What is your favourite dirty boost/OD distortion?

[Der Groovemeister]

I used a BC109B and one GE and one SI diode.

[liddokun]

Hey all,
I ended up building a Trostsky (it's pretty much gotten to the point where I have enough parts lying around to build pretty much any OD/Distortion pedal on demand)
and it sounds, well, not as great as I'd like. I'm still tweaking it. Currently I have a 2n3904 in there, with 2 1n914 in there. I want to try 2n5088, and maybe different clipping.
Also, I find it quite bassy, so might mess around with filtering cap and hpf cap.

[petemoore]

  I'm more picky about the amp/speaker really.
  Most of the OD/Fuzz/Distorters seem to do 'something respectable' with a bit of tweeking...all are a bit different, but distorters: like dogs which have 4 legs and two eyes, they're more similar to each other than to a different type of animal.
  DIST+ and FF are the two 'big distortion' devices.
  Gus's NPN Boost, Dyna-ish Compressor and Minibooster...
  ''Favorite''..dunno except the Comp>DIST+ seems to get a lot of airplay.
  The way they're chained allows quite a lot of drive/compress/distort/boost variations.
  Any little tube or larger tube amp with a relatively clean tube preamp seems to allow very fine distortion/dirty boost/OD tones.
  I have a Valvetronix 15w SS jobby...very respectable tones eminate from this type of preamp, even through the output chip, but any little tube[s doing the output to speaker job seems to be a bit warmer yet.

[Der Groovemeister]

Try different input/output cap values. I used for input: 22n and for the output cap 100n and 47n on a switch (a bit of low cut with the 47n, but more 'snap' to the sound). I also used asym clipping with one 1n914 and one 1n34a. And with a BC109B (i love metal cans, more mojo!) it sounds really tweed like (which i like).

[turbofalcon]

You could check something out like a Sparkle Drive.

808 clone and clean boost in one pedal.  Has a blend knob so you can mix the two to taste.  All the way counterclockwise, all overdrive.  All the way Clockwise gets you only clean boost. 

[jacobyjd]

So I've been watching this thread, and some answers have been intriguing. The Trotsky seems like the best suggestion I've seen so far for what it sounds like you're trying to do.

However.

I've got a suggestion that's coming straight from my breadboard tonight: Hot. Silicon. Fuzz.

Hear me out.

I've been looking for a fuzz to fill a box with 4 holes for pots, and I've been having no luck. Not wanting a Big Muff, and being dissatisfied with the lack of usefulness of any straightforward Fuzz Face variants, I had some trouble coming up with new ideas.

Then I remembered that Doug (I think) cited it as being one of his favorite fuzz designs ever. .

Well, at first when I built it, I was disappointed, because it sounded more like a distortion than a fuzz. However, after about 10 mins of playing, I realized that not only did it sound like a distortion...it sounded like the best distortion I've ever heard--this was through my Blackheart 5w into a 12" open back cab.

So, I figured...if I can make this thing do distortion and a really nice overdrive (read: use it to boost the amp w/ a preclipped signal like a TS, not the pedal into a clean amp...whatever...I get confused with how people refer to things sometimes), I want to make it do what it's name says it's supposed to do.

So I added a pair of Ge diodes off the output, in series with a 20k linear pot just before the volume control, and voila: now it's a fuzz.

It worked beautifully with both my 5w and my 30w amp (Old Crate VC3112--think Classic 30 and you've got it).

I was able to set the volume at just above unity gain and use it with both the clean and dirty channels of my 30w with excellent results all around. I could go from clean straight to dist/fuzz or from clean to dirty, then to fuzz. All around, it sounded very musical--no harshness or anything.

If you'd look to simplify it, you could ditch the tone stack (maybe a trimmer...) and the clipping control (my addition).

Anyway...sorry for writing a book, but this circuit comes highly recommended. I'm going to build my own asap.

[fuzzo]

You talk about the hot sillicon fuzz of Doug hammond (I belive it's him but I'm not sure) ?

Actually I'm looking for a cool fuzz sounding pedal, but a usefull fuzz pedal not like all thoses fuzzy toys which produce only noisy/buzzy/screaming sound. A real fuzz .

Anyway, to back to the subject of this topic, I really like my TS7 tonelock that I've modded. It's always on to have a little dirty clean sound (My amp doesn't have the possibility to create a low drive at clean channel) . Otherwise I made a Mini booster  and a jordan bosstone, both sound really cool and musical.

one week ago I made a SHIN IE fuzz companion, the worst fuzz I made, totally useless and horrible, it went to the trash after 15min 

[slideman82]

BURST BOX! That's the one!

No, really, +1 Highway 89. I will change its tonestack for a passive baxandall type (james?). Needs more mid scoop.

[brett]

Hi
Nobody going for the Odie?  Solid overdrive, reasonably amp-like distortion.  Maybe too smooth?  (It's a mu-amp)  You could add diode-to-ground clipping to make it nastier if you want nasty.

cheers

[liddokun]

Going to revive my old thread here...
I've gone back to rearranging my pedal board, so it'd be cool for people to keep them suggestions coming. I'm not going to biuld everything, but it'd be nice to have a large pool to pick from.

To date I've tried ts808 and other TS variants, rangemasters, trotsky, ds1, dist +, that dod 250 overdrive, sho, bor, fuzz face, a fuzz that dragonfly posted a long time ago, bmp, keeley fuzzhead, ROG mayqueen, amz mosfet

I realize a few of those listed are clean boosts.

[oldrocker]

I'm still going to suggest a Professor Tweed into a TS808 or vice versa.   One of if not my favorite combinations.

[The French connection]

Catalinbread DLS and Beginner boost (Gus boost)!

[TimWaldvogel]

Anybody have a perf layout for the zvex SHO?

[slideman82]

I'm still going to suggest a Professor Tweed into a TS808 or vice versa.   One of if not my favorite combinations.

I would choose the viceversa version, briefly verified in vero... er, seriously, a TS808 into a FET light distortion/booster...

[caspercody]

I do have a file that shows a pcb, perfboard, and veroboard layout. Send me a PM with your email, and I will send to you.

[oldrocker]

The TS-808 into a Peppermill has a nice thick overdrive as well.  For leads turn on the TS and for rhythm turn off the TS leaving the Peppermill on.  I use the Peppermill as a dirty boost too.

[liddokun]

Built the Gus NPN boost the other day, it just doens't seem to play nice with my humbuckers. I get an almost inaudible boost playing a humbucker through the boots, but I get a nice boost with my single coil guitar played through it.


The search continues!

[DougH]

Built the Gus NPN boost the other day, it just doens't seem to play nice with my humbuckers. I get an almost inaudible boost playing a humbucker through the boots, but I get a nice boost with my single coil guitar played through it.


The search continues!

Then you must have wired up something wrong. It will be very audible with humbuckers or single coils.

A simple boost I'd suggest would be a Minibooster.

A Tonesource (Brown Source) might work good for you too. Check out the clip:

http://www.aronnelson.com/gallery/main.php/v/DougH/booster/ToneSource/