If anyone happened to be wandering around the big bad internet wondering what happened to the Zot's Dream website, it is archived here:

http://zotsdream.hintersphere.com/

…and all of the flyer and music downloads should still be working just fine. I did take down the part where we were looking for a bass player though. This is available purely for posterity.

5e3 amp kit, see build thread for ongoing update

My secret santa for X-Mas 2009 was my Grampa Kriete. I thought it would be cool to make him a DIY Radio/MP3 Player pre-loaded with a bunch of songs he liked and also a bunch of songs I've played on.

Eventually settled on this circuit which worked out very well:

http://www.aaroncake.net/circuits/amp20w.asp

One cool thing about the circuit is that it can be powered using a recycled PC Computer power supply. In addition to powering the amp, it can be rigged up as a USB power charger, and also power a cpu fan which cools the TDA1554 chip. So not only is this thing a radio, it is also a charging station for anything USB.

The amplifier parts were mounted in a clementine box which can be seen in the pics. The clementine box was eventually velcro'd inside a decorative box from Hobby Lobby which has a pair of pawn shop JBL car stereo speakers mounted in both sides. At the top of the box is a sheet metal control panel which accesses 4 USB charging ports, the mp3 player/radio and a big on/off switch for power.

I only have pictures and video from before the final radio was assembled.

http://www.hintersphere.com/junk/tda1554_22watt.AVI

The Harmony is outfitted with GFS Crunchy PAF chrome covered humbuckers. Last month I swapped the ceramic magnets with AlNiCo 8 ones. This inspiration came from a 1977 Ibanez Les Paul Copy. Those pickups are wound to about 7k resistance (both the neck and bridge, pretty evenly) with AlNiCo 8 magnets. I noticed that they are brighter with a boingier, more dynamic, musical quality. The GFS Crunchy PAFs are wound to about 10k neck and 14k for the bridge. Out of the box they have a thick, meaty tone. The magnet swap was relatively easy to do without even disconnecting the pickups.

Some interesting observations about the swap… The pickups aren't really any brighter, but I wasn't really expecting that anyway. They are however more dynamic, musical and boingy. Because the pickups are overwound, there is still a lot of “meat” also… I haven't yet established a preference for the overwounds vs the ones in the Ibanez. The wiring itself has already been heavily modded and in this guitar I normally favor the outer coils in series to a standard middle position. With the original magnets, the middle position had a lot of mud whereas outer coils in series is much cleaner (and almost tele-middle) sounding. The mud has really cleared up with the AlNiCo 8s in the standard middle position.

I tend to shy away from the bridge pickup but I'm finding that position more attractive as well.

One unfortunate side effect of the magnet swap was a loosening of the coils or the cover of the bridge pickup. Found this out on stage doing the solo for Alice Cooper's School's Out (check out feedback @ 1:05). Normally the guitar note bleeds into feedback which has to be regulated by position in front of the amp. Instead, I got blasts of unmusical squealing as something in the pickup went haywire.

I found this link and re-potted the bridge pickup last night. Since there is about 2 pounds of copper wire in the cavity, and 5 connections per pickup I was really trying to avoid unsoldering them. Put together a simple double-boiler and mixed about 60-40 parafin to beeswax. Managed to do this without frying the guitar body although I almost burned it on the stove. The final test will be tonight when the Boneheadz play at “Del Ranch”

Latest Mix:
ten_summers.mp3

• 20090207 - Guitar + Vocals
• 20090208 - Beefed up the guitars.