VCI-100 Rotary Mod
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  1. #1

    Default VCI-100 Rotary Mod

    Hey Guys,

    I finally got around to upgrading my VCI to rotary faders instead of sliders. I'm a house DJ and have played on rotary volume mixers for the past 12 years. My mixers have all been vestax... PMC-17 with rotary, PMC-26, PMC-25 with rotary, and now VCI-100R.

    The mod is simple. Purchase 10K audio (log) potentiometer, I used alps. You only need a mono pot as the VCI has no real stereo sound going through it. I pulled my knobs from the PMC-26 and milled the black cover plate on a cnc mill.

    These rotary faders are smooth.

  2. #2
    DJTT Dominator JesC's Avatar
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    very nice mod, would you show us a demo on youtube?

    do you mix house, I know that alot of dj from ny prefer that style
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  3. #3
    Tech Mentor Anthony More's Avatar
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    nicely done!
    I've tried to use a rotary knob for volume,but I couldn't get used to it,
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  4. #4
    DJTT Ninja Mod tekki's Avatar
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    Cool modding bro!

    Moar Rotaries!
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  5. #5

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    Hey finetuning vci looks awesome....i was thinking of doing the same mod myself on a vci 300 any chance you can give me the link to buy these pots cant find them anywhere ????

    Cheers

  6. #6
    Tech Guru charo's Avatar
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    nice mod! it's too bad that the knobs will still have a 0-127 midi range instead of having a +1 or -1 note like the jogwheels.
    We don't believe in the star system. We want the focus to be on the music. If we have to create an image, it must be an artificial image. That combination hides our physicality and also shows our view of the star system. It is not a compromise-daftpunk

  7. #7

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    that's pretty hot. great work.
    Numark NS7 | Asus U81A - C2D 2.1ghz 4gb 320gb | Serato Itch | Traktor Pro | Homework Help

  8. #8
    Tech Guru Fatlimey's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by finetuning View Post
    Purchase 10K audio (log) potentiometer, I used alps.
    Are you sure about the Log pots? The VCI doesn't do anything with audio loudness, it just converts the voltage across it into a value to send as MIDI. I would have thought the sliders were linear 10K.

    Still, great mod. I'm all for personalisation.

  9. #9

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    Quote Originally Posted by JesC View Post
    very nice mod, would you show us a demo on youtube?

    do you mix house, I know that alot of dj from ny prefer that style
    I may do detailed tutorial instead of a video in the next couple of weeks if this generates a lot of interest.

    As of now, I've got a lot of hands on testing to do. Desert Party coming up... its going to be sick.

    I mix house (tech, deep, funky, minimal) and downtempo. Most of my DJ friends have volume slider mixers but love to play on the rotaries.

  10. #10

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    Quote Originally Posted by Fatlimey View Post
    Are you sure about the Log pots? The VCI doesn't do anything with audio loudness, it just converts the voltage across it into a value to send as MIDI. I would have thought the sliders were linear 10K.

    Still, great mod. I'm all for personalisation.
    Good point. The engineering of the VCI is odd.

    I'll explain...

    Basically all the controls (Dials, faders, buttons) on the VCI are analog then they are decoded to digital for the USB output. Why didn't they use digital encoders since the VCI has no audio passing through it??? I suspect they designed it this way because the analog parts are cheaper and Vestax probably has a ton of the parts form the analog mixers. Plus the analog parts keep the same feel as the other mixers in their line.

    So they use a mono pot, but the wiring is unconventional. typically you attach two wires to a pot. The VCI uses three, thus using both sides of the log pot. Wire 1&2 is for standard log curve and wire 2&3 is for reverse log curve. They are superimposing two log curves to create a linear response and then doing the analog to digital conversion. I think this has more accuracy than linear pots. Correct me if I'm wrong.

    The end result is smooth transition of volume from zero degrees to 300 degrees rotation.

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