The Lightning Boy II is a significant achievement in engineering.  I put more time and money into its development than all past LBA pedals added up.  Its a highly thought out design packed full of exciting new developments from the LBA lab.  Its a high voltage vacuum tube powered modular instrument preamp, to sum it up.  On its own, the LBII makes for a serious overdrive/distortion.  The pedal comes loaded with a 12AX7 vacuum tube, but also uses an inert gas voltage regulator tube inside.  The high voltage onboard power supply is mounted on a PCB, which is a first for LBA.  Jon Clarke designed the layout of the PCB with some minor guidance from me.  The audio electronics are all wired point to point still, but in a much cooler fashion than in the past.  I'm in-house manufacturing what I'm calling, the tube module.  The module consists of a ceramic tube socket mounted on a metal bracket.  The bracket also has a pair of modified solder lug tag strips mounted to it.  The tube electronics are all mounted on the mounting bracket directly connected between the vacuum tube socket and the solder tags.  The tube module can be removed from the pedal, taking all the electronics with it, for serviceability.  The module is mounted on two pins and is held down by 2 nuts.  The vacuum tube inside the pedal can be removed with ease.  No need to take the tube module out to change a tube.  You could unbolt the module if your fingers are of the large style.  The LBII will sell for $235.

The Lightning Boy II is modular in design, both inside and out.  There is an 1/8" jack on the heel side of the pedal for connecting an LBA Sidecar Module (Gen II).  At the same time as the LBII is released, we're going to also be releasing the CH2 Sidecar Module, which turns the simple 1 knob LBII into a 5 knob dual stomp multi-channel instrument preamp.  The CH2 is a two channel box with gain and treble controls.  The LBII normally has a fixed amount of gain with a master volume control.  The CH2 allows one to manipulate the gain of the LB2, but also gives you two separate foot switchable channels.  Each channel has a super cool treble boost knob, a unique design of my own.  The boost utilizes a custom Cinemag inductor.  The LB2's vacuum tube literally powers the EQ boost circuit.  The CH2 is a $149 option.                

International buyers rejoice!  I developed an international power supply that works everywhere in the world.  From the USA to Australia, to South America or Asia, it works everywhere.  There's a side switch on the PSU to select the operating voltage.  It works from 110-240V AC and 50-60Hz.   Buyer supplies their own IEC power cord to connect it to the wall power in your country.  For North America and Japan customers, we have a budget wall adapter which can be used instead, but the LBA PSU is superior in 3 ways.  The LBA PSU is not just internationally flexible, but it also outputs less noise than the wall wart due to its improved power regulation from its toroidal transformer, fully shielded case, shielded twisted pair 12V wire, and onboard power conditioning.  The LBA PSU outputs exactly 12.6v AC at 800mA, which is ideal for the Lightning Boy II.  The budget wall wart adapter outputs 15.3v AC at 1A, which is high for the LBII, but works fine.  15.3v will run the tube filaments at 14 volts internally, shortening the tube life to about 7000hrs.  The LBA PSU runs the tube filaments at 11.3v, or under the 12.6v spec, which increases the tube life to about 20,000hrs.  The internal B+ of the Lightning Boy II is 115v with the wall wart, or 100v with the LBA PSU.  The difference in sound is not a lot, but noticeable.  The distortion is sexier sounding (and there's more) with the LBA PSU.  There is more headroom with the wall wart, but a tad less distortion and a tad bit more noise.   The wall wart is a $15 option.  The LBA PSU is $39.   

It should go without saying that prototyping is a battle of goals vs achievability.  I wanted to include tube dampers on the Lightning Boy II's vacuum tube as an added bonus, but alas, they do not fit inside the case.  The lid will not close when tube dampers are installed on the vacuum tube.  I'll look into getting some automotive high temp silicone O-rings for the future.  The automotive kind used in transmissions are generally thinner and should do the trick.  I'm not sure if its something I can procure in time for the official release, but I'll do my best to try.      

