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[rbino]

In my old house I found one of these and obviously the first thing that I thought was "Let's bend it!"
Before probing it, I want to ask you some questions: since I fried two toys, I don't want to fry this either. What can I do to avoid it?
Then, where do I have to concentrate to find sweet bend points without frying something? I read some others reports of someone bending a Yamaha DD series drumset and I deduce that the best bends are on the ICs, but who knows...
And finally: I saw that some DD series modded machines have a patchbay, others use switches. What method is the best for you and why?
Thanks in advance

[Bogus Noise]

From what I've seen on the Yamaha DDx machines, there's usually 2 or 3 chips, and shorting pins between those bring the randomness.

The patchbays are one pin per socket, and it's just a way to bring the pins of the chip to the surface, so you (or the user) can choose which bends to patch in. It gives you all the possible bends, with switches this would take every possible combination, or you'd have to leave some out. For playability the preset switches are good, but I like more options for crazy sounds.

You can also connect two patch points to either end on a switch or button, which can be better for performance.

It's possible to fry these machines, but you're probably safe if you concentrate on the chips, and maybe bend through a small resistor (100ohm perhaps?) for a safety buffer.

[manufactured zero]

I've bent a fair few of these and have a scan if you want it. They benefit greatly from an ltc1799 mod for the pitch too which is all detailed. You can pick up the ltc1799 kits from getlofi or attempt to build your own if you're brave enough to try soldering smt ic's.

[rbino]

Yes I'd like to have your scan, thank you! So, if I connect only the pins of the ICs between them I'm safe... I've read somewhere that is better to avoid the power pins, is it right? How do I find them?

[Circuitbenders]

I've read somewhere that is better to avoid the power pins, is it right? How do I find them?

Either find a datasheet for the chip or get a multimeter and see where the voltage is. It might actually say on the board itself with some pins labelled as VCC

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IC_power_supply_pin

[manufactured zero]

I'll get a good scan together for you next week. I did a DD11 this week and documented it in detail so i'll get together one for the 12/14 for you and let you know when it's done. The scan i have at the moment is a mess and i've recently started updating my scans with better ones that don't look like einsteins late night scrawlings so waiting a little longer will be worth it. Whatever you do don't short the pins out on the voltage regulator or short out areas near the power jack with parts of the main board. I haven't fried one of these yet but this is likely a good way to find out how to permanently bend one. All of the glitch bends on a DD are on one chip. So you don't have to make connections anywhere else or to any other chip. There are other bends here and there but in general shorting the pins on that one chip will give you everything glitchy you'll hear on any of the vids of them you'll see.

[MAGTIG]

I'll get a good scan together for you next week. I did a DD11 this week and documented it in detail so i'll get together one for the 12/14 for you and let you know when it's done. The scan i have at the moment is a mess and i've recently started updating my scans with better ones that don't look like einsteins late night scrawlings so waiting a little longer will be worth it. Whatever you do don't short the pins out on the voltage regulator or short out areas near the power jack with parts of the main board. I haven't fried one of these yet but this is likely a good way to find out how to permanently bend one. All of the glitch bends on a DD are on one chip. So you don't have to make connections anywhere else or to any other chip. There are other bends here and there but in general shorting the pins on that one chip will give you everything glitchy you'll hear on any of the vids of them you'll see.

I've got a DD55 & DD20 (with a bizarre "roll" feature) that I'm looking to bend. Can I please get the scan too if it's not too much trouble?

[manufactured zero]

Here's a link to a shiny new dd12/14 scan.

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j41/verminromance/BOARDSCANALL.jpg

And a bit of info explaining why there's stuff on it that probably means nothing to you.

Basically i made the scan for reference when i bend more machines of this type. I always add an ltc1799 to them to control the pitch so i've highlighted the voltage regulator pins. Both the +5v to feed the ltc (and any other circuits i might want to add like lfo or distortion) and the ground. I've also highlighted a number of convenient ground points on the board for the same reason. The pin to connect the clock out from the ltc is highlighted also.

