Swollen Pickle values

[brian]

Hey everyone!

I think I'm finally going to get around to building my own Big Muff, so I've been studying all of the usual sources and trying to organize the build/tweaks that I want to try out. Of course, the Swollen Pickle thread from a few months ago was of great interest and I spent some time today trying to read the resistor values from some of the pics that were posted. Of course, I can only speculate on capacitor values and to be honest, the 1% resistors were nearly impossible to discern, so after plenty of squinting I convinced myself that all of the 1% resistors are "standard" Muff values. Namely 100k for R4, 10, 15, 22; 1k for R8; and 100 ohms for R5, 11, 16. I also have to assume that all of the caps are "standard" values, but of course there is no way to really know based on the photos. Enough gabbing, based on what I can tell the other resistor values are:

R3-33k
R9-10k
R14-10k
R21-470k
R23-1500

and for the tone stack, Mr. Huge posted his Muff tone stack as well but for the sake of completeness:

R19-33k
R20-22k
C11-.0033
C12-.047

Oops, I guess I should have mentioned up front that the part values I'm referencing are based on the schem Joep drew up dated 15-2-2004 Rev 1.1.

I'd love to hear from anyone who has built or modded an existing Muff to capture the Swollen Pickle mojo. I've never heard one, but I'm sure it deserves at least some of the hype. On top of that, I don't want to risk getting a $50 pos russian and I'd rather build and tweak than shell out $80 for the USA reissue. Anyway, lemme know what you think!

Brian

[Fret Wire]

Instead of trying to clone the Pickle, try Tonepad's Big Muff. The cap mods, subbing .1uf's for the 1uf's really opens the sound up. Gets rid of the excess bass, and the tone control becomes more responsive. Check out the build reports and comments. It's a good base to start from, and with the cap mods, maybe what you're looking for.

[Mark Abbott]

Dear Brian

Could you tell me how the project went. How did the Swollen Pickle sound Vs's the BMP?

Thanks for your assistance.

Yours Sincerely

Mark Abbott.

[Boofhead]

Good stuff Brian.  I haven't checked any of the values or circuit.

For those interest, here's the original thread, schematic and overlay by Joep:

http://diystompboxes.com/sboxforum/viewtopic.php?p=112045

[Mark Abbott]

Dear Boofhead

I was a little in the dark as I hadn't seen the circuit diagram that was drawn up by Joep.

Thanks for all your help.

Yours Sincerely

Mark Abbott.

[cd]

I would forget about the BMP tone stack completely, and use the 4 position switch from the Great Cheddar (geofex.com).  Much more versatile, just forget about the 4th position (the one that rebiases the transistors.)