and the VCO then produces the actual notes you hear. In a sequencer you can set each of these eight steps or notes manually (with a potmeter for each step) to any voltage/note you want.

Here's the schematic drawing for this sequencer. The connections of the rotary switch are not correct in the schematic. They must be offset by one step from those of the potmeters. So step 1 is reset by the pulse from step 2 so pin one of the switch goes to output 2 of the CD4017, pin 2 of the switch goes to output 3 of the CD4017 etc, etc.

In the schematic above the on/off switch is placed after the voltage regulator to easily switch the sequencer on or off without causing switching pulses on the voltage rails. The complete on/off switching is done with the switch of the powersupply which controls the power of your whole modular synthesizer.

Here's the stripboard layout I made for the sequencer. In the schematic I drew in switches that you can add to turn individual channels on or off but I didn't include them in my build because I didn't have the space for them on the panel. In this layout I don't use any transistors either. I thought it was nonsense to make this more difficult then it needs to be. It will work fine without them because we hardly draw any current from these outputs. The CV output signal goes straight into a VCO. The layout has an extra 10µF electrolytic capacitor on the output of the voltage regulator that is not on the schematic. It's for extra noise suppression. You can get away with using a 100nF cap or leaving it out completely.
Be careful when you wire this up, note that the jumper (or wire bridge) for output 5 is connected to pin 10 of the chip so the left bunch of jumpers skips a copper trace at output 5. Look carefully at the layout! If you want to include switches to mute individual channels then put them in series with the diode!

(Last revised: 26-Feb.-2020: Minor cosmetic changes.)

NOTE: All potmeters in the layout are shown from the front side!

Use Schottky Diodes on the wipers of the potmeters. They only have a voltage drop of 0.2V instead of the 0.6 to 0.7 Voltage drop over 1N4148 diodes usually found in sequencers like this. This means you can get deeper tones from the VCO you plug it into. Because of the 0.6 to 0.7 Volt voltage drop over the silicone diodes, the first section of the potmeters wouldn't do anything until you get above 0.6 volts. So with a lower voltage drop there's more throw on the potmeter. As an experiment I also installed a 100K potmeter over the output of the Control Voltage and the wiper goes to the CV output jack. That way you can get even lower tones although, of course, this compresses the dynamic range of the sequencer. With the potmeter fully open you get the normal range of 0.2 to 8 Volts. If you close the pot half way, your range becomes 0.1 to 4 Volts so the spacing between notes becomes smaller. You don't need to include that option, I never use it and it is not included in the layout. But anyway, this is an expirimental sequencer and as a whole it works really well, If you build it you will be happy, I guarantee it. :)
A better solution, and one you should consider if you are comfortable with designing simple circuits with opamps, is to add a DC-Offset feature to this sequencer. That way you can get the lowest notes down to 0 volt without influencing the dynamic range of the sequencer. It's easy enough to do. This is not included in the layout or schematic though.

Here's a close-up of the stripboard:

Bill of materials for the layout version. You'll need ten (10) 100K potmeters instead of the 8 mentioned in the B.O.M. below. You need one for speed control and one for offset (if you build version 2 of this sequencer which I strongly advise you to do. Go to project 49) :

Here's a picture of the sequencer:

The sequencer is build up around the CD4017 decade counter chip, using a CD40106 to create the clock pulses which also serve as the 'Gate' pulses.
The CD40106 hex inverter is used as a low frequency oscillator giving off squarewave pulses who's frequency can be controlled by the 100K potmeter. I used a 15µF electrolythic Capacitor although a 10µF will do just as well. But a little higher value will give you slower speeds so you could even try a 22µF cap. The clock pulses can be interrupted by switch S-2 to give you a chance to tune that particular channel. Sometimes it can happen that after using the 'Stop/Run' switch that the sequencer jumps to channel one. If that happens try using a different CD40106 chip. You might have a fake one and they can be quircky in their behaviour.

With S-2 closed the clock pulses go into pin 14 of the CD4017 and with every pulse the chip will output a high signal on a different pin. The order by which the different pins go high is a bit random. Here is the right order: 3,2,4,7,10,1,5,6,9,11. Because of this confusing order, the outputs are set in the right order by the wire bridges to the copper traces underneath the CD4017. From there the pulses can be accessed in the right order to avoid confusion. Following the schematic drawing, the pulses go straight into the base of the 2N2222 transistors which are used here as switches. The Base-Emitter voltage is way more than needed to saturate the transistor and fully open it up. I chose the 2N2222 transistor because it can handle a reasonably large current and there's no need to use any resistors to connect them (although using a resistor in series with the base connection wouldn't be a bad thing because we're using the 2N2222 at near the limit of the operational specs.) From this base connection we also feed the eight LED's which indicate which channel is on at each moment in time. The LED's are connected with 3K resistors to reduce current flow and still provide a bright light.
All the collectors of the transistors are connected straight to the 8 Volt power rail and the emitters are all connected to ground.
It's better to just follow the stripboard layout and skip the whole transistor setup and connect the output of the CD4017 straight to the potmeters. I'm using transistors as a sort of buffer and to make this sequencer future proof for other experiments so I can draw some current from the outputs should that be necessary. But you can just leave them out it you want to. Makes it so much easier.
By setting the different potmeters, you can create the different tonal paterns the sequencer produces.
Because the potmeters are simply used as voltage deviders, it doesn't really matter which value they are as long as it's 50K or over so that they don't draw too much current and as long as you use the same value on all 8 channels.
You can tap the 'Gate' pulses straight from pin 3 of the Speed Control potmeter to the Gate output jack mounted in the panel. The pulses are really clean looking 8 Volt squarewave pulses with a 50% duty cycle so if you use the gate output into the ADSR, it will sound as if a key is pressed every time the sequencer switches to an other note.

