Just built a Red Llama - should there be farty/fuzzy bass notes when chording?

[grolschie]

Geez. This thread has my head swimming!
Oddly enough I had just picked up all the components to build this pedal a few days before this thread started.
Now I'm scared sh*tless to try it!

Why not build it anyways. You can always re-use the components if you don't like it. Or hock it off on ebay. :-)

[jimmy54]

Geez. This thread has my head swimming!
Oddly enough I had just picked up all the components to build this pedal a few days before this thread started.
Now I'm scared sh*tless to try it!

Nah, it's a relatively easy build with only a few components.  Don't let that big IC scare yer

If it wasn't for my second build having a dodgy chip both of my builds fired up first time.  It really is a great pedal.  One of the best for going from sparkling clean to OD to fuzz just with the volume pot of your guitar.

[twangquack]

Deciding not to leave well enough alone, I took my Red Llama clone and tried several things suggested in this thread. Following Pushtone's lead, I thought I'd make the output cap switchable through two SPDT toggles (on-on) I had on hand. The right-hand side one switches between the "normal"/standard 10uF output cap and then, when switched left, throws the output cap function over to the second (left side) switch which toggles between .33uF and .047uF ... these seem to be pretty good values for the output cap switching for this pedal.

When the gain is set fairly low, the 10uF cap gets a fair amount of use ... but at higher gain settings, I like both the .33uF and .047uF caps -- it also depends on amp settings, guitar tone settings, etc., of course. But it's nice to have these options.

Oh, and I went ahead and changed the IC current limiting resistor to a 390 ohm as opposed to the 1k -- thought I'd try a not-too-radical change ... so far so good. I should have written it down, But I think the voltage at pins 1,5,7,9, and 11 was 6.25 or something close to that. I was tempted to try the 100-ohm but the 390 seems good for now. I got tired of tweaking it after playing with the switches. It sounds pretty good now. Maybe I've "switch-happy" in recent days but I think I like this pedal even better after making the Red Llama's output cap switchable.

[markm]

I feel alone now......like I'm the only one that prefers this circuit in stock factory form. 

[Pushtone]

I feel alone now......like I'm the only one that prefers this circuit in stock factory form. 

Mark, are you a Fender amp man?

That could be it.

I noticed the Llama was better behaved [bass and fuzz wise] with a Fender Twin than with my 4x12 or my Roland Blues Cube.

Twins seem to suck the distortion out of a signal and make everything cleaner.

[markm]

I feel alone now......like I'm the only one that prefers this circuit in stock factory form. 

Mark, are you a Fender amp man?

That could be it.

I noticed the Llama was better behaved [bass and fuzz wise] with a Fender Twin than with my 4x12 or my Roland Blues Cube.

Twins seem to suck the distortion out of a signal and make everything cleaner.

Yeah, that could be it Dave!
I mainly use a Twin, occasionally a Deluxe Reverb or a Bassman LTD.
That's probably what it is. Coupled with the fact that I do use the Vol. and Tone controls on the Tele quite a bit.
Good call!

[jimmy54]

I find that the Llama is only muddy on the bass strings when the guitar volume is on full.  As soon as you roll down the guitar vol you can get a nice clean with no mud.  Mine's also very sensitive to changes of the guitar tone control.  In my case (don't know if anyone else has noticed this) the gain reduces as you lower the guitars tone control (this is with the bridge pup of a les paul).  Makes it a very flexible pedal in my eyes.

[markm]

Well, alot of people I have encountered don't use the guitar's controls much....meaning they set the guitar wide open and adjust everything else from there which I never have done.
I figure the controls on my Tele were put there by Leo for a reason, not just to look pretty!! 
Alot of GREAT Tone lives within the volume and tone pots of an electric guitar. 

[jimmy54]

Totally agree with yer there markm.  In fact, I don't like any OD, fuzzes etc. that can't be cleaned up nicely from the guitars vol control.  That's a definite requirement for me.  That's why I like the fuzz face, red llama, and highway 89.

[grolschie]

Well, alot of people I have encountered don't use the guitar's controls much....meaning they set the guitar wide open and adjust everything else from there which I never have done.
I figure the controls on my Tele were put there by Leo for a reason, not just to look pretty!! 
Alot of GREAT Tone lives within the volume and tone pots of an electric guitar. 

