FIXING THE 70's DIY MAGAZINE SYNTH THAT BROKE THE RULES - ELEKTOR FORMANT

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

NAME A DIY SYNTH

[@T.Ross.]

Elfor 🤓

[@mrwidget42]

Magnuminous

[@Tzulander]

The Thrillmarillion.

[@Nopp3]

Crowminius. Got the bare board working, still working on a case.

[@gerardstrik2555]

The voltage voyager.

[@keschgelb]

I remember when i first saw and heard a Formant at a concert of a local rockband in the late 70ies. Nobody owned a synth back then.... It just blew me away. Now i am 63 and i still remember that moment. What an impression this thing left on me....

[@111elf1]

i remember a friend of mine owning one back then, and he got a call from phil collins, because he owned the other one and he needed a second one for hos europe tour 😅

[@amandahugankiss4110]

i had a buddy growing up. he owned the only other phil collins at the time. he was always getting calls when the original was acting up. wild, man.

[@dieSpinnt]

Besides the other trolls nonsense, I have built mine around 1983. German Elektor Abonnement. That's what we do, or?:) Oh "trolls"? These clowns do not know that Phil Collins is a drummer. And in now way some kind of roady, that organizes equipment for his keyboarder.

[@johnbehan1526]

Yeah that drives me crazy. I own the only other hand-wired analog telephone left in the UK and a malfunctioning Phil Collins calls me on it sometimes. Usually I can't tell what he's saying because of all the gated reverb, but you can tell it's him. I have to WhatsApp Mike Rutherford and tell him the Phil Collins is broken again, and I guess they switch over the spare. Sadly it looks like they're down to the last working Phil Collins now. When you look at how poorly built they are, we're lucky there's any left around at all. I'm glad that someone's been maintaining the last working Phil Collins and using it make music. It would be said if Phil Collins was just left to rust in the corner of some museum and no one ever took it out and played with it.

[@amandahugankiss4110]

@@johnbehan1526 that sounds so typical. we never preserve our real history. we just let our phil collins' rot. really explains the youth of today. thank you for sharing!

[@neiel1]

Sam, Just wanted to thank you. You bring joy to the Internet. I know I am not alone in feeling this way. Thank you for your indomitable spirit and exuberance in creating electronic splendor!

[@richardhorry]

I don’t think you know just how clever you actually are, Sir. Which is often the case. As an ‘old dog’ technical engineer myself, you give me hope for the future of ‘us’ and young people.👍🙂

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

I'm too dumb to know when not to try something that's all I know :Dhaha

[@FirstLast-jl6fr]

I say the same too. 61yr engineer now retired, grew up with Elektor and all those old school electronics mags. Could listen to this all day taking me back to the 70's & 80's. Ty for rescuing all those bits and making them live again; the world before computers made things boring LOL. Well done :o)

[@tiennou07]

OMG. My dad built that one, and I still have it. Not sure it runs still, but it was great learning about formant synthesis.

[@sodothehivesonhisleg]

Fix it!

[@botanicus9371]

Hello, Thank you for your video which encourages me to restore my “Formant” after almost 50 years ! It's a shame that I don't understand much English and you speak very quickly ! I'm French and I translated this answer using Google.... Hello, from France!

[@ianedmonds9191]

Or sell it me.

[@darrenmurphy6251]

love that you never shy away from a huge challenge, i havent had that drive since when i was a teen!

[@electronicgarden3259]

Love to see someone giving the Formant some appreciation. Surprisingly little Formant on the web. Now I really need to go ahead and restore my own.

[@scarletskunkjob9842]

What a luscious sound. Sounds so thick.

[@patrickbodine1300]

You, sir, have the patience of a Saint! Building all of that and successfully connecting all of that stuff and actually making it work, is magic. KUDOS!

[@patrickbodine1300]

p.s. LOVE your enthusiasm!!!

[@db9827]

Well done Sam, another incredible piece of work. You're a hero. Thank you for sharing it with us. Your fight with the keyboard contacts reminded me, some 50 years ago I glued 49 of them onto part of a salvaged wooden piano keyboard for my first diy synth. Memories of tweaking the gold plated wires to get the action right.....

[@macronencer]

What a beautifully awesome analogue tone this has! Especially the dual/stereo version. This channel is the pinnacle of punk nerdery :)

[@stoatystoat174]

Worth headphones 🎧or nice speakers to hear the full chonk. The separate filters for each voice makes it sound so much bigger, like fancy complex chorus. The LFOs movement helps keep the chonk light on its chonky feet too

[@jimboburgess42069]

beauty on the wax lacing, matches the aesthetic for this synth very well.

