Great Cheddar / Big Cheese magic discovered!

[Ghandi]

First off...
I always loved the sound of any good fuzz,
and for a long time I had the idea to build a "über" fuzz, you know with a input and a output buffer a tone control and some extra to increase the raspines!

Then I stumbled across the Big Cheddar (which is a clone of the Big Cheese as used by The Edge) schematic at R.G. site and discovered that that was exactly what I had in mind.

So I had to build one up!

As I fired the cheddar up I immediately loved the sound of the fourth position on the switch it reminded me a lot of the solo on U2's "discothèque" but there was something missing...!

So I again looked at the schematic and found that the collector voltage on Q2 looked a bit small.
So I installed a pot for R8 and went the old fuzz way for V+/2 on the collector of Q2 and BANG!

The fuzz on the first three positions of the switch is much better, natural, endless sustain and a note doesn't drop an octave after 2 sec. anymore!

And on position 4 of the switch the sound is much more useable, it's still that gated sound but it's know much more friendly for playing thing I immediately played the "discothèque" solo and than the beginning of "last night on earth"

Peace, love and bananas

Darius

[Dan N]

Thanks for the tip!

That dropping octave is what makes the cheese stand apart from other fuzzes, but it would be cool to have an extra knob to find different sweet spots.

[Ghandi]

Hi!
I again checked the voltage on the collector of Q2 with the 10K resistor and it was only 1,22V than I used the pot to dial in 2,81V as R.G.'s schematic said and it was better as with 1,22V it wasn't than gentle fuzz like with V/2 on the collector but it was a nice dirty fuzz sound!

You definitely have to tweak around with the collector resistor of Q2!

Hey R.G. what is your opinion on tweaking R8, have you done it?
Was the collector voltage in your clone from the beginning the same as in the original?

Peace, love and bananas
Darius

[Dji]

I built my Great Cheddar as my first project. I put the thing together, fired it up, and wondered at its glory.

Then I fussed about the rotary switch, which I'd mounted on the same side as the other components. When I put the board in the box, this left me no access to my trimpot, plus I had to put a piece of paper in to insulate my capacitors from the box. This all seemed less than ideal, so I desoldered my switch, soldered it on the other side of the board, fired up the Cheddar... and nothing.

A week of futzing later (no multimeter yet, but I built an audio probe) and, after returning the rotary to its original position, I finally got the cheddar firing again. However, it's no longer quite right in the head.

In three out of four rotary positions, my tone pot and my volume pot both seem to have the same function. When I turn my tone pot all the way one direction, the volume goes away. Also, those three positions all sound the same: somewhat muted, and fuzzy but uninspiring.

Something's obviously blown, fried, or poorly connected. Any ideas?

[markr04]

so I desoldered my switch, soldered it on the other side of the board, fired up the Cheddar... and nothing.
Something's obviously blown, fried, or poorly connected. Any ideas?

There's another post stating similar problems: fiddle with the rotary switch and it doesn't work right anymore. Mine is dead from the same thing.

I hope someone can help you, because it would help others as well.