Hi everyone, I have the Hammond M102, Is there aTone control adjustment???

[Ork]

Hey like I said got a M102, I have had to solder 4 wires back onto the tone generator , its coming along pretty good. I am working with the swell screw set.
I put it to 1 1/2 turns. Does the M100's come with a "Tone Switch, knob or an adjustment screw "?? thanks in advance

[Sweet Pete]

M3/M100 use the same 'amp'.(AO29). There is no tone control.The B3/C3/A100/RT3/D100 preamp AO28 has one though.

The swell control trimmer determines how much 'headroom' (sets minimum volume) to more or less and increases or decreases 'dynamic range'.Tone gradually thins out on the pedal because it also acts as a 'tone control' ,more bass=less volume.
The more you open up the expression pedal,the less bassier.......not sure of the 'Q' but the rolloff is significant!

[Ork]

After posting this question, I thought about it and thought I might catch a lot of flack. Because essentially the Drawbars are tone adjusters. I am trying to achieve the sounds that John lord of Deep Purple,That sweet distortion. I did find the turn screw adjustment on the foot pedal. I think I read going past 1 and half turns is bad for the organ' electronics. maybe its tubes. Wish I had tube tester

[Ork]

After posting this question, I thought about it and thought I might catch a lot of flack. Because essentially the Drawbars are tone adjusters. I am trying to achieve the sounds that John lord of Deep Purple,That sweet distortion. I did find the turn screw adjustment on the foot pedal. I think I read going past 1 and half turns is bad for the organ' electronics. maybe its tubes. Wish I had tube tester

[Ork]

Thank you for your help

[ShadyJoe]

I believe Jon Lord ran his Hammond through a Marshall amp to get that sound. You can get some good distortion out of a Leslie, but not Deep Purple distortion.

Go easy on the adjustments on the M100. If it's working, the tubes should be fine.

[tiredoldgeezer]

Go easy on the adjustments on the M100. If it's working, the tubes should be fine.

Exactly right.

Can't get the J-Lo sound without all the ingredients.

1. You gotta have the tones. Spinets lack a lotta contacts (83, i believe) and require those, plus new busbars, to be installed to emulate a console. Spinets don't really wail like a console without this mod. They were made for homes and chapels and, well, it's often not welcome in such sedate places.

2. A Marshall head. Or a few other heads might work. But put your distortion into the power amp, if you can.

3. Another idea is to wire a line-out box. Then you have your pick of literally thousands of distortions with which to play. The J-Lo sound is in there I can assure you.

I'm sure there's someone that has come up with that warm 2nd harmonic distortion that we all like by simply modifying the onboard amp. But i've not seen it.

[enor]

The M-100 does not need new busbars in order to install foldback, all busbars are already full length in them. And it's more like 50 missing contacts.

[kziss]

I think I read going past 1 and half turns is bad for the organ' electronics. maybe its tubes. Wish I had tube tester

Hi Ork.
There is no harm whatsoever done to the tubes or the organ electronics if you turn up the gain trimmer capacitor to produce the maximum output levels. The maximum output levels are produced when the gain trimmer cappacitor is turned up around ten 180 degree half turns ( five full 360 degree turns) from the minimum zero position, and I have done this on my own two C3 organs as well as on other people's Hammond organs in order to allow more overdrive through their Lelies when playing at full volume.

Even with the gain trimmer capacitor turned up to produce the maximum output levels, the AO28 preamps that I have done this basically remain clean sounding and they produce only a very slight overdrive on the bass and the midrange frequencies when the expression pedal is set at full volume, but this slight overdrive is nowhere near as distorted as the overdrive produced by a Leslie tube amplifier played at full volume, and the AO28 tubes and the other organ electrics will not be damaged by the slight overdrive.

The AO67 amplifier that I have worked on also behaves similarly to the AO28 when I turned up the Gain Trimmer capacitor to produce the maximum output levels.

Constantly driving the Leslie tube amplifier at full volume in order to produce the lovely overdrive sound will cause the tubes in the Leslie to wear out quicker than what they would if they are not overdriven, and the Jensen V21 treble driver and the bass speaker voice coils can overheat and eventually become damaged by the constant fully overdriven volume levels.

You can prevent speaker damage by connecting a suitable 16 ohms power soak device between the output socket of the Leslie amplifier and the speaker wire plug.

On my own Leslie 147 I use a 16 ohms THD Hotplate so that I can fully overdrive the Leslie amplifier at much more comfortable levels without annoying other people and without damaging the speakers.

All the best.
Kon.

[kziss]

Spinets don't really wail like a console without this mod.

