Soul food diodes

suspiciousminds

Does anyone lnow what diodes are in the Ehx soul food?

GIJoe

Calling @handsomerik

monquixote

Silicon rather than germanium like the klon.

suspiciousminds

I fancy adding a switch to flick between the standard diodes and some ge oa90's that i have.

handsomerik

standard silicone ones. Changing them out for germanium 1N34a diodes makes it much smoother.

suspiciousminds

Thanks handsomerik, would my oa90's be no good then?

handsomerik

I'm not familiar with them I'm afraid. @juansolo is probably more knowledgeable about such things and I'm sure he'd be happy to offer advice.

ecc83

The 1N34a diodes are point contact types just like OA90/91s so I doubt there will be any audible difference.

Other types you can play with are LEDs and Shottky diodes. 

Just to be an early morning pedantic? SiliCONE is a complex compound. SiliCON is an element and is what semiconductors are made from.

Dave.

suspiciousminds

Brill, thanks guys!!
Just got to work out the wiring now!!
Happy days!

jonnyburgo

ecc83 said:

"Just to be an early morning pedantic"

Did you mean "Just to be an early morning pedant"?

eventhelosers

jonnyburgo;357829" said:

ecc83 said:



"Just to be an early morning pedantic"





Did you mean "Just to be an early morning pedant"?

Ecc83 pitches it up...

Jonnyburgo takes a swing...

Its right out of the park folks!

juansolo

Sorry, been away. No idea what's in the SF, likely BAT41's or something like that at a total guess

Everything else has been covered I think. I tend to use 1N34As from Tayda with a forward voltage of 260-290mV. They're as close as anything to the unicorn tear diodes.

jpfamps

ecc83 said:

The 1N34a diodes are point contact types just like OA90/91s so I doubt there will be any audible difference.

Other types you can play with are LEDs and Shottky diodes. 

Just to be an early morning pedantic? SiliCONE is a complex compound. SiliCON is an element and is what semiconductors are made from.

Dave.

Forward voltage drop of geranium diodes is lower than silicone diodes so you will notice a difference.

As you are generating a square (ish) wave with higher harmonics I suspect stray capacitance may also have an effect.

ICBM

Given how similar these two pedals sound in the demos I've heard when they use completely different diodes, I would be amazed if the exact type of diode within a particular class makes any difference.

But for the record, I usually prefer geraniums to silicone.

handsomerik

you mean silicon surely

randomhandclaps

ICBM said:

Given how similar these two pedals sound in the demos I've heard when they use completely different diodes, I would be amazed if the exact type of diode within a particular class makes any difference.

Well there's the thing with the Klon isn't it? - You start to crank the gain and it starts to sound shit.  Or to rephrase that - You start to crank the gain and the diodes come in to play and it starts to sound shit.

The Soul Food diode look like (and going by EH's standard) 1N4148  (1N914). I would however safely bet that if you took a regular genuine Klon user, removed the pedal from their board and switched out the germanium diodes out for 1N4148s, then put it back they would never notice as so few people use enough gain on the Klon to get into the territory where the diodes are having any large effect on the sound.

Dave_Mc

I thought the soul food sounded alright as a standalone od. I know it has the rep (the klon i mean) of sounding terrible as an overdrive, but yeah. Maybe my ears are terrible ) I guess it could sound a bit harsh but you can also tweak the treble control to (sort of, at least) compensate.

benecol

jpfamps said:geranium

ICBM said:geraniums.

suspiciousminds

How would it sound without the diodes?

juansolo

You'd still get some op-amp clipping, so likely nasty (if like me, you're not particularly keen on op-amp clipping).

suspiciousminds

If thats the case them i'll go with on/off/on switching.