Earth rail for Deluxe Reverb

[Petedub]

Hello, I'm building a Deluxe Reverb, It's not my first amp build but I consider myself to be a novice builder.

I am constructing a ground rail and I plan to attach it to the turret board in 4 places with a copper leg. I will then run the other connections with wire.

Before I do this:

Does this look ok?

Am I missing anything obvious/stupid?

Is there a better way of doing this?

Should I solder the board up first then attach the earth rail, or earth rail first then do the rest of the board?

Many thanks in advance for your help. Pete

[sluckey]

That looks fine. Lots of people do that. Might be easier to solder the rail first. I prefer to run the ground buss behind the pots as seen in this pic...

     http://sluckeyamps.com/6v6plexi/P-6V6_05_big.jpg

[tubeswell]

Yes that will work, but it might hum a bit if you haven’t got the strands completely soldered together all the way (or not). Try it and see

[bmccowan]

I do the rail the same as shown in Sluckey's pic, as that's where I learned it. But that's not why I'm jumping in here. A quick look at your board - there may be some issues. I suggest going over it carefully before heating up the iron - polarity of bypass caps, potential shorts. Also, some of the crowding on the board can be reduced by using the turret holes for more of the leads - will be tough to avoid burning some of the plastic caps that are right tight to the turrets.

[Petedub]

great comments, thank you.

I am moving the components to the holes, I've moved about half so far.

I making a new earth rail for the back of the pots.

My wife thinks you are all lovely.

[bmccowan]

Nice - the board and your wife's comment. Note that Sluckey and most here do not solder to the backs of the pot bodies. The photo shows that, but thought I'd mention it.
Are you Brits? I ask because the word "lovely" is so much more common across the pond. I always get a kick out of things being either lovely, or rubbish, without much in between.

[Petedub]

We are in Stourbridge about 15 miles west of Birmingham England.  I am a better musician than I am solderer!

I have tried to address the issue of leaving enough space to solder the components on the board as was also bought to light- see photo
 

I will not solder to the back of the pots, I'm aiming to space the bar 1/4 inch or so from the pots and attach to the lugs. You can see I've made a start in the picture.

[bmccowan]

And I am a better solderer than musician.
Greetings, I have spent many joyful weeks hiking the Dolomites and Corsica with Brits. I miss that kind of camaraderie.
That ground rail is a good method in my experience.

[AmberB]

Just a question, where is the ground rail normally attached to actual ground?

[bmccowan]

At, or near, the input jack(s). I usually make a dedicated ground lug near the input.

[pdf64]

A non ideal aspect of the board design is that the screen grid node common is mixed up with that of the preamp. Via the cathode returns of the trem oscillator V5 and the reverb driver V3. So those current loops might potentially end up causing audible contamination of the preamp.
Martin Manning made a few well considered tweaks to the circuit common layout arrangement of his DR build https://ampgarage.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=428861#p428861