Now, the bit you'll be interested in if you're doing one for the first time is the glitch pin setup. I've found there are one or two combinations which will crash the dd12 hence i use all pins apart from the four corners. Another reason for this is i spent ages looking for the best combinations and in my opinion they all sat within this configuration. There are more pins than i use on my dd12's highlighted but i know for a fact than if you stick to these pins it won't crash. Not even if you short out all of them at once (yeah, i've tried it

How you decide to go about making your controls for them is up to you. I use a patch bay as it lets me access all bends without spending a fortune on switches. The downside is that patch leads aren't as spontaneous to change on the fly as switches. Hence i wire up seven channels to switches which all connect to the patchbay. To me seven channels of glitches is ample when you consider a lot of the bends on the 12 and 14 just send it spiraling into a wall of noise. The patchbay atleast gives you the opportunity to fine tune the glitch selection to the channels before you kick off on a recording/live run. While at the same time not limiting you to a preset selection of hard wired options.

Anyway, to get started i'd just set up some switches based around the chip to get a feel for what it will do and then work up from there.

Don't be scared of soldering to the IC pins. Just take your time. Using multi strand wire is easier than solid core. Soak up a bit of solder onto the wire. Rest it on the pin and re heat. Once you get the hang of it it's a piece of cake.

[manufactured zero]

"I've got a DD55 & DD20 (with a bizarre "roll" feature) that I'm looking to bend. Can I please get the scan too if it's not too much trouble?"


Sorry, still haven't quite sussed out the quote feature.


I don't have a 55 but i do have a 20. I haven't attempted to bend either of them. I'm guessing a dd55 is like a dd35 with more features. if this is the case then the chip bends of the old school machines will likely be near impossible to achieve. Nearly every pin combo on the one chip available to probe on the dd35 cause it to lock up. My way around this was to add pitch control, distortion and an 8 step sequencer. Turning it into a basic but cool 'programmable' beatbox. If the 55 has the mad sounds (dogs, cat's cows, whatever) and has midi in then simply adding pitch control and distortion would turn it into a pretty cool machine.

Check out this vid to see what i'm talking about. It's my 35 with a sequencer stuck in it. A bit of a quirky machine but it can kick out some good sounds with a bit of patience.

M-Z3R0 - Circuit bent Yamaha DD35 drum & noise sequencer mk2

I picked up a really beat up dd20 from a car boot sale the other day. The case was smashed up but it works fine. It's on the back burner at the moment but i'm planning to build it into a wooden case with a sequencer. 16 steps as soon as i figure out how to chain two 4017's without having to play hell to do it. I only briefly poked about inside it so can't tell you if there's anythjing cool to be had in there yet but i'll let you know when i do get onto it properly.

[MAGTIG]

That's awesome, thanks!! I've never put a sequencer in anything yet (I'm pretty new to this stuff). Are there any tutorials out there on it?

Also, what do you do to add distortion (really good heavy distortion) without frying the unit? I've read the stuff on WarrantyVoid about connecting a couple of transistor pins together with a resistor between the base connected to a pot that's also wired to the V+ or V- current (depending on whether it's an NPN or a PNP) but I haven't been too successful (I can copy and paste the excerpt I'm going from if that helps).

I have one of those little Melotone / Electronic rap pad things and just as I got going on it yesterday I noticed it's one transistor (it's a C9013) heating up. So I disconnected everything, but it was still running hot. What the hell? Not long after that the volume went really low, and then nothing at all. I felt the little black blob the entire time but it never got hot. I figure it's probably fried, but I'm gonna replace the transistor anyway and see if I can get it back. Do I need the EXACT same one?

I wish there was a circuit bending book to help me get beyond the basics covered in Reed's book.

Anyway, I've seen your videos before and your stuff always sounds absolutely incredible (plus your tattoos look cool)! Thanks for sharing.

