SergeModular

Thanks for all the replies. Would the following be true...

1 - Disconnect the hot lead from the 1/8 or 1/4 and connect to the newly installed banana jack.
2 - Remove the ground wire as needed.
3 - Connect a ground wire from the power supply of unit (A) to the ground of Serge power supply (black jack on power box)
4 - Remember that any normalled connections on unit (A) may not work correctly with this update.

yes, that sounds about right. the doepfer and asys stuff have board mounted jack assemblies, so you just take out the retainer nuts and the assembly falls away. there should be a single ground that runs to the board and is distributed to the jacks via the pcb and therefore the sleeve connection on the jacks. each jack, then, should have a single wire from the tip assembly to the module pcb. pop in your new bananas (keeping the serge coloring scheme, of course) and solder each wire to the new jack; as you say, w/ normalled connections you would have to drill a new hole and connect a new jack and switch.

as for grounding, i have a somewhat cludgey system. the ps for my non-serge stuff is an old +-15V unit from blacet. in fact, it was the first ps he sold back when he started up business again w/ the new dark stars years ago. as i added modules, i built a little distribution board for future modules, using a couple 7812 regulators to provide for the 12V configurations. its not pretty, but it works. all grounds from the modules and the ground of the PS meet at a "star ground" type post, which is attached to the serge PS as you describe. i've had this setup for years and it works perfectly. the only prob is that the blacet PS is only an amp or so and the modules can easily overpower it, so a couple are not connnected all the time.

As an fyi, making smaller holes bigger is pretty easy with a good steel bore-reamer hand held. It is a V shaped tool that you insert and turn with your hand and it shaves off layers of metal, like an apple peeler. You need to be VERY careful that you don't make the holes TOO BIG, bit if you are careful it is an easy way to enlarge the holes without taking everything apart. Laos need to be careful of the metal shavings that fall off so as not to short anything out!

i simply use a hand drill and ream them out. gently. and vacumm afterwards!

good luck!

-- 

blake wilson

"There has got to be a God. The world could not have become so f***ed-up by chance alone."
--Edward Abbey