Johnnys Junkyard Gem

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JSett
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Johnnys Junkyard Gem

Post by JSett » Thu Jun 01, 2023 12:28 pm

I posted about this when it first landed during lockdown. After languishing in the garage for over 2 years I decided it was high time I fixed this Gem Mini Deluxe I bought so I can play it. This is how it looked when I went to get it from the other side of the country (not far in the UK):

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And fresh out the garage...

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When I picked it up only half the keys played and a bunch of other obvious things. I took the time to clean and service all the trigger rails and stuff and ended up with a 99% functional vintage analog organ for £40. The only thing causing issues was the E tone card. It rarely passed a note, and when it did it was very distorted and missing one of the octaves.

It's quite a complicated beast...

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...but the tone cards themselves break them down quite nicely into bite-size chunks:

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I can't find a schematic anywhere for it so just have had to go by educated trial and error, along with looking how Vox Continentals were made (same factory but not the same internals annoyingly). I accertained that is was either the tin can transistor up top or one of the 4 Silicone transistors. Through trial an error I established it's one of the MTJ00109 type. Online organ guides have the replacement for this as 2N5449 (NPN) which I actually had 3 of already. Those went in and the problem persisted, but got slightly better.

Not having any more to hand I stole one from the adjacent cards and that fixed part, but not all of it :fp:

So, currently, the E card has it's 3 originals put back in it, plus the one from the F card...and now it works great. But not the F :fp: I managed to rummage around and the only other NPN I had was this big ol' 40w thing that I wedged into it for the time being. It works, but it's not quite right. You can see it on the right hand side with it's little heatsink thing poking out like a plumbers asscrack :D

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Further reading showed that BC549 transistors are a suitable fit, so I ordered 100 for £5 delivered. Lets see if those get me any closer!

Once that's fixed and I'm happy with that I'll turn my attention to giving it a proper recap, and take a look at the vibrato circuit as it has an underlying noise in it that's unaffected by volume (likely some cap noise).

Fun times.
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Re: Johnnys Junkyard Gem

Post by OffYourFace » Thu Jun 08, 2023 11:16 pm

this is a fun project. We don't see many Gem units in the States.

I've restored a lot of old italian made string machines (pretty similar in design to these old transistor organs) including all of Neil Young's Univox Stringmans. They can be a real pain but it's worth it 8)

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JSett
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Re: Johnnys Junkyard Gem

Post by JSett » Thu Jun 08, 2023 11:56 pm

OffYourFace wrote:
Thu Jun 08, 2023 11:16 pm
this is a fun project. We don't see many Gem units in the States.

I've restored a lot of old italian made string machines (pretty similar in design to these old transistor organs) including all of Neil Young's Univox Stringmans. They can be a real pain but it's worth it 8)
Yeah, I don't think many made it out of Europe...as they were definitely the 'poor man's Vox' really. The highest octave has no harmonics so sounds kinda weedy compared to anywhere else on the organ but I can live with that. The rest of the sounds are great if you dig that 60s/70s transistor charm.

I don't really have anywhere to put it once it's done either so I'm really just reviving this for the sake of keeping it alive and something to do. It'll probably just go back into storage once it's done. Or I'll give it away.
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JSett
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Re: Johnnys Junkyard Gem

Post by JSett » Sun Jun 11, 2023 3:14 am

Well, that's that obstacle overcome. Swapped a couple of transistors and, well, then tried a couple more...finally landed on whatever magic combination was needed and it began to work correctly. Woohoo!

Next up will be a cap job. There's 3 big filter caps and about another 11 or 12 smaller electrolytics that won't take long to do. For now though, I'm fine with this.
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Re: Johnnys Junkyard Gem

Post by sal paradise » Sun Jun 11, 2023 6:32 am

Sounds/looks awesome!
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Re: Johnnys Junkyard Gem

Post by OffYourFace » Sun Jun 11, 2023 12:35 pm

JSett wrote:
Sun Jun 11, 2023 3:14 am
Well, that's that obstacle overcome. Swapped a couple of transistors and, well, then tried a couple more...finally landed on whatever magic combination was needed and it began to work correctly. Woohoo!

Next up will be a cap job. There's 3 big filter caps and about another 11 or 12 smaller electrolytics that won't take long to do. For now though, I'm fine with this.
congrats! figuring out transistor equivalents can be a pain in the ass.

I don't know what it's like in the UK but I still have trouble finding certain capacitor values, especially in axial.

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Re: Johnnys Junkyard Gem

Post by JSett » Sun Jun 11, 2023 12:40 pm

OffYourFace wrote:
Sun Jun 11, 2023 12:35 pm
congrats! figuring out transistor equivalents can be a pain in the ass.

I don't know what it's like in the UK but I still have trouble finding certain capacitor values, especially in axial.
Yeah, I've often struggled with finding the right transistors on older stuff. Took about 3 or 4 attempts with this one.

Axial caps are the same here, some just don't seem to exist anymore. It's fine, but radials often look weird when you have to resort to them.
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Re: Johnnys Junkyard Gem

Post by Perlynator » Mon Dec 11, 2023 12:08 am

Sounds awesome!

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