Today I finished building a prototype of the LB2 that I'm happy with the sound of.  Things progressed through the prototyping phase in a way that I could not have predicted.  The noise is super low, the gain is high, the headroom is high, the tone is beastly.  Its tight, clear and mean.  To get to this point I had to do some things I didn't want to do.  Things that make the pedal more expensive.  I'm going to have to install a power filter choke inside the pedal, which takes up a good bit of space and costs a bit.  Its necessary for super low noise.  The added choke is complemented by an added filter cap that's fairly large for such a small pedal.  These new parts in the power supply section lower the B+ voltage a little bit - down to about 100VDC.  That didn't seem to have a noticeable effect on the sound of the pedal other than it has much less noise.  I plotted out the placement of parts in the pedal and everything fits if I omit the internal turbo switch I wanted to add.  The switch would have been an inexpensive and cool feature to add, but there really isn't enough room for it.  Worth considering are the high voltages inside the pedal.  Its probably best to avoid sticking your finger inside to flip a switch.  I don't want anyone getting shocked.

Now that I have the pedal sounding the way I want, the next step is designing the PCB for the internal power supply section and getting it manuftured.  The audio portion of the electronics are still going to be wired point to point.

That's right!  Popular demand has struck.  To satisfy the wishes of the populace and to silence the constant email inquiries, I decided to bring back the much loved The Lightning Boy tube drive/boost pedal.  I'm sure that will satisfy a good number of folks.  On Youtube recently, Intheblues channel, demoed the out-of-production pedal.  Here's that video if you haven't seen it yet:

So what's different about The Lightning Boy II?  Well, I wanted to keep it fairly true to the original, but I had a number of personal issues with the original that I wanted to change with the new version.  First off, the LB2 will operate on 12V instead of 9, providing more headroom and more gain.  Next, the original version was designed to be as inexpensive as possible, which forced me to make many compromises on components and the circuitry.  This time around, no cutting of corners to make a low priced product.  Its going to cost a bit more, but you're getting a much cooler pedal.  There will be an internal switch that can be accessed by taking off the back plate.  The switch will toggle between normal operation and "Turbo," a feature that will be on all new LBA products since the Op-2 Comp.  The original had no noise filtering electronics, since that would have increased the cost of the pedal.  The LB2 will have a number of features designed to reduce noise.  There's going to be a noise filter cap, improved grounding path to eliminate internal ground loop noise, and the tube filaments will be running about 1v under normal, which will not affect performance of the tube, but it will lower the noise created by the heater filaments by about 5dB and it will radically extend the life of the vacuum tube.  The tube itself will ship with a tube damper mounted on it, stock, to minimize microphonic noise, which could be heard as an amplified "click" when stepping on the pedal.  The tube socket is getting upgraded to the super tight kind used in the Op-2 Comp.  The original socket was an el-cheapo.  The new sockets are double the price, but they are more than double as good.  Super grip means, better transfer of signal (better sound) and reduced risk of the tube ever becoming accidentallly unseated (which I never heard of happening to begin with).  The visual look of the pedal will be very similar, with an almost identical top panel decal and single big knob.  The knob is getting upgraded to the same one as I'm using for Trinity.  This knob is actually 4x's more expensive than the original knob used on The Lightning Boy, but it looks 10x's cooler!  The back plate and side are going to be laser engraved instead of hand engraving to save time and reduce the risk of mistakes.  Machine work will be done via CNC instead of by hand to reduce cost and improve accuracy.

The original pedal had a 1 year warranty, mostly due to the low quality parts used in it.  The new version will have a mighty 5 year warranty because it won't be using anything less than the best of the best parts.  
  
Availability:  I'm aiming for a February 2017 release of the pedal.  At this point it looks like The Lightning Boy II will sell for right around $200 USD.  We're currently accepting pre-orders, which will be for $180 USD.  Free shipping on all pre-orders.  The pre-orders will ship in late January 2017.  There's already people on the waiting list prior to the publishing of this blog post.   Email sales@lightningboyaudio.com if you're interested in pre-ordering The Lightning Boy II.  

I started work on designing Trinity in March of 2015.  Today I feel confident in saying I am done prototyping and ready to move into production... for real.  I said this once before, but it never happened.  I realized then that I rushing things for no reason.  I decided to take my time and create something I could be super proud of for the rest of my life.  Today I feel so massively accomplished.  It has been the most complicated journey of my life, but I'm a better, smarter man as a result.  I'm looking forward to sharing my masterpiece with the world. 

