Forest Fortress Studios

I should be doing Chemistry

Jake Hintze — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 21:39:51 +0000

But I am thinking about Tom’s Vox AC 30.
And how I am going to mass produce a ton of condensor mics from home, 10-20…

Flashbang new jam!

Jake Hintze — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 21:31:13 +0000

My friends Adam and Ian both agreed to jam some heavy blues with me the other night and this is what happened. There was a lot more, but the file became corrupt. This is all that survived the first explosion.

http://jakehintze.bandcamp.com/

Electret capsules

Jake Hintze — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 21:00:57 +0000

JUST CAME IN:

They are tiny. Curious to see how they will turn out…

Projected project outlook

Jake Hintze — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 20:16:16 +0000

New projects on the way:

Tom Sloans’ Vox AC30 Melon clone

New condenser mikes with frequency response 20-20k hz

CB mike cartridige (shown) for a possible bass drum mic

Guitar effects such as an Ampeg scrambler clone, tube and transistor fuzz pedals etc…
Analog baby step sequencer

Recordings of what my Rhodes sounds like right now

All this fun for under twenty dollars!*

*each, excluding tom’s amp. that cost us forty…

Rhodes tune up

Jake Hintze — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 23:25:24 +0000

Got all the tines cleaned up a bit with some steel wool (and a magnet to clean up), new grommets in, and O BOY what a difference. This thing doesn’t sing yet but it sure is screaming right now. (I think those old speakers are starting to go). Thank you Vintage Vibe for the hook up. (They gave me enough screws and grommets for an 88 tee hee) Borrowed a Peterson strobe tuner and got everything really close. Now I just need to adjust individual volumes and escapements for taste, and the occasional flat or sharp.

Thats one out of 73 tines, new grommets in.

Grommets

Jake Hintze — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 07:31:07 +0000

Old rubber grommets (and their mounting screws seen here) along with the tines are all out of the ’72 Rhodes as of right now, and so I am cleaning the tines waiting for my new grommets to get here. Those tines are CRUSTY.

Fender Bandmaster 5E7 (Tweed) Clone

Jake Hintze — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 17:15:32 +0000

Sir Jeffery Lownsberry approached me with a challenge to build him an amplifier. I had only built guitar pedals from schematics before, and I was itching to build a tube amp. And so, with help from the schematics and layouts in the back of Gerald Weber’s Desktop Reference of Hip Guitar Amps, I bring to you the very first “Tramp Amp”, which is probably not what Jeff calls it. This is the result of a month’s work (mostly spent waiting for parts). (Don’t worry, I grounded the circuit up to modern standards…)

Also: I feel kinda dumb because I didn’t believe in shielded wiring practices. Until after I built this. Keep your input wiring short and shielded kids.

(Y’all know these things will kill you if you touch the insides while it’s on, right?)

More Rhodes Mods

Jake Hintze — Sun, 25 Dec 2011 15:42:09 +0000

My Fender Rhodes was made in the third week of 1972. This means that it didn’t include an effects loop built in to the preamp, only the amp itself. I wanted to have my echo, chorus, phasers, Moogerfoogers etc to be plugged in where I could see them, and perch them on top of the piano when I mod the suitcase lid the Dyno way (http://www.fenderrhodes.com/img/history/dyno/dyno-ad-december-1980.jpg) (flat top conversion). Oh yea Merry crumpus or whatever.

Here you can see the two 1/4″ jacks (In/Out duh) and DPDT switch for true bypass… (still makes a nasty sound every time I switch from the pedals to the piano. I think I’ll experiment with adding a cap or something.)

Homemade condensors

Jake Hintze — Sat, 24 Dec 2011 22:38:53 +0000

Just putting my under 300 dollar “Crystal Sounds” recording studio together, thats all…

found some schematics and layouts on the net for condenser mics!

The hard part about home made microphones is building sturdy, usable cases. I’m slowly getting it. (Life is hard without giant shop tools…)

Hit me up for schematics I found or pics of the insides…

A humble ’72 Fender Rhodes suitcase restore

Jake Hintze — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 17:20:37 +0000

An amazing sounding instrument. Back when it was new in the 70′s, anyway. Got mine in close to “like hell” condition. Why would I pay three times as much for something I can restore? (ZO yea, new blog heading…).

Fortunately I can mod it now without feeling any collectors item guilt. I hate that stuff. Time to de-rust, vacuum, make cables and tune it while I wait for more parts.

For the savvy or really bored I present:

Tech talk: I needed a four pin din to a four blade Cinch-jones to power the pre-amp in the Rhodes from the speaker cab (WEIRD) that it conveniently sits on. More on old weird hookup cables later. I drilled a hole in the amp and pre-amp’s faceplate, dropped in a more common style four pin female in the amp and made a matching cable. Beautiful. More to come.