That sounds pretty cool Jay Daniels. The strings sound a lot better than people give them credit for. I couldn’t really make out the brass amidst all the guitars and drums though. Hey Mee3d any luck yet? If you can set up some clips I would really like to hear the Organ, Brass, and String section on their own.
Here’s a collection of sounds from the Opus-3, maybe not the most representative patches, but they show you how wild it can get when coupled with FX.
http://www.aliens-project.de/t_200205_moogopus.html
scroll down for mp3 selections
Thanks I’ve heard those before. They kind of give the general idea but I’m looking for more of a demo of each of the three sections trying to sound as much like the instruments they are named after as possible. I know that they don’t sound a lot like the real things but I just want to hear it. I can’t believe there is no one on the internet that has recorded there opus like that.
hey mee3d did you ever get that opus up and running?
No… she’s still in her case, along with my sickly memorymoog… sorry.
I’ll post as soon as I get her up and running (perhaps a little YouTube video?)..
Mal
Excellent! The more people that make YouTube videos of their Moogs, the more people understand about Moogs. : )
Absolutely; You Tube has become such a great resource for anyone wanting to get a true representation of all of these rarely played vintage synths (thanks in part to Museslave)
I’ve finally found a MiniMoog at a price I can afford and it should be shipping to my home this week.
I’m really looking forward to taking some videos of it in action and posting them.
I just wish I did the same for all the other analogs I’ve burned through on my way to the Mini (MG-1, Micro, Rogue, Mono/Poly, SH101, SH09, Odyssey, Avatar, MS-20, MultiMoog, Sonic Six, ect.).
Pretty much all of these synths have had at least one (and often many) qualities or characteristics that made them unique and worthwhile in their own right. But until you spend some time with each one it’s impossible to really know what those qualities are… but the videos are such a great way to exhibit this.
Thanks, Eric. : )
That’s fantastic news!! Yey! You’ll have to post all about it.
Yes, I feel the same way about several of those same synthesizers… but a couple of them I still have and plan to make videos of! Especially the MG-1, so everyone knows just how useful it can be!
That’s why I want to make them, and want others to make them! What an excellent tool to aid people in finding the sound and functionality they desire!
I wish I had video editing software, then I could make my videos somewhat more bearable as a single video. I really like Museslave’s approach to the making of his videos.
Thanks a lot, Spike!
Thanks for asking. I really think I got the deal of the year on my Mini. I’ve had it for about a week or so now and I’m really pleased. I bought it for $1200! Had I known what a great price I was going to get, I wouldn’t have had to sell both my MultiMoog and Sonic Six to finance this purchase. I would have had more than enough money from either sale. Oh well.
It’s an early model Mini, seriel number 1XXX; it was a one owner synth, and the guy took very good care of it. It’s about as nice as you could expect. The control consoles had that bubbling effect which happens on most all Minis. But I’ve already taken care of this and exposed the metal underneath the plastic film. It looks almost like new now, and the wooden cabinet is also in very nice shape.
The previous owner thought that there might have been significant problems with the oscilators, but after cleaning and applying polish to the buss bar and key contacts, the oscillators are now extremely stable and are triggering perfectly. So, there doesn’t seem to be any major problems and I think I really got a good deal on this Mini. I’ve just done a few repairs to it in the past week, and it’s already almost %100 functional!
There’s very little left to do now. But I think I’m going to do a few mods to it. I want to get switching pots for the oscillator tuning knobs, and let the switch function as sync on/off for Osc 2 and 3. I’m haviong some difficulty finding these 5k switching pots for this mod… but I’m gonna keep loooking rather than putting seperate switches on the control panel for sync. I don’t like the way normal switches look on other modded Mini’s I’ve seen. But switching pots will look the same as no switches at all, but will have the functionality I’m looking to add. Oscillator sync is an really great addition on a Mini.
I also want to take all of the signals (oscs, mixer, envs, etc) and send them to an outboard modular expander like the VX box for the Voyager. I just need to find a nice enclosure to house this project. I’d like to find one the same size as the CP-251, and then rack up both units. This will be the heart of a modular set-up I’m hoping to begin putting together. The Mini will be my controller as well as a source for oscillators, noise, LPF, etc…
I have the service manual and I believe I’ve found all of the spots to extricate signals from… most of them can be had from the edge connectors below each PCB board. I think this is going to be a very fun project, and an unobtrusive way to modify the Mini-- one that won’t require drilling holes in the cabinet or making any acsestetic changes to this classic synth.
If anyone has any ideas as far as this project is concerned, I’d love to hear. I know that some members of this board have mentioned similar mods to their Minis…
You lucky bastard 
I (and others I’m sure) only hope that someday I (we) can get a Minimoog for a price like that.
Those mods sound like a lot of fun. I’ve thought about modifying my Rogue like that, but then I think I should just buy a CP-251. (or perhaps I should just do both?) It’s funny, when I first got my Ring Mod, I didn’t know much about CVs and couldn’t care less about them. But after experimenting with the 102 and 105 and then the Rogue, it’s like a whole world was opened up. (The Sonic Infinity DVD from Moog helped a bit, though 
) I’m guessing for the modular synth guys that it’s no big deal. But for someone whose first “real” synth was a Rogue, it’s pretty damn cool.
Eric, you’ve got to tell me the process you followed to clean the buss bar/key contacts!
That’s great about your Mini! Yay! When are we going to start hearing recordings?
: )
OK, well, I’d done it before to the Odyssey and MultiMoog I used to have, so I was pretty confident about doing it. Maybe too confident (you’ll understand in a second) . I just removed the bottow panel, disconnected the keyboard and removed the keyboard assembly from the cabinet.