There have been several massive hurtles on this journey.  The biggest was noise, which I have done a great job of limiting (-90dB at full volume, drop the input volume to 50% and the noise is -110dB).  Second was the EQ section.  The EQ was strangely way more difficult to get perfectly integrated than I expected.  It would cause self oscillation at extreme settings and with the knobs centered the response was not flat.  There was also an 18kHz roll off regardless of knob positions.  I tried so many different EQ circuits with no success before finally getting smart.  After finally getting some software to run EQ simulations I was able to design an EQ that is perfectly flat in response when the knobs are centered, offers a good amount of boost and cut, and does not cause self oscillation at any setting.   I started with the "James" EQ, which is a passive version of the Baxandall circuit.  That circuit is not perfectly flat with the knobs centered, so I had to modify it.  The circuit still oscillated at extreme settings, but thankfully I came up with a mod that resolved this issue.  I got it worked out really good.  The other element of the EQ equation is the amplifier section that drives it.  The EQ has its own tube, which is out of circuit when the EQ is bypassed.  Its a 6922 cathode follower circuit with some negative feedback around it to create a super clean low impedance output to drive the EQ.  It sounds stupendous!  The EQ adds a bit of THD when engaged, but its not over the top.  It sounds very warm and musical.

Next week I'll do some thorough tests measurements for the Trinity page.  Next step is to build a production model.  Thanks to the high cost of prototyping it will have to wait a little bit.           

Without a doubt, this project is the most significant thing I've worked on to date.  Its a complicated analog device that needs to perform like a space ship (minus the whole going to space thing).  Lots of requirements like low noise, flat frequency response throughout and beyond the audio band, low THD, decent amount of gain, all controls work perfectly, no self oscillations at any setting, and tons of flexibility.  Basically it needs to do a ton of stuff really well and offer a sound that's highly desirable.

That all said, I went back to the drawing board about a month ago or so, with good initial results.  Its better now.  The current prototype has no EQ in the circuit yet.  I wanted to get everything else performing perfectly before designing the EQ section.  I'm writing this blog post today because I'm finally really satisfied with the amplifier.  It sounds absolutely stunning.  High resolution and pretty low noise with a decent amount of gain.  The sound is what its all about and it sounds nothing short of amazing.  The current topology is a single ended ultra-linear pentode amplifier driving a custom output transformer.  THD is 0.185% with a 2kHz sine wave feeding the input with 80mV and the volume knob on the channel strip set to 100%.  At that setting the noise floor is measured at -90dB A-weighted RMS and the gain delivered is 48dB.  Turn the volume knob down to 75% and the noise floor drops to -100dB.  Kick on the turbo and the gain jumps from 48dB to 57dB!  With the turbo engaged, the THD is just over .3% with the volume knob cranked.  With those settings, the A-weighted RMS noise floor is -80dB.     

There's still a lot of work to do, but at least now things are looking better than ever and most importantly, it sounds absolutely wonderful!  

We're going to offer a giveaway for the exact Op-2 Comp pedal used in our crash test video (video below). If you're already on our email list you'll be automatically entered into this giveaway. If you're not on the list, sign up here before September 1st:  http://eepurl.com/lELgf.
A winner will be selected from our email list subscribers at random on September 1st. We will announce the winner on our facebook page and the winner will be notified by email. If we do not hear back from the winner within 3 days, a new winner will be selected at random and the process will repeat until we hear back from someone with their shipping info.

Things have really been on the up and up lately.  A lot has been getting accomplished.  I finally found enough time to get back to work on designing the Trinity channel strip system.  Looking back I realized how far I had come and how much I had learned along the way.  After spending a few days trying out new ideas and getting nowhere significant I decided to scrap the design and start over from scratch.  It really sucked having to make that decision.  Bottom line is I am a perfectionist and I have a vision for what the final product will be.  I tried everything, exhausted all possibilities and spent probably too much time trying to make the damn thing meet all of my insane performance requirements.  Scrapping the design to start over made the most sense in order to meet the system requirements I set forth well over a year ago.  I started over by designing a block diagram of how the new version should be laid out.  It will be significantly more expensive now, which also sucks, but the sound and performance are what matter to me.  

