Big Muff Breadboard Troubleshooting help

[SWINEMOTHER]

I've been working on a simple v8 RUSSIAN BMP clone(a pedal i own and love) as a method to sharpen my breadboarding skills and start to self-educate on what makes a pedal tick. Alas, after completing my breadboard, the effect does not work as it should. The gain simply isn't there. It gets crunchy, but not the heavy clipped full on fuzz sound it should be. Moving foraward, please excuse my typing as i have recently lost half of my ring finger on my right hand(thank god) due to a careless accident by my boss at work. Also, please excuse the use of a program that isn't diylayout. I have the program, but could not figure out how to jump the base terminals of the transistors to where i needed them and also could not find trs jacks. And thank you for your time.


THE SCHEMATIC I USED **NOTE: MY LAYOUT FORGOES THE USE OF A SWITCH**



MY BREADBOARD LAYOUT





ACTUAL POPULATED BREADBOARD FAR THEN CLOSE

[bluebunny]

Welcome!

Have you checked you have continuity all the way along the power rails on your breadboard?  The gap in the middle of those red and blue lines often indicates a real gap in the bus beneath.  You usually have to jumper across to join up the two red busses (and the blue).

[SWINEMOTHER]

I have and the power rails are continuous along the entire length of both positive and ground.

[duck_arse]

also welcome.

you really should post all your transistor voltages. also, I'd suggest poking the transistors into the bb w/ pins inline 1, 2, 3, and then twisting and linking wire to make the connections go where you want them, rather than messing the tx leads all in knots.

but mainly voltages. and photos of the offending breadboard, with parts.

[SWINEMOTHER]

you really should post all your transistor voltages.

Thanks for the hospitality! Forgive the newb question, but would the transistor voltages just be the voltages at each leg of the transistor relative to ground while the circuit is powered?

I'll get the photos of the board asap.

by parts I assume you mean a list? If so, I didn't include one as the schem included the parts in it. I can type one out if it helps though. I'm using BC184B's as the transistors.

[bluebunny]

Forgive the newb question, but would the transistor voltages just be the voltages at each leg of the transistor relative to ground while the circuit is powered?

Yep, exactly that.

I think duck is asking that the photo be annotated to match the schematic so we know which bit has been placed where.  Or he's just asking that the photo is of a populated board, not an empty one!   

[SWINEMOTHER]

Updated the post with pictures of the actual board.

collected the tranny voltages. they are as follows:
Q4 C:7.02V B:0.65V E:0.08V
Q3 C:7.07V B:0.65V E:0.08V
Q2 C:6.93V B:0.63V E:0.07V
Q1 C:8.18V B:0.98V E:0.43V

[willienillie]

transistors are backwards

[antonis]

collected the tranny voltages. they are as follows:
Q4 C:7.02V B:0.65V E:0.08V
Q3 C:7.07V B:0.65V E:0.08V
Q2 C:6.93V B:0.63V E:0.07V
Q1 C:8.18V B:0.98V E:0.43V

These are quite satisfactory values for 6V power supply..!! 

P.S.
Welcome, also..!!

[duck_arse]

the breadboard with parts - I meant don't show us an empty breadboard is all. pics what's posted is good for now.

EVERY time I see the part number "BC184" in a debugg thread, I have to ask - is it a "BC184L" or a "BC184"? the "L" very often is the cause of the problems.

[SWINEMOTHER]

transistors are backwards

I don't believe they are. if you are referring to the layout orientatiuon, i labelled the legs because the orientation i needed wasn't available. Thank you for the respose though!

These are quite satisfactory values for 6V power supply..!! 

P.S.
Welcome, also..!!

Haha, well this problematic as I verified my supply delivering 9.6v. Thoughts on where I should start looking?

the breadboard with parts - I meant don't show us an empty breadboard is all. pics what's posted is good for now.

EVERY time I see the part number "BC184" in a debugg thread, I have to ask - is it a "BC184L" or a "BC184"? the "L" very often is the cause of the problems.

I can go farther with photos n such. Whatever you need, let me know.
The transistors i am using are BC184B's not L's. would that cause an issue? Also, Q1 is actually a BC550. I had swapped hoping the bc184b's were the issue. Thank you for your time!

[willienillie]

transistors are backwards

I don't believe they are. if you are referring to the layout orientatiuon, i labelled the legs because the orientation i needed wasn't available. Thank you for the respose though!

BC184Bs with CBE pinout instead of the more common EBC (looking at flat side), right?  They are oriented correctly in your breadboard diagram, but reversed on your actual breadboard.  Well I can't see all the pins, but that you have the collector stuff connected to the emitters.

Also, what kind of cat do you have?

[SWINEMOTHER]

BC184Bs with CBE pinout instead of the more common EBC (looking at flat side), right?  They are oriented correctly in your breadboard diagram, but reversed on your actual breadboard.  Well I can't see all the pins, but that you have the collector stuff connected to the emitters.

Also, what kind of cat do you have?

You, sir, are absolutely right. I'm a dummy. reversed the trannies, straight to sweet sweet fuzz town. wish i could actually play right now,  ha! Thank you so much.

I have 2 cats, just a couple of scraggly bastards I found out in my yard as kittens. Starving, so I took 'em in. 2 dogs as well. one is a crippled stray mutt, the other a boxer. And, no, the cats and dogs don't play well together hahaha!

Learned a lot from this. Be wary of pinouts, don't twist transistor legs just lay them out straight, and blow you desk off so your pets hairs aren't visible in your project photos!

Thank you all very much. Been a lurker for quite some time. Hopefully i'll be a bit more active on here now.

You can sunset this thread, PROBLEM SOLVED!