With the keyboard removed, I desoldered the first buss bar (there are three) on both ends, removed it, and polished it lightly (but enough to remove the tarnish). This was a mistake, because it was very difficult to reinsert the buss bar and I ended up bending it up alot in doing so. Thankfully, the bending didn’t have any adverse effects; but all the same, I would rather it not have these bends… and it could cause problems in the future.
So, after going through all that for the first buss bar. I decided to just polish the other two without removing them. I also realized after polishing all three that only two are functional. But two of the three are right next to each other and it’s easy enough to just clean them both at the same time (even though one has no function).
Without removing the buss bars, it pretty hard not to leave some polish behind on adjacent parts, but I just went back with Isopropynol and cleaned off most all of the excess polish after I finished with the buss bars.
The key contacts themselves are springs, of course, and don’t really take a polishing very well. So, I just tried to clean them as much as possible, again, with the Isopropynol and a cotton swab.
The actual polish I used on the Buss Bars was just an all purpose Silver cleaner/polish that says that it’s safe for use on Gold and Nickel… this is very important because the contacts are gold plated.
It was “Silvo” brand and I picked it up at the hardware store.
It’s recommended in some Moog manuals to clean these parts with Isopropynol and cotton swabs; But I’ve found that Isopropynol will not fully remove the tarnish if there is much tarnish at all. The polish, however, removes it and cleans these parts much more thouroghly and pretty much instantly.
It’s amazing how many problems this solved on this Mini. I thought there would probably be other issues to deal with after cleaning the contacts, but it turns out, this was the entire problem. After spending $5 on the polish and carefully applying this procedure (approximately 2 hours work) I’ve probably doubled the value of this instrument. It plays pretty much perfectly now.
I could post some recordings if someone will tell how (like where do I go to post them?) I guess I should just try to put a video on You Tube. All I have is the video option on my still camera-- but I guess that will be fine… I haven’t really tried it before.
By the way, can someone suggest how to care for the Mini’s wooden cabinet? Is there a type of polish or product that is benificial to apply to the wood (to protect it and/or give it some sheen)?
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Thank you, thank you. As you can probably detect, I’m very proud of this purchase. But I should mention that I’ve been looking for a deal like this on a Mini for well over a year. That’s a year of combing e-bay and other lists several times a day. It’s not an accident that I was able to find this deal. I actually found the guy on another Moog forum and set up the purchase through escrow.com.
But all in all, I think this is a great time to buy a Mini. Over the past 3 months or more I’ve seen tons of Minis sell for around $1500. In my opinion, $1500 is still a great price for a MiniMoog. Especially if you consider that Prodigys are selling for close to $1000 recently and I saw a Rogue sell for $800 this week. These are crazy prices. If Prodigys are $1000, MiniMoogs should be selling for $4000. But they’re going pretty often for around $1500. So, it would seem to be a great time to buy one, or two.
If you want a good deal, try to find one that needs some work. In my experience, most all vintage analogs need some kind of attention; So, it’s not worth spending extra for a synth in “perfect” condition. Especially on a MiniMoog which is very well built and solidly constructed. I would guess that they can all be repaired and restored to “perfect” condition with a minimum of work/expence. A Rogue or Odyssey, on the other hand, with faulty sliders (for instance) is much more difficult to restore to plcayable condition. You have to replace alot of parts (like slide pots, which are difficult and costly to find) versus just cleaning and/or maintaining the high quality parts used on the MINI.
Well, idealy, the modular mods to your Rogue would be complimented by a CP251.
One way to go is to buy a kit from Analogue Solutions in England. I bought a kit like this for an Arp Odyssey and found it very quick and easy to install. It was around $80, but most of what you’re paying for is the information on where to insert and extract the signals. After using this kit, however, I’m pretty sure I can do the same sort of thing to my Mini myself. Now that I know how it’s done, I can find the patch points myself.
but, now that I own and can fully appreciate the design of the Mini, I definitely don’t want to alter such a beautiful specimen at all; so I’m going to have to build an outboard unit. I’ll just add one multi-pin connector to the bottom of the Mini’s metal enclosure. This will be the only alteration I’ll make, and it won’t even be visible.
With all the patchpoints from my Mini via the stand-alone box, and side by side with a CP251, I’ll have a very functional, portable little modular set-up that I can add modules to in the future.
Eventually I hope to put together a small three row portable modular system with the break-out box and CP251 on the bottom row. I want to ascetitcally model this system after the Moog System 15. It will be a set-up I can take to shows and play togther and in conjuction with my Mini.
Thanks for the info, Eric!
Unfortunately, I moved to a city without a well-known analog tech… which means that having my Mini, or any other analog synth, fixed requires SHIPPING… which I would like to reserve for problems I couldn’t possibly surmount. : )
Don’t fear cleaning the buss bar. It’s totally do-able… not a major operation. Just requires some care.
One other thing I’ll probably do to my Mini is clean all the switch contacts. Many of them require a little toggling to get them on and off. It’s easy enough to remove the PCB boards from their sockets. Then it will just be a matter of getting to each of the switches…
My next goal in life is to learn to properly remove, disassemble, and clean pots and sliders. What a wonderful thing THAT would be.
That’s one thing that I would be a little afraid of doing- disassembling a pot. Everytime I’ve tried it (on effects pedals), I end up breaking it before I can get it reassembled. I feel like it’s easier just to replace the pot if it’s not working or if it’s dirty…
I’ve already asked this several times, so please excuse me, but have you ever used any cleaning or finishing product on your Mini’s wooden cabinet?