Post by brassteacher on Dec 4, 2008 19:59:59 GMT
I thought I'd share the results of my first restoration project, a vintage ARP Axxe, specifically the "Orange Axxe":
Now, this was recorded with a typical cheap digital camera, so the "vibrato" you hear is not coming from the synth, just an artifact of the recording.
The poor thing was all but dead when I got it, capable of producing almost no sound (well, sound worth listening to anyway). So, as is my usual custom with such matters, I started from where the power comes in the back, and worked my way forward. In this case, it didn't take long to find something! So, one rebuilt and calibrated power supply later, I was getting a much greater variety of ugly noises to play with
.
After much poking and prodding, and after thorough cleaning of all those cursed sliders, the ugly noises only became a little more manageable, even though the sine and square wave oscillators looked GREAT on my scope. This is where things got weird. I put the scope's probe on the noise generator test point (mind you, I was flying blind at this point with no manual, I'm glad ARP marked all the TPs on the circuit board) and I got a very pretty sine wave with a strong octave overtone, very much akin to the trace a flute produces when a microphone is hooked to the oscilloscope. In other words, a very pure tone. In short, the noise generator wasn't making any noise!
After replacing the ONE dead transistor, and two small electrolytic caps in the circuit for good measure, the ARP began to sing almost as you hear it here. I kept my fingers crossed and calibrated it according to the service manual for the earlier version of the Axxe, since I could find not even a hint that a manual was ever compiled for this version, and keyboard adjustment took care of the rest! ;D
Enjoy!
Don Taylor
Now, this was recorded with a typical cheap digital camera, so the "vibrato" you hear is not coming from the synth, just an artifact of the recording.
The poor thing was all but dead when I got it, capable of producing almost no sound (well, sound worth listening to anyway). So, as is my usual custom with such matters, I started from where the power comes in the back, and worked my way forward. In this case, it didn't take long to find something! So, one rebuilt and calibrated power supply later, I was getting a much greater variety of ugly noises to play with
. After much poking and prodding, and after thorough cleaning of all those cursed sliders, the ugly noises only became a little more manageable, even though the sine and square wave oscillators looked GREAT on my scope. This is where things got weird. I put the scope's probe on the noise generator test point (mind you, I was flying blind at this point with no manual, I'm glad ARP marked all the TPs on the circuit board) and I got a very pretty sine wave with a strong octave overtone, very much akin to the trace a flute produces when a microphone is hooked to the oscilloscope. In other words, a very pure tone. In short, the noise generator wasn't making any noise!
After replacing the ONE dead transistor, and two small electrolytic caps in the circuit for good measure, the ARP began to sing almost as you hear it here. I kept my fingers crossed and calibrated it according to the service manual for the earlier version of the Axxe, since I could find not even a hint that a manual was ever compiled for this version, and keyboard adjustment took care of the rest! ;DEnjoy!
Don Taylor
I dream of doing what you do, only more specific to Synthesizers
