Schlappi Engineering - Angle Grinder

[starthief]

Mine arrived today and I freaking love it. It's pretty great as a filter, I love its tone with the grind section, it's fantastic with other oscillators driving various things. I've also gotten "toy with dying batteries" sounds, sudden octave jumps from small changes to Grind, weird chirpy noises, self-pinging filter noises and all kinds of mayhem out of it already.

[inoshi]

Mine arrived today and I freaking love it. It's pretty great as a filter, I love its tone with the grind section, it's fantastic with other oscillators driving various things. I've also gotten "toy with dying batteries" sounds, sudden octave jumps from small changes to Grind, weird chirpy noises, self-pinging filter noises and all kinds of mayhem out of it already.

Glad you like it! It always has a home in my patches.

[autopoiesis]

recently picked one of these up and have been loving it as much as I expected to. the only thing that I feel is "missing" is a global VCA that governs the amplitude of all the grind feedback paths. like how on the Hertz Donut MkIII there's a single "index" control over the entire modulation bus, which scales everything you've set up in it in terms of operators' contributions to FM and phase distortion, or on the DPO where the FM index sets the level of the two oscillators' linear and/or exponential FM of each other.

have I missed or failed to envision some way of patching this with Angle Grinder?

granted it's a lot more flexible and interesting to have access to each of the four feedback paths' amplitudes, but without a "global grind feedback index" to use as a VC "macro" control, I could see it being a little difficult to reign in more involved patches

[minatorymodular]

You could patch a DC offset > 1:4 mult > all 4 grind sliders. That would give you a macro to control all 4. Lots of modules offer DC offset, for example Mutable Blinds.

I don't think it'll get you great results though. The interactions between the 4 feedback paths are highly unpredictable. But I'll try it out later.

[autopoiesis]

yeah, I was thinking about that -- a negative DC offset to defeat the sliders' positions or recover them when the offset is increased to 0V (e.g. with the help of an envelope or sequencer). would probably want to insert 1-4 unity mixers in between the DC offset and the 4 feedback level inputs, so you're not entirely giving up individual voltage control over them.

I guess some normalization of the CV across the inputs would be handy but not desirable in many cases. like ... if a positive DC offset was normalled to the first grind CV input, and whatever is patched into a grind CV input normalled it across the adjacent CV inputs. and the sliders acted as attenuators for the normalled offset or patched in CV.

well, whatever, it's an analog module and a beautiful one so no point in speculating about stuff like this

[Stice]

I just have to say, this thing is incredibly stable. It's never more than a few cents off when I turn it on, and once tuned it doesn't drift. At all.

[MARK27]

I just have to say, this thing is incredibly stable. It's never more than a few cents off when I turn it on, and once tuned it doesn't drift. At all.

Welcome to the Church of Schlappi!

[autopoiesis]

yeah, the stability and precision in these things (I speak only from experience of Angle Grinder and 100 Grit) is really remarkable given how insane they are when you choose for them to lose their shit. how many other absolute feedback monsters have a fine tune knob and endless permutations of feedback flavors?

[scragz]

Is there a new batch in the works? All I can find are questionable pre-orders.

[AXN]

Is there a new batch in the works? All I can find are questionable pre-orders.

Bought mine here last week, and still in stock: https://cymrubeats.com/product/schlappi ... e-grinder/

[scragz]

Is there a new batch in the works? All I can find are questionable pre-orders.

Bought mine here last week, and still in stock: https://cymrubeats.com/product/schlappi ... e-grinder/

Awesome, thanks for the tip! Never seen this site before.

[AXN]

You’re welcome.

[ablearcher]

Just wanted to say there -is- a new batch in the works (along with the 100 Grit and Interstellar Radio). I'm optimistically shooting for late November or early December to have Angle Grinders in stock again.

[Estes]

still trying to find sweet spots here...

[dangayle]

I've been using my Angle Grinder as a bit of a drone machine, and the unpredictable nature of the different slider combinations makes this thing such a blast to play. The way it feedbacks and stutters and glitches at different settings is just so much fun. Not for the faint of heart.

I'm definitely having more fun with it as an oscillator than as a filter or waveshaper or quadrature LFO, but it seems like everyone has their favorite uses for it.

[dvdmllr]

Just wanted to say there -is- a new batch in the works (along with the 100 Grit and Interstellar Radio). I'm optimistically shooting for late November or early December to have Angle Grinders in stock again.

Any update on the next batch of Angle Grinders? What date were you pessimistically shooting for?

[Estes]

I've been using my Angle Grinder as a bit of a drone machine, and the unpredictable nature of the different slider combinations makes this thing such a blast to play. The way it feedbacks and stutters and glitches at different settings is just so much fun. Not for the faint of heart.

I'm definitely having more fun with it as an oscillator than as a filter or waveshaper or quadrature LFO, but it seems like everyone has their favorite uses for it.

I just found out that he can handle multiples saws harmonies very well. First time I actually used it like a filter/waveshaper.

[nodog]

Just wanted to say there -is- a new batch in the works (along with the 100 Grit and Interstellar Radio). I'm optimistically shooting for late November or early December to have Angle Grinders in stock again.

Any update on the next batch of Angle Grinders? What date were you pessimistically shooting for?

Waiting for over half a year trying to get this now. I know Schlappi can take it's time as much as it needs and doesn't owe me anything but if possible, an update would indeed be very welcome. Cheers!

[ablearcher]

Hi all! I'm planning on placing the PCBA orders for the next batch this week, I'll try to remember to update when I get a firm date, mid May is a reasonable expectation.

Sorry for the long wait, I've been getting a lot of messages about these and really appreciate the interest. I had a couple of small tweaks to make but then got lost in the weeds (as well as being busy with R&D on new stuff and production of the other modules), but I finally just tested a revision I am happy with (again)! Thanks again for being into it!

[studio460]

Hi all! I'm planning on placing the PCBA orders for the next batch this week, I'll try to remember to update when I get a firm date, mid May is a reasonable expectation . . .

That's awesome, man! Thanks for giving us the update! Your modules are all EXCELLENT!

[nodog]

Hi all! I'm planning on placing the PCBA orders for the next batch this week, I'll try to remember to update when I get a firm date, mid May is a reasonable expectation.

Sorry for the long wait, I've been getting a lot of messages about these and really appreciate the interest. I had a couple of small tweaks to make but then got lost in the weeds (as well as being busy with R&D on new stuff and production of the other modules), but I finally just tested a revision I am happy with (again)! Thanks again for being into it!

Thank you very much. Best of luck with all your endeavours!

[MARK27]

Will the new Angle Grinders with these “small tweaks” be functionally or audibly different than the initial batch of Angle Grinders?

[ablearcher]

Will the new Angle Grinders with these “small tweaks” be functionally or audibly different than the initial batch of Angle Grinders?

not really! I spent a lot of time trying to make them easier to manufacture without losing the very finely tuned and specific magic that is the Angle Grinder and ended it up not being able to change much.

things you might notice:
slightly different temperature compensation scheme (attempting to make the black blob unneccessary)
dropping expo vs linear fm header for fm1 (linear only and no longer inverted, does anyone ever use jumper modes?)
Low frequency mode lowered slightly (larger capacitor package allows for a larger value of C0G capacitor)

[scragz]

I do wish the grind CV was +/-5v instead of 0-5v but that's more of a me problem... My whole rack is standardized +/-5v so I don't have to remember shit.