A ten step switch is used to select the length of the sequence. It can be anything from 1 to 8. Btw, you can easily make this a ten step sequencer by connecting the last two pins from the CD4017. I made it an 8 step because I didn't have enough space to mount everything horizontally and because 8 steps is more natural for music than 10 steps because you normally have 4 notes in a beat. So multiples of 4 are better. The potmeters on my panel are mounted vertically and I could only fit eight of them below eachother anyway.
Connect the wiper part of the switch to pin 15 of the CD4017 and the wires from 1 to 8 to their relative position on the switch. Connect pins 9 and 10 of the switch together and connect the ninth output from the CD4017 to that. The pulse going into pin 15 of the 4017 will reset the chip and the counter will start over again.
Don't forget to connect pin 13 of the CD4017 to ground.

It is best with this build to make the panel first and connect all the components and do the essential wiring while you have access. Then make the circuitboard and connect the wires to the panel. Solder the resistors straight to the LED's and the diodes to the wipers of the potmeters. Connect the cathodes together and solder a wire from there to the CV output jack.
I used 5mm LED's and I made the holes in the panel by using a drill rather than a hole enlarger bit which I normally use to enlarge the pilot holes I drilled. The drill is usually a little bit less then 5mm and therefor the LED's will sit very tight and don't even need to be glued in place (although it is best to hot-glue them in place anyway).

Do not forget to solder a big 470µF capacitor on the input of the 7808 voltage regulator. Otherwise pulses will bleed through onto the power supply rails and you'll hear the tone sequence even if the sequencer isn't connected to the CV input of the VCO. I also included an ON/OFF switch (S-1) on the panel just to have the option to shut it down. It's the only panel in my synth build to have an ON/OFF switch.

TUNING THE SEQUENCER:
To tune the sequencer, simply set it to the lowest speed and use switch S-2 to interrupt the clock pulses and stop at each channel. Then you can tune that particular channel using a tuner or simply by ear, by turning the potmeter and then you turn switch S-2 back on. The sequencer flips to the next channel, you turn it off again with S-2 and tune that note, then you flip the switch again and jump to the next channel, etc, etc. It's very simple and very effective. :)

A note for beginners. You must connect the CV OUT of the sequencer to the 1V/Oct input of a Voltage Controlled Oscillator (VCO) and the oscillator makes the actual sound. The sequencer only produces a sequence of stepped voltages that the VCO turns into notes so for tuning the sequencer you must have it connected to a VCO.

Because the sequencer can produce any voltage between 1 and 8 Volt it's difficult to set it accurately to a specific note without using a tuner. That's why most professional sequencers have a built in Quantizer which automates this proces. A Quantizer reads an incoming voltage and turns it into the nearest 1/12th of a volt, that way making sure it's a pure note. 

Because most synthesizers use the 1 volt per Octave system and there are 12 notes in an Octave, each note is produced by a multiple of 1/12th of a volt. For instance note C1 = 1.000V, note D1 = 1.083V (1 + 1/12th volt), note F3 = 3.333V (3 + 4/12th volt). So the notes progress upwards in steps of 1/12 of a volt. This sequencer does not have a quantizer and because they are quite difficult to build I don't have a quantizer project on my website. You can however buy them for Eurorack systems. In my Eurorack system I have the Doepfer A-156 QNT which costs about €119 and contains 2 quantizers.

If you are good at working with Arduino's you can easily make a quantizer with that. You can program it to turn any incoming voltage into a multiple of 1/12th of a volt.

Momentary switch:

There is a good way to include a momentary switch mentioned in the comments below by 'tamasgal'. The suggestion is to put a resistor and switch in series connected between V+ and ground and then run a resistor and capacitor from the high potential side of the switch to ground and also connect it to one of the left over schmitt-triggers of the CD40106. Then connect the output to pin 15 of the CD4017. That should take care of any bounce in the momentary switch.

In fact, I have implemented this in version 2 of this sequencer (project 49) and it works really well.

That's all there is to say about this. It's one of the most fun panels for the synthesizer but one of the most tedious to build. It cost me 6 hours straight to design and build it but luckily it worked straight away.

Here's a little demo of the sequencer. This was filmed before I put in switch S-2 so I had no option to tune the sequencer at the time of filming. I might make a new video soon:

Okay, that's another one done. I hope you enjoyed it. If you have any questions about this build then  please leave them in the comment section below or in the Facebook Group.