Nordland Electronics MT-11 Mosland Overdrive

Nordland Electronics MT-11 Mosland Overdrive 

 

As part of my development of the ODR-C, I of course also took a closer look at other MT-11 overdrives. Another highly valued “Green” Nashville candidate quickly came into my focus: the Mostortion MT-10. The name sounds like distortion... but in principle it is a classic overdrive circuit.

 

I noticed that the price of these devices has risen dramatically in recent years. No wonder, because the manufacturer hasn't built the MT-10 for many years. Demand regulates the price! A few years ago I bought an MT-10 for just under EUR 400 and tested it extensively. The basic sound is excellent and very nice for low-gain, but also high-gain settings.

As always, I quickly noticed a few points that I could improve! First of all, it is very dangerous to operate the original MT-10 with more than 15 volts DC. The built-in Mos-OpAmp (chip) can only handle 15 V DC nominally. This means that if an 18 volt DC power supply is used, the chip will break! That wouldn't be so tragic if you could still buy and install this chip today! But this chip hasn't been manufactured for many years and is of course essential for the sound.

About two years ago I was lucky enough to get almost 500 chips. This means I am now in the fortunate position of building several hundred worthy successors to the “MT-11”. So if you've always wanted an MT-10, I now have the improved version at a much more affordable price!

 

What I have improved:

• Voltage limiter for the expensive chip! When connected to an 18 volt DC power supply, the voltage is limited to approx. 14 volts DC.
• Conversion to True Bypass
• Best components:
  • 1% metal film resistors
  • 5% film capacitors (Wima, Epcos, Kemet) in the signal path
  • solid 6.3mm gold plated cliff jacks (UK)
  • Gold-plated PCB plugs/sockets
  • High quality potentiometers
  • Special foot switch with an extra light pressure point
• Tone control with center detent
• Stable and closed aluminum housing from Hammond Mfg./UK (perfect shielding against hum and EMC)
• Solid design such as screwed boards with double gold-plated contacts between the main and controller boards
• 9 to 18 volt operation. When operated with voltages between 9 V and 18 V (14 V), other tones are possible. Difficult to explain: just try it! The feeling of the game changes.

 

What was added:

Outside:

• O.D.C. Overdrive De-Compress:
  A special mini knob for the overdrive level. It's hard to describe, as this effect is best felt when playing! Overall, I can say that this makes it sound a bit more open and less compressed. This also makes it a little louder and the proportion of mid-range frequencies increases. At the same time, the harmonic harmonics decrease and the overall sound becomes somewhat rougher. This depends on the position of the drive control - so it hardly has any effect when the drive knob is at the left position. As always, the same applies here: only small rotations on the O.D.C. Adjust the knobs and listen to what happens!

Inside:

• Wheel for the LED brightness: bright / dimmed (Standard: middle position)