[manufactured zero]

Cheers for the good words. I really apreciate it. As for the ink, just a spin off from my starwars fixated days where i wished there were star ships and i was a rogue trader like han solo haha.

I make my own distortion circuit up wit an LM 386. They circuit works really well with drums as it won't let really high frequencies through so what is just a crap wall of noise from some of the bends on the dd's get's turned into a more defined and crunch kind of rhythmical noise. This is enhanced further by altering the volume input to it usng the machines original control. The lower it goes the less the 386 picks up and the more defined or spaced out the rhythm becomes. PM me your email address and i'll send over all the info on making and fitting a sequencer. It's not easy by any means and when it doesn't go right first time can be time consuming and annoying to sort out. There are some small mysteries i've yet to solve too. basically, to get a 4017 to trigger two hits from the same pad in a row on a dd you have to gate the 4017's output. This si ok and with a bit of help i figured it out. But the thing is it works on a dd6 and 35 but for some reason i just can't get it to work on a dd8 or 7 so when i build them you have to work around triggering doubles by assigning the same sound to two pads. I have no idea at all why the hell it won't play nice. You get one or two pads to work properly but then as soon as you alter the tempo or wire up another pad it goes back into misfiring and machinegun trigger territory. If anyone reading this can help me out there i'd really apreciate it. Anyway, like i say, i'll send over some info if you want. It's a bit too much to stick up on here in one hit. It's not the hardest thing to do in the world but other than dd6, 7, 8 and 35's i can't tell you if you'll have trouble fitting a sequencer. There may be little problems you'd have to figure out.

[mutilectric]

Hi,
I’m new in this forum. 
At the moment I am modifying a DD-12, which I recently bought at a second hand market for 0,50 euro. 
I searched for possible bends inside and as mentioned by others here, the IC3 is the only place where I could find interesting bends.  I was also planning on installing the ltc1799.
But I can’t seem to find other possible bends, beside those.
That’s how I started searching for more information and ended up in this forum. Thanks for all the information I found here! It’s a great help.

But I still have a few questions:
1 component in my DD-12 looks almost dead, although the device works fine.
I suppose it’s a capacitor.  This component is labeled 0.047F / 5.5V. 
It’ s located above the IC5. Does anybody know what this is, or what I could use as a replacement for this component?

And has anybody found some other nice bends in the DD-12?  All the other IC’s I’ve tried crash the machine, or don’t change anything.  Before I continue I want to be sure where I should search for nice bends, to avoid frying it.

As for the sequencer: what could I achieve with this if I put it in the DD-12? Triggering the drum pads should be possible with midi. Triggering the bends is the only thing I could think of, which would be great too.

Manufactured zero: thanks for the scan you posted here! It helped me a lot!
Could you send me the info for the sequencer you made and other useful files for the DD-12 you mentioned here?

Thanks

[Gordonjcp]

1 component in my DD-12 looks almost dead, although the device works fine.
I suppose it’s a capacitor.  This component is labeled 0.047F / 5.5V. 
It’ s located above the IC5. Does anybody know what this is, or what I could use as a replacement for this component?

It's a capacitor.  It's a very large capacitor - 0.047F is 47000uF.  It will be used for keeping the memory alive when the power is off.  It might have leaked, a common fault with memory backup capacitors in video recorders.  The electrolyte is moderately nasty and should be cleaned off the board carefully.  When you try to solder near it, it will spark and splutter and stink.

You can live without the capacitor if you don't mind losing any stored settings when you turn the power off.

[mutilectric]

Thanks for your reply,
yes it has leaked, because the capacitor is almost broken in two parts.
So i could replace it with any  0.047F Electrolytic capacitor?
I really want to replace it, because i don't like it if a function doesn't work. and it is not so difficult to replace as well.

[Gordonjcp]

Yes, you can get replacements.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=350109966191

^ that guy has them ;-)