[solderingnewbie]

I assembled the Bugle but it doesn't work.  This is my first ever diy/soldering project and some of my joints are questionable (especially one that I had to desolder).  How do I go about diagnosing where the problem is?  I really have no idea what I'm doing, and I'd like to salvage this project if at all possible.  Thank you in advance for your help.

- jeff

[Darterboy]

Mine didn't work right the first time either. Turns out Mouser sent me some of the wrong resistors. Don't trust the labels on the little bags. Get a magnifying lens (if you don't want a nasty eye-strain headache) and carefully check the color codes (and thus values) of the resistors and other parts against the PCB artwork and the schematic to make sure they're the right ones. The second resistor I checked was supposed to be 13K ohms and was 13 Ohms (!) Out they came and in went the right ones. Very beautiful music soon followed!

Great site to check Color codes against:

http://samengstrom.com/elec/resistor/index.html


Good luck!

-Stott

[Grover]

Can you please explain more fully what "doesn't work" actually means?

Is there absolutely no sound at all?
Crackly, staticky sound?

Did you insert the batteries?  

[solderingnewbie]

just produced a bunch of noise, but no music.  Jim offered to look at it, so I mailed it to him with a note requesting that he try to fix it if it was just a minor repair, but to scrap it requires major effort.  What a nice guy.

Possible areas where I screwed up (I don't know anything about electronics, so hopefully you can understand what I'm saying below...)

1.  polarity?/directionality?...other than parts c7,c10 (which are 220uF capacitors?), does it matter in which direction any of the other parts are oriented (in terms of which lead goes in which hole for a given reference designator?
if so, then my project is way messed up.

2.  I accidentally dropped solder in one of the resistor holes.  I was able to remove the solder, and install the resistor, but may have damaged the metal contact at that hole.  Can that be fixed?

3.  I ordered parts from digikey (and from Mouser when the digikey parts were backordered).  I didn't check to make sure the parts corresponded with their respective labels, but I'm pretty sure I installed the parts at their proper locations.
....

Out of curiosity, how did you first learn about electronics?  I just bought a beginning electronics book (Starting Electronics by Keith Brindley ISBN:  0750644354), a breadboard, multimeter, and some parts to play around with.  Any beginning books or other projects that you recommend?

OK.  Thanks for your help.

[ohenry]

I recently got some good information sources from a fellow in this thread:

http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=11791

Happy learning, Henry

[GRD]

Jeff,

You're not alone.  There's a thread running in Asylum you might want to see.

http://www.audioasylum.com/forums/tubediy/messages/58218.html

[solderingnewbie]

I checked out that thread at audioasylum.  Thanks.

- jeff