[@ares395]

That sounds freaking incredible

[@user-oh4yj5xk2h]

The wax lacing!! Oh man! The loomage! Favorite part for me 🎉

[@unclemick-synths]

5:06 gotta love aluminium angle ❤ sooo useful for studio projects 👍

[@Tutorius]

Cool... i read the Elektor-Magazines dealing with the Formant from the beginning. My father bought Elektor-magazines from time to time, and one of the magazines showed the thing about the Formant. I could see all the magazines in our town-bibliothek, and learned by reading what synthesizers are about... I could not afford one, i was 14 years of age in 1977, and a synth-kit was about 1700 Deutschmarks, so forget it, i had 100 or 200... I was able to play a Formant somewhen in the beginning 80s, it was in Dortmund on the Hobbytronic, Elektor had a booth there, and i was able to patch the synth and create nice and ugly tones, just learning how to do this by reading the build instructions :) Was mach fun, but i did never buy a Formant. Today, at the age of 60, i have had some synths, best known is the waldorf microwave, and all are dead. I will by a Behringer model-D soon, to get a bit into the sound a formant could offer ...

[@TheSynthnut]

Top stuff Sam! Hats off to yotfor building the proper backplane for this, it's really an integral part of the Formant as an instrument. Its sure got the chonk in great chunks!

[@Nobe_Oddy]

I am IN LOVE!!!!!! There is just SO MUCH that is TOP NOTCH about this beauty!!! When you add the rest of the OSC's I hope you have another one of those resonant filters to add to it.. I think THAT is what is giving it such a phat crunchy sound! And when you put it in stereo I started to DROOL!!! Maybe that's what you should name it. Drool :) LOL !!

[@caroo9807]

This synth sounds super sick

[@cal-scot]

Cant beat your workflow man. Epitome of synthesizer scrapheap challenge. Shouldnt work? Will make it work. Pure wizard

[@PhilWaud]

Jeesh thats a beast of a machine. I was just starting to nod off (sorry), then you started using it! Wowza, amazing! Brings me right back to the seventies/eighties when I used to get Elektor and send off to Maplin for a list of parts (took ten days usually), then copper etched boards and soldered away to my hearts content! Your enthusiasm, relentless optomism and skill is an example to us all! Thank you thank you thank you!

[@jaigyn]

I have no idea about Synths, and haven't a musical bone in my body but Im absolutely fascinated by this and loved your video. Subscriber for life.

[@stephenparry6811]

Those oscillators & filter had a throbbing gristle vibe to them... excellent stuff

[@Maxxarcade]

It was really satisfying watching that pile of parts turn into a nice synth, and it sounds great too!

[@pcprobot]

Thats cool that you are bringing all this stuff back to life.

[@strangeluck]

I love this synth just for the typeface that was used. 😍

[@codelicious6590]

Oh man that looks and sounds SO frickin FUN!!!

[@altberg__]

"the wobbles, the wiggles, the wooblies" LMNC - 2024

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

haha!

[@fus132]

_All perfectly technical terms_

[@davidpiper3652]

It sounds AWESOME through headphones.

[@burmesecolourneedles4680]

What an odyssey - and what a joyous result! Kudos and congrats!

[@ElliotFlowers]

I have to comment here that this is (for someone who has been into sysnths since the late eighties) absolutely mindblowing. To think this stuff came from a magazine, and my god, the depth to the sounds once you hardwired the modules in. Amazing! Thankyou!

[@ElectronicazMusic]

Bloody amazing. You're a legend.

[@JohnOShaughnessy]

great fat sounds. That thing sounds huge! Great vid!

[@kaitlyn__L]

Love the off-white/pale-grey knobs, my Super 6 has those too 👍

[@drumslapper]

Awesome. Built a PAIA system in the late 60's, landfill now😢 Moved on to an Apple II system, still somewhere, must dig it out. Feel your pain on the wonky kybd switches, same issue on my Taurus peddles, swapped those for relays,all good now. Enjoy your content.

[@dave_s_vids]

That moment at 27:18 when you can see the song idea forming in your head is awesome :D It sounds so good!