I am a wide open kinda guy! Actually, I prefer to just my tone cap rather than use the tone knob a little. If the pedal responds better when volume on guitar turned down, couldn't the addition of a resistor to the input of the Llama do the same thing. hehehe. 

Hey Mark, what brand IC are you using? Maybe that's a factor?

[twangquack]

Like MarkM, I'm a Fender man myself (Strats, Teles, and I was testing my Red Llama clone through a Deluxe Reverb). And a good point was made about not letting your guitar's tone knob go to waste. But I also tend to be a "guitar controls to the max" kinda guy -- heck, I even modified my guitar controls to have no-detent, no-load tone controls on my Fenders for when you want to peel paint (especially with my Tele). I love treble! (blame it on listening to Roy B's Tele playing).

But there are times you want to tone things down ... you can't always scorch the wallpaint. To that end, I forgot to mention that I put a 250 pF silver mica cap across the volume pot of my Red Llama clone to do the "smooth" mod ... I forget the exact URL, but many here have seen that mod page. I tried 350 pF, 470 pF (I saw a post where someone swore by 470 pF) ... but for me, that's getting too far from stock. I do like the 220-250 pF range for the "smooth-mod," however. I feel it's a decent "do it and leave it" sort of thing.

I re-checked my notes and found I had mistakenly listed the stock 10uF as one of the three switchable options on my clone. I did use that for awhile, and it sounds best when I use the AMZ MOSFET Boost into the Red Llama (it does help to do away with any farty issues that may occur with some setups or guitar/amp combinations) ... plus, it's major gnar! It would be cool to combine these two circuits in a single pedal.

Anyway, re-checking my notes I saw that I ended up changing my right side switch to using a 4.7uF output cap, and the left-hand switch goes between roughly .3uF ( .22uF and .1uF film caps in parallel) and a .047uF. I actually like the .3uF so much it might be tempting to use that as one-and-only ouput cap, but having options is good. Either the 4.7 uF or the .3uF output caps sound good with my single coil guitars ... the .047 is also OK, maybe not quite as good, but still good to have as an option. A humbucker player with hot pickups might like the .047uF output cap option even more.

But I also have to say that there really is nothing wrong with the stock design and there's no obligation to have to dime the drive control on this most gainful of overdrive pedals. It's has so much oomph one may never need to use all of it, but the output cap switch idea means you can tweak it for certain amps and/or different guitars.

[remmelt]

Stock! I breadboarded the RL at first, tried out a couple of different values but liked the stock ones best. I haven't tried any other ICs or the input buffer like on the TSF. I did try the switchable extra gain setting (I think it was 10M extra in the first feedback loop, like on the TSF.)

I've built 4 so far, all sold or given as presents. This is one rocking pedal.

[jimmy54]

So if I wanted to be able to switch between output caps and I've got a SPDT on-off-on switch, how would I go about wiring it?

[joelap]

So if I wanted to be able to switch between output caps and I've got a SPDT on-off-on switch, how would I go about wiring it?

That should work, but I just woke up a few minutes ago and haven't had breakfast yet.

[jimmy54]

Thanks joelap.

[railhead]

I perf'd the circuit, stock, today, and I really like the tone with my Les Paul -- but not so much with my Strat. I'd like it to have more compression, too, since I'm not getting a lot of sustain.

Thoughts?

[railhead]

I'm personally really liking a .1uF film cap at output (C5) now.

[joelap]

I found .1 to be a bit farty with the rest of the values I chose in my adaptation.  I found .068 to mud out on bass notes, but .047 to lack a little bass notes.  Luckily smallbear stocks a .057 or so cap, which I intend on trying.  When using a strat, I found I had to the the cliche tube screamer + strat OD sound out of my head.  most of the time when you pick up a strat, thats what you envision, but with this circuit thats not what you get    I also prefer it with humbuckers or tele pickups over strat style.

[railhead]

I used it live over the weekend, and it'll be coming off my board. It has an okay sound, but I have a Barber LTD I use for low gain, and the Red Llama just didn't compare. The RL was a bit too mid-heavy, and it lacked the dynamics the LTD had -- and it sounded like crap when used behind my compressor (Barber Tone Press). Since I'm rhythm and doa  lot of clean, I use a compressor 100% of the time, so I have to have my peds sound good with. Unfortunately, the RL didn't - but it was fun to build!

Now, I'm off to shrink the size of the BSIAB2 so it'll fit into a 1290NS, because that's a sound I'm absolutely loving (pref'd it last night).