As part of my new years resolution to put considerably more effort into making Vacoloco into a business, I’ve registered, and obtained a MIDI sysex ID. It seemed to make sense given the OS updates I do are currently done via MIDI.
So, new products will be using this instead of the PPG manufacturer ID I had been using (with a respectful nod to Wolfgang Palm, creator of the PPG range).
It’s been a while since I put an update up here so here we go…..
JuJu is finally making sounds, after weeks of hassle and prep…
This is still early days, and the samples are very quiet so I had to bump up the gain to get them recorded (hence the background noise), but they’re there and sounding really good.
Sounds are on Synth.net here -
We’re now on Facebook in addition to twitter and Synth.net, so why not pop over and “like” our facebook page!
Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/VacoLocoInstruments
Twitter - http://twitter.com/VacoLocoSynth
Synth.net - http://synth.net/VacoLoco
Kit 1 and kit 2 for both GorF and Tron are now available from my order page.
Postage has changed a little for Kit 1, with UK P&P being £4, EU P&P being £6 and Rest of the World P&P being £9.
I probably won’t be doing any more Tron kits, but I will probably carry stock of both types of GorF kit for a while to come..
Remember, all funds from this go to fund other projects like Zira and JuJu (still in development). I do this for a hobby not to make a living from it. What this means is that your purchase is an investment into future projects for yourself 
Paul
Just a quick update that from Monday night (UK time) there will be some GorF and Tron kits available which will be just the PCB and CPU. A few people have asked for these and now my back order of CPUs has come through I can finally offer them for £25 plus postage.
Postage for Kit 1 breaks down like this,
It’s been an interesting couple of weeks. I built a second Zira to test the remainder of the chips I have and start sending units to beta testers.
But the one I built wouldn’t work, it lit up, you could edit values, save patches, load patches but would not respond to MIDI!
I checked the MIDI in, and could see the signal, checked the tracks, all checked ok… Swapped the CPU for a known good one, same problem, put the suspect CPU into my prototype and it worked fine.
Checked the 5V rail, all good, Checked the ground planes, all fine… I just didn’t get it!
So I passed it to a friend of mine, figuring a fresh set of eyes might spot something monumentally stupid I had missed… he was just as confused as I was…
a week later, he’s had a brain wave, he checked the frequency coming out of the main crystal, instead of reading 16MHz it reads 20.3MHz!!!! 25% off, that’s nuts!
Fingers crossed I don’t have any more like that!
A few people have asked about some elements of how to build their GorF kits, so I’ve revamped the tron build guide to make a little more generic and updated the links.
The new build guide can be found here and whilst it’s still about how to build a Tron the important parts (order to build in, orientation of Diodes, LEDs and Switches, etc will be the same for each of the micro module kits I produce.
I’m still happy to answer problems if you have specific questions.
I’ve finally succumbed and got myself a twitter account - VacoLocoSynth. The main reason is that I hope to keep a journal about the development of my projects and also provide updates about the progress of kit sales and events such as Synth DIY UK 2011.
I’ve uploaded a stack of pictures from Synth DIY UK 2011 to the events page on synth.net.
It was a great event, well attended and we raised over 180 pounds for charity!
I would like to thank Neil Johnson for making all the arrangements at Cambridge and in particular Terry Shultz for the donation of some great prizes and nagging his suppliers to donate as well!