[@ChrisHuelsbeckOfficial]

That is freakin awesome! Didn't expect much when you started this project, but I have to hand it to the designers (and your mad restoration skills), this thing rocks! :)

[@MaxWattage]

I applaud the incredible amount of effort you put into this project. Truly a labour of love. Well done 👍 Sounds amazing too! God bless Elektor Magazine. 💜 Oh, how I miss doing hobby electronics in the 70's & 80s, when the logic signal switching speeds were slow, the components were still big enough to see with the naked eye, and before all circuits included a computer. 😆

[@iainmcaleese5468]

Wood, saws and glue. The most mental synth video ❤

[@Nukle0n]

that LFO wobble is just sublime

[@popuptoaster]

Great stuff, I have no idea about synths but i love seeing all your projects on the go. We visited the museum last month and saw you rushing around fixing stuff, had a blast in there, bought the T shirt and we will be back in the future. Carry on the wobbly wibbly good work young man. ;)

[@nicholasgoldstienbeckburg9255]

you brought me into getting a synth and im super love it, your vids are amazing, ty so much for all you do!

[@gerardstrik2555]

Very nice Sam, I could have easily watched for another half hour.

[@bartolomeothesatyr]

Ooh, I like the sounds of this synth very much indeed!

[@pathwaysmadepublic]

I'm always amazed how much work goes into every video. Very cool synth!

[@MarkRoss-v4y]

Great video Sam. I'm a very happy Formant owner, and doubt I'll ever let it go. Love the channel and your approach. ❣

[@skyrocketautomotive]

That's one of the best sounding synths I've ever heard (in my humble opinion). Christ I want one

[@MarkRose1337]

That is a beautiful sounding synth! Might be my favourite that you've shown

[@colinstu]

This thing is crazy! Love it, can't wait to see some more vids. I wanna see Alex Ball do a vid on this company/synth now and mess w/it!

[@dcallan812]

The colour of t he case blends well with the Joan's organ (brown wood☺) Interesting video 2x👍👍

[@jts-jc8jk]

So incredible watching this come together! And what an amazing, phat sound!! i love a semi-modular; best of both worlds!!!

[@EdEditz]

That is one sweet sounding modular!

[@marting4042]

I love the awesome job you did on the knobs.

[@mattcharles1505]

Superb job. Looks and sounds beautiful. Really great video. Wax lacing reminds me of when I used to wire up telephone exchanges 😅

[@ssmith2019]

Nicely done sir, Good on Ya ! 😁

[@dimensionalineage]

Outstanding, you fine bloke. Super well done.

[@mynewcolour]

I’ve never seen wax laced cables before but that is neat. And less plastic products. Cheers for the infoze.

[@jts-jc8jk]

Actually, now that I've thought about it: It would have been cool to add another keyboard and treat each voice like a division of an organ. The left side with three oscillators could have been like the Great, or main division and the right side with only one oscillator could've been like the Swell. That way, you could play two different musical lines coming through with different timbres from each "division". But it sounds awesome the way it is now, kind of like a CS80! I use Surge XT, a plugin that works exactly this way with Scene A and B.

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

you can have polyphonic synths but sometimes monophonic is superior. This is a mono synth. It was designed as one and it has certain advantages. No point making a Frankenstein. That's what you build new synths for

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

There is a switch at the back however so using 2 keyboards they control each side seperately I guess that's what you wanted

[@bitegoatie]

I'm glad you got around to building this as it was intended - and that it turns out to sound pretty good indeed. Tripling the voices will be delightfully monstrous, if all goes well.

[@thezenwizard]

I built and played both the Maplin 3800 and Transcendent 2000 synths way back in the 70s. The 3800 was a beast of a multiple circuit board design, while the 2000 was a single motherboard job. Both were amazing, although they had a tendency to drift out of tune. Had the same problem as you - had to leave the keyboard unscrewed, because a bit of over enthusiastic playing could leave one of the contacts 'stuck' and I had to get back inside to free it up. My university room was a chaotic jumble of parts, boards, integrated circuits and bits and pieces. My playing? I was useless. But the sounds were great!

[@projectartichoke]

That thing really does have some great sounds, such a cool video!

[@richardlincoln886]

Around 5:40 using the saw handle as a square - not seen that before, very good.

[@SuperGinkgo]

Sounds PHAT as... to me, great job Sam! I think you were channeling Keith Emerson at some points. 🎶💯😜

[@datashat]

Goddamn that's nice. The EUROSTILE extended typeface really seals the deal. Excellent werk.

[@marylewis3311]

Curlywurly brown wood stain. Niiiiiiccccceeeeee.

[@JonoEllis]

Thank you for this Sam - it's a brilliant video and the sounds this synth (now) makes are gorgeous. I'm technical enough to have soldered an Atari Punk Console synth kit and musical enough to play some tunes on a guitar and I have to say that this level of detail is fascinating to watch. :)

[@shacal]

Love the sound... made me search my old records.

