Electronics for Guitarists

Electronics for Guitarists teaches the basic theory of operation and design principles of analog guitar signal processing circuits and amplifiers. The design and operation of common effects circuits such as tone controls, preamps, phasers, flangers, envelope followers, distortion and overdrives are covered, as are both solid-state amplifiers and power supplies. Written specifically for the guitarist, this book balances coverage of theoretical analysis and design while providing many examples of practical experimental circuits. The main thrust of the material is old school analog circuitry, focusing on: Fundamental principles of transistors Integrated circuit and vacuum tube-based amplifier operation Theory and operation of typical guitar signal processing effects circuits Electronics for Guitarists should be of interest to any musician that is interested in analog signal processing. The material covered is also useful to general electronics hobbyists, technologists and engineers that are interested in guitar and music-related electronics applications This book covers the operation and design of guitar-related electronics circuits. Starting with simple power supply circuits, the book then covers basic transistor amplifiers and op amps, then effects circuits including flangers, phasers, filters and so on. The last chapter covers tube amplifier design. Several practical design examples are presented, as well as complete tube amps of various power output. Details of how to add a spring reverb are also covered here. This is a pretty technical book, but still very interesting. It really helps to demystify the operation of some pretty complex circuits. The math behind all of thet circuits is presented, but you can skip it and just build the circuits to experiment with, or read the circuit descriptions to get a better feel for how effects and amps work. This book is written for the guitarist that would like to know how transistor and vacuum tube-based amplifiers, and how various circuits effects work. The main thrust of the material is old school analog circuitry, including heavy coverage of discrete transistors and diodes, classical filter circuits, and vacuum tube-based amplifiers. This book should be useful to electronics hobbyists, technologists and engineers that are interested in guitar-related applications. Covers the operation of pickups, filters, tone controls, basic transistor and op amp circuits, as well as the design and analysis of guitar signal processing circuits such as flangers, phasers, envelope followers, distortion units, etc. The last chapter covers the design of basic vacuum tube amplifiers. Design examples use 12AU7, 12AX7, 6L6, EL34 and EL84 tubes. Electronics for Guitarists focuses on analog circuitry, and is written for the guitarist interested in transistor and vacuum tube-based amplifiers. Topics include discrete transistors and diodes, classical filter circuits, and vacuum tube-based amplifiers.