si FF transistor "magic gain #s"

[b_rogers]

i have been messing with different caps and transistors this weekend.

so far it seems that as long as q1 is in the 60-120hfe range the sound is more like a overdrive pedal with good clean up like a Ge unit.

with q2, it seems like the higher gain it is the more "sizzle".

at least with my setup the 2.2 uf input cap doesnt work well with out lowering the value of the 22uf to 10uf .  it has way too much "woof" to it. a .022 seems to be a good balance of bass and treble, for my setup at least.

with both q's with high gainers the overall fuzziness is greater, but with the loss of good cleanup properties.  when you roll back the vol, too much bass is lost.  

right now i am messing with reintroducing clean input signal to the output to keep some clarity and note separation during chording.

also i am going to try "bootstrapping" ala Tim Escobedo's circuit snippets page with the low gainers.

the tripple fuzz and square wave shaper made simple have some really good tones judging from the soundclips, especially the square wave...listen to the sound sample at the very end there is a great EJ-ish tone.

whenever i bring my "multiface" along to jam or try with different setups it ALWAYS gets a compliment and a "what kinda pedal is that?" i have it set up with a bc338 low level driver for q1, and a bc547c for q2. it has more of a ts-9 had sex with a FF and this is the "lovechild" tone.

if you havent tried the multi yet be sure to give it a chance.

www.runoffgroove.com

[Fret Wire]

Droping the 2.2uf down to 1.5-1.0uf will clean up the "woofiness", yet still sound like a basic Dallas ckt. I haven't tried the multiface yet.

Awhile ago, I made two fuzz test bed jigs (pnp & npn) using the basic Dallas Arbiter ckt. Sockets for the caps, and trimmers for the 33k, 8k2, and 330/470 ohm resistors. The npn also has a socket for the pf smoothing cap. I use them to set the bias and bass response for a particular set of trannies, then install them in a regular pedal.

[b_rogers]

i like the multiface a lot..it has a slightly different tone to my ears i cant really explain it...more "open" i guess if that makes sense???  

maybe due to how its biased?

Brent

[brian wenz]

Hello Hello--
  I've had great luck with the Vox Tonebender values instead of Fuzz Face values.   I try to fine-tune my pedals to playing "live" with a band and the TB circuit is much less mushy and bass-heavy.  A couple of years ago I built a Mosface [with a BS-170 for Q2] using  Vox TB values and it sounds GREAT.......much more useable then the stock Mosface.
Keeping the feedback res. to 47K helps alot.
Brian.

[Bluesrock]

I'm sorry to bring this one back up...

I have a Si FF with a BC108C in the first and a BC109C in the second position. Both are hfe 500~550.
I found that the only way to make a Si FF sound good is AFTER a univibe. The univibe works as a buffer; you can actually turn down the guitarvolume without lots of noise. It does sound really good this way!

Best Regards,
Koen