Sometimes newer devices get overlooked for purposes of circuit bending. Two main reasons are price and abundant use of SMT components almost too small to work on. The Kaosillator is one such device. However once the novelty of the factory sounds wears off it is necessary to explore other possibilities and Kaosillator is no exception.
The first modification is an addition of the LTC precision module in order to control the pitch. Wiring is very simple with only Ground, Positive, and the Output connection. Nothing needs to be cut or removed. The Output from the LTC module can be patched directly to the Crystal leg that controls the Kaossilator CPU.
Here is a closeup of the crystal connection. It is second of the two non SMT solder spots right next to the IC. It could help to undo the circuit board and take a look at where the crystal is exactly, however, should be simple to tell from this image.
The power connections are pretty easy, Ground goes strait to the spring coil on the left. The positive wire is slightly more difficult. After probing around I found a spot that can be leeched from without the worry of draining of batteries when not in use. An empty pad in the capacitor block is just what we need.
The modification works well at pitching down the Kaossilator and stretching out all sounds. The pitch up is rather limited before the CPU crashes. To prevent the crashing during the LTC modification it helps to add a 5-10K resistor between the board and the potentiometer. This ensures that the resistance never drops below a certain level when the knob is dialed all the way down. So the operating frequency will not raise above the threshold crashing level.
The only remaining problem is embedding a 250K potentiometer inside of the Kaossilator. The potentioner would however fit perfectly if we remove the unused side of the output RCA circuit board by carefuly cutting it with a dremel, however I don’t advice that just yet. If you are interested in trying out this modification it would probably be easiest to use the Gameboy Pitch control kit or the LTC Modules from the GetLoFi.com/shop. This mod is not the only thing that can be circuit bent in the Kaossilator. It turns out that there is a Waveform ROM IC on the underside of the circuit board yielding interesting results. To get at it requires some very precise soldering skills. More on that very soon. Enjoy.
MORE DETAILED CLOSEUP IMAGE:
Tags: Circuit Bent, Clock Modification, LTC, Pitch Bend
can not wait to try this . . . . thanks a million for this one.
I wonder if one could use the LTC precision module on the Korg mini-KP?
yikes look at the 80 gazillion pinned chip!!!
this is super cool. is there ANY way to get the pot and the ltc to be inside of it? i dont like to tape stuff to my gear
[...] Kaossilator Pitch Mod 2010 January 15 by salamanderanagram The good folks over at GetLoFi have added a pitch mod to a kaossilator, complete with pictures and tutorial. [...]
[...] A well placed LTC1799 certainly seems able to spice up the stock sounds on this one. Check out the full how-to for more on circuit bending the Kaossilator. [...]
I suppose that the whole KP line is atleast pitch bendable.
@roflbbq – please re-read the last paragraph of the article, it mentions the possibility of mounting everything completely inside of the Kaossilator.
wondering if its possible to implement the inputs on the circuit board instead of cutting them off.. in this article you say:
“The potentioner would however fit perfectly if we remove the unused side of the output RCA circuit board by carefuly cutting it with a dremel, however I don’t advice that just yet.”
but in this site the picture says that they are inputs RCA. wondering if i just throw some jacks in there then be able to run stereo in?
any help or tips would be amazing
thanks
By the way, cutting of the empty jack circuit boards works fine. More info will be posted shortly.
Unfortunately there is no real way to run anything IN to the Kaossilator. The problem is that the CPU would not know what to do with the signal. You have to have the actual Kaoss Pad Rom loaded. Not impossible, but probably not practical either.
[...] Previously on GetLoFi we covered adding of the LTC Precision module to control the clock speed of the Kaossilator, thus pitching the device up and down. The only snag with the mod was not having the potentiometer mounter internally. Now that problem has been solved with a daring modification to the device. [...]
Very interesting mod.
Why don’t you advise to cut out the RCA inputs? Any chance you find a use for them?
The next great thing would be to be able to adjust the volume of each sound separately. Does it seem possible to you?
Cheers!
The RCA inputs have been cut out in the latest mod. You will find the Pingback link right above your comment.
Hallo circuitmaster !
I have the Kit to circiutbent the Kaossillator.
But there is a problem. I cannot figure out the exact connection of the resistors between the potentiometer and the LTC Module. The Picture you send me makes no sense, because they are not parallel. The 10 K would be useless if I connect it the way the pic shows it.
Can you please help me ?
Hey Kris,
No problem, I will try and explain further.
10K ( Brown, Black, Orange ) is the most important resistor. It helps to keep some devices from crashing when the Clock frequency is too high.
It simply goes from Middle pad on the LTC board to Middle Leg on the potentiometer, instead of the wire.
Take a look at this image http://www.getlofi.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/LTC_trim_resistor.jpg and everything should be cleared up.
Hi Circuitmaster !
Thank you very much for the detailed picture. I figured it out.
Now I have another question. Where do i have to connect the out of the LTC board. You wrote that is has to be the crystal leg of the Kaossillators main CPU. The Picture that shows it is a bit blurry. Do you have a sharper one ?
Hey Kris,
Just added a much better closeup image to the bottom of the article, have a look. Also shows where the 100K resistor goes ( in Parallel ) with the Potentiometer to give it better Low End range.
Hey CM and everyone,
If I want a master pot and a precision pot, what would you advise? Would a 50k pot mounted in series with the first one do the trick?
Cheers!
Yup, 50K should do it or maybe even a 20K or 5K, definitely in a series.
Hi everyone
A newb here.
if I want to mod my kaossilator as directed would I buy the ltc1799 kit in hte generic version or the gameboy one? and why?
I understand the difference is a 10k resistor that prevents the gameboy from crashing, but does this apply to the kaossilator as well?
thanks
You probably want the Gameboy, because that has the 10K SMT trim resistor which saves space and the 250K potentiometer. This makes it for a better usability range.
Wow, I was way off. I had to actually flip the board to look at the crystal casing and right there it reads “18.432z” which seems to mean that the crystal oscillates at 18.432 MHz or 18,432,000 Hz. Ahhhh