Si Transistor with gain of 197

[Joe Hart]

Can I build a booster with this and be able to clip the signal with diodes? I mean, will there be enough signal to hit the clipping threshold? Any other ideas on what to use this transistor for? It's a very cool transistor and I want to use it for something kind of special. Thanks.
-Joe Hart

[mac]

I have a Ge booster, hfe 90, with a switch to engage clipping diodes. Works fine..

mac

[maarten]

Depends upon the voltage your pickups will give; just try it, if it does not clip enough to your liking, you can lower the voltage to the circuit by adding one or several diodes from the plus 9 v of the battery to the circuit.
Maarten

[R.G.]

Notice that (a) it's only 197 at one specific set of collector current and temperatures. and (b) the 197 is the current gain, not the voltage gain, which is what matters to you.

[tubelectron]

Hi Joe,

For a single transistor and 2x1N4148 clipper arrangement, have a look to the ELECTRA distorsion - I built one with a serial 100K input pot (overdrive control) and it works well with a 2N3904 (Hfe = 135 / Ib=10µA) for an overdrive/booster.

A+!

[Brymus]

Ive been thinking the same thing Joe.
After the 250 build I thought for added Mojo why not build a Ge Electra or Mu amp and add shunted clippers to it.
Or even two RM in series set for near full range boost,with clippers at the end.

[Joe Hart]

Wow, the Electra Distortion looks cool. I guess I'll have to try it. I got a TON of random OLD transistors (some Ge, lots of Si) and I want to try some different things rather than just a bunch of Fuzz Faces. It seems that many transistor circuits call for specific transistors and I don't really want to build, say, a Big Muff only to find that it takes 20 hours to audition different transistors (and, I would guess, change resistor values to bias them) and end up with nothing that sounds good. And most of the transistors have part numbers that must have been either "re-branded" with the individual company's part numbers or just transistors that I can't find any info on, so all I really can figure out is the gain, whether they are PNP or NPN, and the pinout.

But thanks. Any other suggestions?
-Joe Hart

[tubelectron]

Yes, Joe :

1/ do not expect from the Electra more than a gentle overdrive, but very transarent and dynamic-sensitive.
2/ you can try to boost the gain with cap on the emitter R, but the sounds will lose some smoothness.
3/ the stock RC values works well with the 2N3904, as described in 1/
4/ here is my schematic :



A+!