[@OldSkoolF]

Have all your albums in my Apple playlist... AWESOME!!!!

[@T.J.Kennedy]

Nice one with the wax lacing my dude, a brilliant look for this machine. I love that you take the time for that kind of stuff.

[@Colin_Ames]

Excellent work Sam. That synth sounds great. I was a subscriber to Elektor when this was featured, and I thought about building it, but then realised that I would never have had the skill to play it.

[@schance1666]

A lot of character to that synth. Amazing how good you are at this stuff... I'm still struggling after many years! Maybe do a video about how you learned so much? Would be killer if you could get a more direct recording of your gear at some point. Camera mics suck no matter what. Great vid man, thanks!

[@expandingknowledge8269]

Sam, you are a bloody electronic Genius! That is one incredible synth for sure, Much Respect to you my friend!

[@padders1068]

Great work Sam, that is already sounding awesome even with a few non working bits! Thanks for sharing 🙂😎🤓❤

[@jeremyacton4569]

Definitely a fair bit of chonk!! I appreciate the scientific terms. 😅 Excellent work, Sam!!

[@KarlSheen]

For DIY junk it's damn good....when you turned the bass up I immediately went ...Ooooh.....when you went stereo I almost melted....now currently studying the files, doubt I'll be able to build it but I can dream

[@fabiovsroque]

Nice work, lovely sounds!

[@JohnCripps]

wow.... I want to make one now.... that is an awesome sound!!!!

[@KiR_3d]

8:25 - "they have power on different pins"... me: what? :D ))) it's ingenious! :)) If something will fail, the company's manager will tell you: please, check that wiring on every module is proper. Sam, maybe it could be better to connect the other parts of the connectors (female?) first and drilling them to the rails after that? This is a way to minimize the tension. Also you could use some rubber spacers behind bolts when connecting them to the rails. Thus it can eliminate the problem with different lengths. Other than that you're doing a great work!

[@jscan]

Freakin' brilliant Sam! One of the more rewarding videos involving modular that I have ever seen! I can't even imagine how long this took - you make it look so easy..

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

One very boring week! Bloody felt like it never ended 😂haha

[@Usul]

Incredible build. When Sam drops a project like this, you know it is going to be amazing before it even starts. Zero disappointment here!

[@KWHCoaster]

Man, 26:00 on made me envious of what you have there. Sounds amazing!!

[@zeitgeist909]

Elektor is gonna have some new sales!! Hope he can keep up!!!

[@Jon78-ni5rcA]

Thanks

[@mick3950]

Fantastic sounding synth ,well done for getting it to work,pity no one does a kit of this ,i had a Kimber Allen keyboard which was just as bad as those springy things are awful ,

[@dansonthetube]

Outstanding patience and ability to fix all! #TopJob #Geezer 😁 xo 🥳

[@richandglorious]

Sounds absolutely amazing!

[@keromblum]

Sounds really good~!!! What an effort to bring this to life. The stereo (or dual mono) sound is absolutely huge and wonderful! What a surprise, shame about the dodgy keyboard.

[@petdoe8938]

Somewhere i have a box of electronic bits for this and a few others,must find them someone would like them i am sure,nice vid thank you

[@SpeccyMan]

Ear candy. Pure and simple. Extraordinary.

[@patternlesstide]

This video is sooo coool! got super interested in this kind of stuff but man, your work is awesome!! keep it up mate!!

[@Stewart_Bell]

Talented master artisan tinkerer you are.. Awesome.. 🤙

[@asn413]

that IS an incredible sound!

[@curtishoffmann6956]

That IS a really sweet synth. Really wish we got those magazines in the U.S. when I was going to electronics tech school...

[@toddpeterson360]

You are a SYNTH GENIUS!

[@23Gears]

Awesome Sam. Love your exploratitive making videosnlile this.

[@ghostexits]

Love the case building segments. Synth-DIY needs more guidance in this area. If you're taking requests, would love some aluminum panel brake-bending and metal enclosure making footage.

[@jakehendriksen2841]

You really give me a lot of inspiration to try new things. I think you're quite clever, but when you're fiddling about, I can see, "oh, there's a logic and a (semi-)consistency to these things. I could do that if I took a little bit of time to figure it out." Your DIY ethic has already translated into some successful minor projects around the house, as I think about it.

[@davidjordan2880]

That is a brilliant sounding synth.