Anyone not sick of helping n00bs with Royer Mod?

First of just wanted to say that I love this site, I did the cap switch on my old Mxl 990 and I am hooked on DIY gear. That being said is there anyone willing to help me out with a foyer style tube mod? I have been through the Meta forwards and back, and while I have a lot of great info on what I need and quite a few schematics and PCB diagrams I have hit quite a few dead ends as far as deleted or archived threads with photos removed. I know this has been done to death, and maybe everyone has moved on to a better project that I don't know about but well.... I wanna make some tubes glow dangit, hehe. Thanks for taking a look, sorry if I am being an annoying newbie. I look forward to tons of DIY in me future thanks to you all though!

Can't help ya if you don't ask. If you do ask someone will come along and provide an answer usually. This not the gsluts...

Sorry bout that, new to this whole forum thing. At this point I am just trying to find a good resource, preferably with photos, on how the mic PCB goes together and the tube is attached, I have found tons of good resources for the power unit but all the photo links for the internal board are broken. Sorry if this is not specific enough, I am about as fresh to this as a guy can get. Just trying to get as much info as possible before my part arrive. If anyone has done this and could supply some fresh photos I think that would get me past this bump. Thanks for your patience, I know I have probably bit off more than I can chew but what can I say, I am hooked!

Do you have the schematic for it? And the PDF with the instructions?

Cheers,

abe

Do you have the original tape op article? That has pretty good walk-through instructions.

EDIT - Abe beat me to it! 

I do have the original article as well as some basic schematics, I am just having a hard time actually visualizing the circuit.

I have all the PDF docs from here:
http://www.idpmultimedia.com.au/diyfactory/projects/royerproject/royerproject.htm

and using various photos of the power unit and board have been able to make sense of that, and I have a pretty good idea how to arrange the parts on the mic board itself but seem to be missing where to attach the actual tube leads. I will wait until my parts arrive and I lay out my assembly before posting more. Thanks for being helpful!

absolutebass said:

I do have the original article as well as some basic schematics, I am just having a hard time actually visualizing the circuit.

I have all the PDF docs from here:
http://www.idpmultimedia.com.au/diyfactory/projects/royerproject/royerproject.htm

and using various photos of the power unit and board have been able to make sense of that, and I have a pretty good idea how to arrange the parts on the mic board itself but seem to be missing where to attach the actual tube leads. I will wait until my parts arrive and I lay out my assembly before posting more. Thanks for being helpful!

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all i can say i just do it and screw up a few times. It's not THAT expensive to break some components. And you'll be a lot wiser afterwards. All the info is in there. If it's not clear enough try to find datasheets and maybe just start a walkthrough with pics on here. All the noobs will love it and all the veterans will call all your mistakes. What i'm trying to say is, you'll learn as you go along.

greetings,

Thomas

I just finished one of these, and made a few mistakes along the way. I used BigUgly's boards and omitted a few parts for the basic Royer Mod. (MXL 2001) I have a build thread (more photos on the way) at the Homerecording.com bbs forum. I used BigUgly's PSU board, but with a much lower AC input (70v or so) which got me just about 99vdc, and regulated 6.28 (I need to readjust teh trimmer...) on teh heater.

As for the tube leads, the red wire (if it's an MXL2001 you are modding)  goes to the grid (lead #1) and can/should be done "mid air" or on an insulated post. (Lesson learned the hard way...)

Are you using perfboard? a PCB like the one in teh link? (BTW what happened to the diyfactory.com?????) If the latter, then the article says to feed the grid connection through the board and splice off board.

Here's a pinout of the tube.

Thanks for the tube diagram, that clears a few things up. I was unaware that the PCB were still available and plan on ordering a set or two asap, lots of good stuff in that black market. This place keeps getting better! Do you have a link to that thread? Would love to take a look.

has anyone tried this with an MXL 4000? I've got one sitting around that I never use. should be the same K67 copy capsule

I'm having another run of boards made, seems like a lot of interest, and BigUgly's are perfect for either the stock RoyerMod or a G7 like mod. (I'm even planning on using a 6AK5 on one to see what that is like.)

has anyone tried this with an MXL 4000? I've got one sitting around that I never use. should be the same K67 copy capsule

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http://recordinghacks.com/microphones/MXL/4000 It  has a dual sided capsule and says patterned after the k67. So you can do BigUgly's dual sided Mod.

