Bellerophon AM16 project

[Arrigotti]

I built a mic pre with Chae's Bellerephon PCB (AM16 based) a few years ago, and I love the preamp, but it seems that it had been distorting a lot lately.  It is mostly on loud sourced, and usually with a hot microphone.  I love the sound of the preamp for acoustic guitar.  It's absolutely golden, but if I have a heavy handed strummer, I get distortion.  I'm now scared to use it because I don't want to risk a perfect take having distortion on it.

It is actually a pretty nice sounding distortion that is like the stuff you hear on Helter Skelter, but not appropriate for my application.

Has anyone else had this problem, and if so, is that just the nature of this preamp?  Maybe it would help to pad the mic before it hits the preamp?

Any feedback would be great.

Thanks.

 

[emrr]

Sounds like input overload, try a pad.  These older fixed gain designs have lower input headroom. 

 

[Arrigotti]

Thanks, I'll give that a shot.  The design has a built in pad, but I'm not sure where in the circuit it is.  I am assuming it is at the front end of the design, but I'll have to do a little research on that.

 

[Arrigotti]

Thanks Chae,  and thanks for the design.  I really love the sound of that preamp.  I use the Bellerophon or the Chimera for nearly 90% of my recordings.  They're fantastic and have stood the test of time.  I think I built them 7 years ago, and they're still going strong.