Today, I made some incredible developments.  The Trinity channel strip will have 3 vacuum tubes in it, each one representing a gain stage.  Today I finally was successful in developing a working prototype of the first gain stage,  in which my sound and performance requirements have been exceeded.  The first stage offers 35dB of gain (with a gain knob for the input level).  The noise floor of this stage at full volume is -110dB on the spectrum analyzer.  It has a very flat response from DC-25kHz, which is the cutoff point of my analyzer.  I'll use my o-scope soon to determine how far out the high frequencies extend before rolling off.  25kHz is pretty awesome as it is, but I feel like it probably goes way up.  The THD is below 0.1% with a 1v 2kHz sine wave, but I can't give an exact number until I conduct more tests.  Each stage will contribute some THD, so it needs to be low... although some THD is ok with me.  My limit for what I feel sounds great in normal situations is 0.47% THD.  To me, anything above half a percent is too colorful to be an all-around-player.  Above .5% it becomes to me, a specific sound and color that is desirable for only certain situations.      

This new design for Trinity is going to be very expensive and will probably take a considerable amount of time to work out, but I'm sure I can get it done in under a year!  The new layout calls for 4 audio transformers in the signal path, twice as many as before.  Its necessary for total isolation between the various circuits.  The EQ circuit especially needs to be isolated for noise and stability reasons.  I'm planning to go with a push/pull output stage this time around to minimize noise and THD, while providing plenty of volume.  I experimented yesterday with using an interstage transformer as a phase inverter and it worked great.  That's the plan for the output stage.  The main thing I need to figure out is a low noise tube stage for the EQ circuitry.  That stage mainly needs to provide about 20dB of low noise gain that's relatively clean.  I would be cool with a higher amount of THD with the EQ on vs. bypassed.  It would be easier to design and I think no one would complain about more tube tone.  More to come!    

Lots going on and planned for the future.  Jon set up an instagram account for LBA and is managing that for us.  If you're on Instagram, head over and check out http://www.instagram.com/lightningboyaudio.

In other news, we shot an crazy video in which we demolish an Op-2 Comp (or attempt to) to demonstrate how bullet proof the design is.  People have expressed concerned over the fragility of the glass tubes when it comes to gigging and possible stage falls.  Others have shown concern over the reliability of point-to-point wiring vs. everyone else's PCB building techniques. This video was put together to silence the naysayers.  There is no way in hell your pedal will ever be abused to the extremes we put it though.  Check out the vid here:

Yep, it works and it sounds great!  A one-off for LBA Recording Studio (new website coming soon with photos).  After I finished designing the Op-2 Comp and finished teaching Jon how to build them exactly as I would, I was supposed to get back to work on the Trinity project.  I decided to take a slight detour and completely rebuild the control room at LBA Recording Studio from the ground up.  lol.  That was no slight detour, btw!  I have been planning to do this for years.  Really, I just needed the time, money, and motivation.  It was a huge job that would not be complete unless I built a vacuum tube powered mixing board.  Here it is... the Trinity Master Module.  Its expandable, so as the years drift on I can keep adding modules to expand its capabilities.  The Master module seen here is a 10 channel mixer with pan controls for 8 channels.  The other two channels are fixed hard left and right.  There's a Master output volume attenuator (Gold Point stepped attenuator), and left/right master trim controls for the tube output amplifier stage.  Most of the controls are for the stereo master, which include independent left/right channel mutes, a master mute, phase invert, mono/stereo switch, speaker selector, input selector (external stereo input or 10 channel internal mixer), and output selector (monitor, bounce).  The board is powered by the Trinity system's "Beast Mode Power Supply," which can supply power to 4 different Trinity system devices.  Right now its powering the Trinity Master Module, the Trinity ARA (Auxiliary Return Amplifier), and a prototype Trinity Channel Strip.  The idea is a bunch of Trinity Channel Strips feed into the Trinity Master Module.  This is probably the first all-tube point-to-point hand wired mixing board made since the 1950's, but its lightyears beyond in terms of technology and fidelity.  The mixer is basically noiseless (-110dB noise floor) and has practically no crosstalk, with a flat response from DC-30kHz.  In terms of sound its more punchy and forward than the Flux Bender EQ, but with some of the same tonal qualities.  Very clean, but tastefully warm.