Hi Tireoldgeezer.
Even with the full treble foldback modification, the spinet organs will still not sound like a console organ because the console organ manuals have the manual tapering scheme whilst the spinet organs do not have the manual tapering.

The manual tapering scheme creates a noticeably thicker more midrangey sound whilst the non tapered manuals produce a more "scooped" sound with less midrange and a stronger bass and also a stronger or more piercing high treble when the full treble modification is done..

For example, with the 888000000 or the 888800000 drawbar settings, the highest two keyboard octaves (the fourth and fifth octaves) will sound noticeably fatter on a console organ with the manual tapering scheme whilst the same drawbar setting sounds thinner on the organs without the manual tapering including all the spinet models as well as the console organs which do not have the manual tapering such as the pre 1937 Model A, and BC organs and the H-100 series, the R-100 series and the X-77 organs which because of the absence of the manual tapering scheme this results in these particular console organs sounding more like the spinet organs which have the full treble foldback modification.

I'm sure there's someone that has come up with that warm 2nd harmonic distortion that we all like by simply modifying the onboard amp. But i've not seen it.

You can drastically boost the gain levels and create overdrive within the AO29 (M3) and the AO67 (M100 series ) amplifiers by doing the following modifications:

Disconnect the C6 30pf treble cut feedback capacitor from the V2 6AU6 (Non Vibrato Channel).
Disconnect the C1 20 pf treble cut feedback capacitor from the V1 6AU6 (Vibrato channel).

Disconnect the C33 0.0022 uf ( 2.2 nf) treble cut capacitor from the Percussion output filter.

Disconnect the C13 20 pf feedback capacitor from the V4A 12AX7
Short out the R29 treble cut grid resistor from the V4A 12AX7.

Disconnect the C20 20 pf feedback capacitor from the V4B 12AX7.

Disconnect the C22 220 pf treble cut grounding capacitor from the V3B 12AU7.

Disconnect the C25A 0.001 uf (1 nf) negative feedback capacitor which is wired between the C23 Gain Trimmer capacitor and the junction of the R45A 270K resistor and the R45B 8.2K resistor.

If the above modifications result in more overdrive than you want, then rewire the C13 20 pf feedback capacitor back in place, and even after this if there still is more overdrive than you want, then also rewire the C20 20 pf feedback capacitor back in place.

All the best.
Kon.

[tiredoldgeezer]

Hi Tireoldgeezer.
Even with the full treble foldback modification, the spinet organs will still not sound like a console organ because the console organ manuals have the manual tapering scheme whilst the spinet organs do not have the manual tapering.

The manual tapering scheme creates a noticeably thicker more midrangey sound whilst the non tapered manuals produce a more "scooped" sound with less midrange and a stronger bass and also a stronger or more piercing high treble when the full treble modification is done..

Kon,
I'll not question the exacting emulation of the outcome. I'm aware of your extensive data collection.
My mod spinet sounds a LOT like my console, but of course not identical. But then neither does any other console.
But the OP was looking for a heavily distorted Jon Lord sound, not necessarily a console clone which presumably could double in a jazz gig.
So yes, you're right. The spinets employ a constant impedance in the contact wires. No tapering one way or another. That'd be a crazy mod. A good, solid, 3 band tone control works absolute wonders to move the tone wherever needed. I use a tube parametric, skipping the AO-29 altogether.

For example, with the 888000000 or the 888800000 drawbar settings, the highest two keyboard octaves (the fourth and fifth octaves) will sound noticeably fatter on a console organ with the manual tapering scheme whilst the same drawbar setting sounds thinner on the organs without the manual tapering including all the spinet models as well as the console organs which do not have the manual tapering such as the pre 1937 Model A, and BC organs and the H-100 series, the R-100 series and the X-77 organs which because of the absence of the manual tapering scheme this results in these particular console organs sounding more like the spinet organs which have the full treble foldback modification.

All I really know is the M-3 because that's the only spinet I've modded. So I don't know how it stacks up to anything other than a C-3 which is my current console.
I had a pre-1937 Model A. And yes, it was a teensy bit thin. But it didn't have vibrato or chorus, either. But through some tone, the right distortion, and even a phase shifter, it really kicked hard and I got all kinds of compliments on it. That might've been because I had taken the lower manual down one octave which fattened things up, too.

You can drastically boost the gain levels and create overdrive within the AO29 (M3) and the AO67 (M100 series ) amplifiers by doing the following modifications:

Disconnect the C6 30pf treble cut feedback capacitor from the V2 6AU6 (Non Vibrato Channel).
Disconnect the C1 20 pf treble cut feedback capacitor from the V1 6AU6 (Vibrato channel).

