Newbie Questions

[Chris Crosskey]

>Hello all,
>I have just gotten interested in building my own synth after looking at
>the Fatman from PAiA which looks simple enough for even a klutz like me
>to be successful with. I was wondering if there were any other companies
>that I should check out that produce kits; also any recommendations on a
>good book that will help me get up to speed with the basic techinques of
>circut board building; and are there plans anywhere to make modular
>synth devices and things like hardware sequencers?
>Thanks so much and I hope this isn't to basic for y'all.
>Dana Woodaman
>


Well, apart from the PAIA stuff, there's Gene's ASM-1, Chris List 
produces panels for those, and is hoping to produce an extension 
module, I hope Gene let's him call it the ASM-2 cos it would make 
sense, either that or a Butterfly (as in a beatiful thing that comes 
from a chrysalis <G>), Midwest Analog do some good stuff, especially 
synth drums, and myself and the rest of the Modulus crowd are doing 
stuff in the UK, I'm hoping to market it kits for a Digisound/Aries style 
1V/Octave discrete module modular, and have a little company for that 
very purpose called Abingdon Synthesis Projects. I get the feeling 
that when I start, in order to keep my set-up costs down I'll only be 
able to do the PCB's, the panels and any odd-ball components like 
tranny pairs that aren't easily obtainable at sane prices to 
hobbyists, leaving the commodity resistors, trannies and pots/knobs to 
the builder.
Hardware Sequencers.... Hmm... if someone gets me the centre part of 
each of the schematics pages I'll scan in my copy of the ARP1601 
sequencer. It's one of the best, and adding extra channels would be a 
doddle.... Similarly, if you look at Josh Brandts ftp/http bits at 
ultranet then the Penfold book (a whole load of synth circuits that 
are cheap, easy and permanently useful) has several simple sequencer 
circuits, complete with PCB layouts in it.
chrisc