creamy dreamer mod

[olslick]

i tried this mod out on a russian muff, which i guess they work best on, and i didn't notice a whole lot of difference. i've searched the web to find out how to do it, but mostly found things pertaining to the politics of where the mod came from and who did and didn't use it. i never really found a good solid explanation of how to do it other than this: http://rkerkhof.ruhosting.nl/Taas/Mods/Big%20Muff.htm

"Emitter mod: The 2 gain stages of the Muff are tied to the groud by emitter resistors (R12 & R16). These are 390 ohms in Russian models and 100 ohms in NYC models (exact value can differ between models). Jumpering these resistors (replace resistors with a wire) will increase "gainy-ness" of the unit, enlarging em will reduce the "gainy-ness" of the unit. A potmeter can be used to control this value although I noticed I usually used only one setting.

Resistor mod: Each of the gain stages has a limiting resistor on the start of it (R8 & R13). These are 8.2k (8k2) or 10k in different models. By enlarging these values the unit gets more gainy.

Creamy Dreamer: basically the combination of the Emitter mod and the Resistor mod."

so i did this but, like i said not a whole lot of difference. a couple things i noticed, though, were that he doesn't specify what to change r8 and r13 to. i went up to 12k. what would everyone else recommend? the next thing is that some places i read to jumper the first three emitters rather than the second two. is this correct?

lastly, the idea seems to be to just increase the hell out of the gain. and my understanding is that the russian muff is lower gain than some of the other muff circuits. my question would be why, then, is this mod so popular as performed on the russian if extremely high gain is the ultimate goal?

[Scruffie]

I tried this mod for someone on a black russian muff... thought it was a waste of time, I made it switchable and it was only really noticeably different at lower sustain settings... I think I used 22k Resistors for R8 & 13

The thing that worked best for me was to take out the first set of clipping diodes, that gave the best change of anything, changing them to a different type of diode didn't do alot either.

I also tried changing out transistors, I changed the first stage to an MPSA13 which has a high hFe and it didn't make a blind bit of difference to my ears, thought i'd atleast get something.

Other than that, I don't really know, it's something shrouded in mystery, probably because it's not very good.

[petemoore]

  Nothing I've leads me to believe in anything except a breadboard, or.
  There's no way to tell what mods is best.
  Anyone who tries them ''knows more after''.
  Suggest that the BMP is a big truck with four gears and quite a big hauling capacity, if it doesn't vibrate or rattle to your liking when on the highway [sound right through your amp], whittle down on the tires or change the gearing or...do anything else like add or remove leaf springs or try different shock absorber damping.
  To me it's like a big race truck, and that's 1/2 the joy of it. 4 transistor distorter, throw your gear in it, turn it on, hit the gas [volume], shift the gain gear, adjust the steering [tone], simple, drives a load home, haulzass, may not stop or corner like the littler vehicle.
  But it's worth it to fiddle with the diodes, caps etc., emitter resistors is a popular 'top 3 things' to start with. I'd say fiddling with the tonestack, which as is is cool, a bit mid-scoopy, but has a tendancy to just has 1 speed setting.
  I fostered the concept of try the same basic truck frame [4 transistors, 3 knobs], but with a different type of 4 cylinder 'engine', a more adjustable and fiddley 'carburetter', each stage was a number:
  1 Compressor
  2 Mild distort-o-boost
  3 About the same as 2, or bit heavier, yea, harder-clipping here
  4 Just enough tone control, basic 3 knob, your choice, , and plenty of boost.
  Doesn't need to be comp up front, the clipped and then the hard-hit diodes make hard comp-distort tone anyway.
  Hopefully this post is sufficiently incomplete and disjointed [except the part about the 'breadboard or'...perfbread.
  Yours sounds different anyway, when plugged into..