[stevdnls]

Hi--

One of the members here suggested that I post. I run Small Bear Electronics, which is an on-line "general store" for people who build their own stompboxes. I offer very competitive prices for some things, like Hammond boxes and PC board hardware, that are also used in building headphone amps. Please do pay a visit:

Http://home.netcom.com/~smallbearelec

Thanks for your attention!

Regards

Steve Daniels

 

[erix]

Hello all,

I've bought many parts from Steve and found him to be overwhelmingly cordial, prompt, and knowledgable.

He'll stock only what people seem to need and he's always been more than willing to add items at customer request. He buys bulk from most of the same suppliers we buy small orders from.

He is in NYC and he priority mails most every order same day which seems to be cheaper than UPS that most suppliers use, in my experience anyway.

I think if fellow headwizers had suggestions for him, a 'standard' set of parts i.e. 1% resistors, poly caps, B-B IC's, Pac-Tec cases, etc.., he would be more than happy to be a one-stop source for us.

What are stompboxes? Otherwise known as effects, these are little circuits housed in robust enclosures designed to color, distort, mutate, and otherwise mangle the sounds of electric guitars and other instruments. Pretty much the opposite of what happens here but similar here in that most are battery operated and small in size.

Coming Monday, pics of my Cmoy/Hansen housed in a metal stompbox enclosure designed to resemble a vintage stompbox and painted a stunning shade of lilac!

Cheers!
erix

 

[Apheared]

Steve,

Truly, that is probably the only way to get HeadFi/HeadWizer money... I mean if you only buy from places we all already buy from directly for not much difference in price, and you don't stock other audiophile-specific components like an Antique or Percy or Parts Connection....

... your best bet would be go grab 1,000 of BB/TI OPA-2134PAs so you could sell them lower than DigiKey. Then also when sketchy DigiKey says out-of-stock again, you can shout out RIGHT HERE! (that IC is in multiple projects on HeadWize)

The crappy part of stocking "audiophile" parts is the volume you have to buy to make any profit over the other guys already doing it... How many thousands of dollars invested would it take to get dual pole 48 position rotarys for attenuators, that you could sell them under $20 each? And then how many years to sell them? Ugh. (personally don't want to know!)

But if you want tips on what to stock, you'll get em.

 

[Tomo]

Hello,

I think more active soliciting is good idea. Personally, I spend more time looking for things than making or thinking about a design.

Provided that there will be no email soliciting, I don't mind it. (Of course, they must be selling good parts.)

Tomo

 

[stevdnls]

Hi--

Thanks for writing!

When I was getting Small Bear off the ground, I would "farm" a lot of addresses from bulletin boards like this one and send a message introducing myself and my services. Since I was polite and had clearly not mailed blindly, I got the mixture of responses you might expect: Most ignored me, some thanked me for offering something useful, and I got flamed a few times. Eventually I started keeping (very carefully!) a "Don't Mail" list. By now, word-of-mouth has kicked in, and my rep for good service and brand-name parts at reasonable prices has gotten around. I no longer need to market as much, nor do I really have time for it; I'm up to my ears either doing customer service and filling orders, or designing.

If you have a question about effects design or construction, or where to find what, I hang out when I can at Aron Nelson's forum (www.ampage.org and follow the link). I wish you good listening, and let me know if I can help.

Regards

SD