Disconnect the C33 0.0022 uf ( 2.2 nf) treble cut capacitor from the Percussion output filter.

Disconnect the C13 20 pf feedback capacitor from the V4A 12AX7
Short out the R29 treble cut grid resistor from the V4A 12AX7.

Disconnect the C20 20 pf feedback capacitor from the V4B 12AX7.

Disconnect the C22 220 pf treble cut grounding capacitor from the V3B 12AU7.

Disconnect the C25A 0.001 uf (1 nf) negative feedback capacitor which is wired between the C23 Gain Trimmer capacitor and the junction of the R45A 270K resistor and the R45B 8.2K resistor.

If the above modifications result in more overdrive than you want, then rewire the C13 20 pf feedback capacitor back in place, and even after this if there still is more overdrive than you want, then also rewire the C20 20 pf feedback capacitor back in place.

All the best.
Kon.

This data goes into my keeper file. I've never got into the Hammond unit, but this looks interesting enough to try on one of my loose amps.

[peterb_2795]

You can drastically boost the gain levels and create overdrive within the AO29 (M3) and the AO67 (M100 series ) amplifiers by doing the following modifications:

Disconnect the C6 30pf treble cut feedback capacitor from the V2 6AU6 (Non Vibrato Channel).
Disconnect the C1 20 pf treble cut feedback capacitor from the V1 6AU6 (Vibrato channel).

Disconnect the C33 0.0022 uf ( 2.2 nf) treble cut capacitor from the Percussion output filter.

Disconnect the C13 20 pf feedback capacitor from the V4A 12AX7
Short out the R29 treble cut grid resistor from the V4A 12AX7.

Disconnect the C20 20 pf feedback capacitor from the V4B 12AX7.

Disconnect the C22 220 pf treble cut grounding capacitor from the V3B 12AU7.

Disconnect the C25A 0.001 uf (1 nf) negative feedback capacitor which is wired between the C23 Gain Trimmer capacitor and the junction of the R45A 270K resistor and the R45B 8.2K resistor.

If the above modifications result in more overdrive than you want, then rewire the C13 20 pf feedback capacitor back in place, and even after this if there still is more overdrive than you want, then also rewire the C20 20 pf feedback capacitor back in place.

All the best.
Kon.

Somehow I knew this was coming ... especially after the discussion had touched on spinet foldback (48 upper and 29 lower) plus tapering (36 upper) and now the mention of dropping the lower manual an octave (there is a similar thing to do on the spinets - for a pseudo octave drop).

I too will be retaining the above information in my 'Keeper files' (as I am sure will many others) ...

Good one Kon ! :)

[Ork]

WoW!!!Sorry All, I had posted something when I first joined and I didn't get any response so I sort of took my time getting back to here and now I must say I must seem ungrateful. I will assure you all I am not. Such good stuff You all posted . I will have to find out how to get and email notices

[Ork]

tiredoldgeezer, kziss and Shady Joe, enor and Sweet Pete, almost forgot Peterb_2795. Lot of knowledge there. [Foldback] I have now heard this term 9x and I saw a video of a guy cutting wires and resoldering back using a chart. It was of interest but not sure it pertained to M102, but I guess if had a chart it would be easy to do but wonder what the benefit is. With every change in the Yin what is the Yang?

[theseacowexists]

Pull out any of the four highest drawbars on the upper manual, one at a time. Play a chromatic scale all the way from the bottom to the top of the manual. Notice how the tones will disappear after a certain note? Foldback will add in these "missing" tones, which would be present in any of the console (B3,C3, etc) models. It gets you one step closer to your spinet being a console.

[enor]

This is me explaining and demonstrating the concept (in Swedish, but the video has English subtitles) many moons ago.

[peterb_2795]

Ork, just in case you are wondering what lies ahead for you if you choose to go the foldback and tapering route. The following is what you will need to add in to your upper manual. Rest assured that it is not as complicated as it might at first glance appear to be. It is really an exercise in patience and a logical approach to your work. There is no magic to it, but you can *really* mess your manual up if you are not careful ... :o

In the attached images, you can see the number of resistors required to be attached to effect foldback and tapering in an upper manual. This is after adding in all of the "missing" contacts....

[Ork]

That is a long soldering session

[Ork]

Hi, Peter_b, I getting closer, my teardown is complete on the Baldwin and will soon have time to devote to the Hammond, I recently saw actually a few video of doing a foldback but it was on the lower keyboard and I thought the results were impressive. I was wondering if you had also had done this to your organ besides the upper keyboard. I also have a question. Do you loose your foot pedals with the lower foldback?