Thanks for the tube diagram, that clears a few things up. I was unaware that the PCB were still available and plan on ordering a set or two asap, lots of good stuff in that black market. This place keeps getting better! Do you have a link to that thread? Would love to take a look.

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This is my build thread. http://homerecording.com/bbs/special-forums/diy-mods-homebrew/royer-mod-starting-331451/

BTW, the VAFAM XLR's are for the cable, you need something with a set screw for teh actual mic body. -- something like a Switchcraft A5M or A7M (or a knockoff. However, per a thread at TapeOp the Neutrick version doesn't quite fit the MXL mics)

The VAFAMsound ones I bought are like teh MXL cable connectors, they have some snap in piece (that is a PITA to get back in btw....) not a screw.

zebra50 said:

Do you have the original tape op article? That has pretty good walk-through instructions.

EDIT - Abe beat me to it! 

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for Zebra50: You had a thread on mods to the mod, but most of the links are broken. Do you still have that info online anywhere?

for Zebra50: You had a thread on mods to the mod, but most of the links are broken. Do you still have that info online anywhere?

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Hi! Possibly on my hard drive. Can you post a link to the thread that you're talking about?

I have built quite a few mics over the years.  But the 'standard' Tape op / Royer mod is fine, and I don't think that anything I did really improved it.

Perhaps the best one I did was on a Neumann KM75!

This one talks about "zebras schematic"

http://www.groupdiy.com/index.php?topic=4896

and here is the one with links to multimic.html

http://www.groupdiy.com/index.php?topic=103.0

My first go around is a bit noisy, but I'm sure a lot of that has to do w/ my overall sloppy technique.

  Royer specifically designed this so it was easy for anyone to build. Using the original article, I knocked off a version on perfboard (both head amp and PSU), and it worked great, even though I had never built a mic head amp or power supply before. I think I even used the old MXL circuit board and some of the components on there for the head amp. Put the PSU inside a lock box I got at the thrift store.
  Even after switching it from a V67g body to a 2001 body there were no problems.
  I would suggest just fitting the parts into some perfboard without soldering until you find the best arrangement. By the time you've done that once or twice you'll be ready to go.
  If you have any problems the folks here are glad to help, especially if the questions are well framed and photos or a schemo are included.
  Good luck...it's worth the effort, and makes those capsules sound much better. You'll learn a lot!

Well that's 7 years ago now!

I recall that was playing with the Royer circuit and the G7 as well, and simply mixing ideas, like adding a 1 Meg grid resistor to the Royer rather than using grid leakage, and also adding or removing the cathode bypass cap.

Those mics went through several incarnations and I think they currently have 5840 tubes and Lundahl transformers.

Stewart

zebra50 said:

Well that's 7 years ago now!

I recall that was playing with the Royer circuit and the G7 as well, and simply mixing ideas, like adding a 1 Meg grid resistor to the Royer rather than using grid leakage, and also adding or removing the cathode bypass cap.

Those mics went through several incarnations and I think they currently have 5840 tubes and Lundahl transformers.

Stewart

Click to expand...

Thanks, I think I have the general idea, and was looking at the similarity/differences between bigugly's Royer and the G7.

Hi,
  I've done a number of Royer Mods MXL2001 and MXL603 - and a variation of the 603 , here are some links to some pix

https://picasaweb.google.com/audiophreeek/MicModEdit

https://picasaweb.google.com/audiophreeek/603Mogami

https://picasaweb.google.com/audiophreeek/603PSU

  I think they sound great, that was three years ago .... no I'm and adict of DIY  ;D

Followup. I've read about "tube burn-in" and "letting capacitors expand" or something along those lines. And opinions one way or another. However, letting my first go around sit on for about two or three hours had a definitely positive effect. "Settling?" hard to describe, but it sounds much better after this "burn-in" period.

Seems like tubes in general need some time to "warm-up" every-time. Like powering on a guitar amp for a couple hours in stand-by just to let the tubes warm up, it really makes a difference. It depends on the time and patience I have, but usually a good thing for tube mics too.

PS just want to say i'm excited to built up some more tube mics.... probably be the royer mod kind!