supa fuzz is sucking a ton of tone

[alange5]

i built a supa fuzz clone this afternoon.  when engaged, it sounds excellent, but when bypassed, it is seriously muddying my signal.  i A/B'd straight into the amp and the difference is pretty big.  i used this layout:  http://forum.musikding.de/cpg/albums/userpics/16602/Marshall_Supa_Fuzz.png

any obvious places i should look?  grounding?  does the position/length of the hookup wire have anything to do with muddying tone? 

thanks in advance

[garcho]

It's true bypass - outside of lengthening your cable it shouldn't do anything to change your tone. Maybe a wiring error?

[R.G.]

I would look very carefully at whether the wiring to the bypass switch is correct or not.

[alange5]

here's the type of switch i used:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/31G7JbwvMRL._SL500_AA300_.jpg

it's got the "x" terminal pattern instead of the two columns of three terminals like the layout shows.  i also wired all of the ground points to the sleeve of the output jack.  i'll double check the switch wiring when i get home

[R.G.]

The reason I say that is because one of the motivations for "true bypass" was to eliminate treble loss by loading when an effect input was not removed from the signal line when bypassed. That's the whole point.

So if yours ought to be true bypass, and is still loading your guitar signal, it makes me think the wiring may not be disconnecting the effect entirely from the signal when bypassed.

True bypass has some built-in faults, but loading in bypass isn't one of them.

[alange5]

makes sense. i appreciate the input - i'll take a close look at the switch.

one thing i forgot to mention...  regarding the electrolytic caps, the layout doesn't show the polarity of the 64uf cap (in my case i used a 10uf). i used the same polarity as the 50uf next to it.  also, regarding the 10uf cap on the far right, the only extra one i had on hand was non-polarized.  does that matter?

[R.G.]

With polarized caps, polarity always matters.

If I were you, I'd get out my DMM, check that you can read from 9V to ground in the proper polarity, and then measure the voltage across the caps. If it's the right way round ( positive on the positive lead, negative on the negative lead) you did it right. If it's the other way around, even a fraction of a volt reversed, you did it wrong and the cap may or may not be damaged.

Non-polarized can go either way.

[alange5]

bringing back this old thread, as my pedal got put on the back burner for a while...

i've done some poking around but I can't seem to find a layout showing true bypass off-board wiring with a 3PDT switch, no 9v jack, and no LED.  i'd like to make sure my switch wiring is correct.

I found this one:
http://tagboardeffects.blogspot.com/2012/02/offboard-wiring.html


I don't need the LED... can I bypass the resistor and LED in series and wire the 9V directly to the top-left switch pole?

thanks.

[Focalized]

Just don't wire the LED. The 9v goes only to the board, not the switch at all. That left column is just for the LED. So it's a big of a waste to use that kind of switch.

Your original switching should have been fine. Looks like you never posted a pic or anything.

[slacker]

If you're not using a LED then don't wire anything to that lug of the switch.

[alange5]

OK, after some careful scrutinizing, looks like the bottom left pole of the original DPDT switch was wired to the tip instead of the sleeve of the input jack.  Whoops.  Fixing it now, testing it when I get home.  Thanks for all the help!

[duck_arse]

last week I spent a day looking for why my true bypass with millenium was not bypassing, using the multimeter. I got down to the point where the switch, new and unused, one of those very x-wings you pictured, was the only possible cause, and the hardest part to remove, of course. but there you have it, one side was short, common to both ends.

so now I have a single pole, double throw just lurking about.