Mesa Fuzz Faces

[petemoore]

  My Fuzz faces have undergone yet more swaps, this time with choices from a batch of rare for FF transistors, Mesa Ge's found in old Reciever/Amp.
  One is solid Mesa technology, the other is Ge mix of Mesa and a Ge, Hfe 109.
  I started out with 7 of them, 3 are in my PNP FF's.
  I can't say it's the 'Mesa' in them that is producing the very smooth FF sound with most excellent rolloff at guitar, but I suspect strongly that it is.
  They are different sounding than all the other Ge's, and have taken over many of the sockets in the PNP boxes that I'm using..quite noticable is the reduced gain of high frequencies, I reduced the Ge Axis Faces '1k rolloff cap'.
  These also seem quite stable, and 'hold up' even when the FF is driven hard at the input, say by a FF, a problem I've noticed...bias drifts and they get grainy, even pre-gatey sounding.
   A/B testing drift using cold draft and thumb for cursory hi-lo temperature drift checks showed a good bit less temperature drift comparing the Mesa to the unit I had in there.
  Anyway they got me diddling with transistors again, and I'd say they were well worth the effort, the smooth, resonant grind.