been a while, thought i'd post something new...

[pinkjimiphoton]

hey kids,
miss me? lol.... life's been happening..... bought a house, moved, been gigging like a madman, good things, bad things (dealt with a small tumor blocking my colon)... and here i am back at the diy thing. why?

well.. when going in for the damn colonoscopy that found the thing in me, while i was out, somewhow my right thumb got dislocated. now, i realize, some thumbs up my ass jokes have to be made, hell, i've made 'em myself, but no idea how the @#$% my right thumb could get this messed up getting a goddamn pipe stuffed up my arse.

well... anyways... between that and all the rest, i've kinda gotta take a break from performing so i started tinkering around a bit. fixing old f'ups and re-voiceing fuzzes, and fixing the stuff that BUGGED me about the crap i had left that wasn't sold or given away ....  somewhere around 300 pedals have been made here, i have about 50 of 'em here still... that's a lot of sh*t STILL, but jesus...

one of the pedals i was dicking with was the third pedal i had started working up for wags, tentatively called the WWP...  for Wagner Winston (my son, who was working with me on the design) and photon, of course. i had worked up the prototype and given one to wags when he visited in 2013, but frankly neither he nor i nor winston much cared for it, it needed more development. but with the move, and having my stuff in boxes, and all the other crap, it got waysided, and never got finished before dickie left us this past spring for the other side of that rainbow bridge.

well, late last nite, i took it to task... it was a pretty smelly fuzzface variant with a cheezy ass tone control for all intents and purposes. so i set out to try and maximize what i'd come up with, and ended up changing some of the things and adding some others, and using a few tricks i've learned from dickin' around with god knows how many circuits in various effects and amps.

when all was said and done, it's a three knob dirt box with one extra switch.
the first knob, "saturation" is not only a fuzz gain/contour control, but you can sweep it from octave up--CCW (WITH fundamental intact) to mild overdrive to fuzz at full CW rotation.
the baalz pot too sweeps , adds fuzz as well and acts as a master volume of sorts. i did NOT add a master volume, tho some peeps may want one. if so, standard 100k from  the output should do the trick
the snarl control is a tone control, for all intents... it loses volume a little at CCW at some settings, and acts pretty much like an "attack" control on a tonebender... adds high end bite and fuzz the more ya turn it up.
the compression switch adds a diode clipper to ground from the output cap(s, i used two in parallel cuz it sounded great, no idea what the hell the capacitance would be.... 470n divided by 100n?? huh?) and makes it a little easier to get the octave thing happening.

all the controls are highly interactive, and it should let ya get well enough above unity gain to push an amp hard if necessary as a TRUE overdriver.

there are feedback loops all over the fuggin place, and things panning between different parts of the circuit. it was breadboarded up, and is physically built at this point... i dont totally understand all the things it does, but it's way different from what i've presented in the past.

this is a commercial product, for all intents, so DIY all ya want, but ZERO commercial use will be tolerated.

i'm sure i've reinvented the wheel, and someone smarter than me (easy, these days) i am sure can tell me what i've lummoxed across as a circuit, as these things NEVER end up being "original" (other than maybe some phat pink schmuck using a ge fuzz in the feedback loop of a jfet opamp as a clipper....AHEM).... so please feel free to educate my dumb ass. i'm sure Gus has already done this. but i hope not... of course..

really nice dirt box, capable of a LOT of tones. cleans up fairly well from the guitar, too. nice sustain, not a lot of background noise...
another PJP hybrid circuit, npn, so it plays nice with other pedals.... bc547 for q1, and ac176 for q2. hfe's, e/b/c voltages  on the graphic.

made a cheezy pcb pattern as a schematic... still no idea how the hell to do a schem other than drawing it out by hand. i did. will scan and post that tomorrow maybe if anyone is interested or can't follow this graphic.
no vero yet... i use perf more these days... go figure...

would LOVE IT if some crazy person wanted to throw this on the breadboard and see if they get similar results...
btw... q2 can be damn near anything i think... socket and experiment. i tried several GE's in there, cuz i roll like that, but 3904's or whatever will probably work too.

enough of my yammering bullsh*t

here ya go:

[Buzz]

Looks good. The Nurse Quacky just took the back seat again... ha ha.

[deadastronaut]

Hi man , was thinking about you the other day...good to see ya back up n doing it man..

cool.....btw ive had that colonoscopy thing, whoaaaa....but came out with my thumbs intact..

my butt however....hmmm...took a while to get over that...

anyway, welcome back fella..

[bluebunny]

Of course we missed you, Jimi!  Seems like you've had plenty to occupy you.  I'll leave the butt/thumb jokes to someone else...

Having read all 18 paragraphs of narrative (or "yammering bullsh*t", as your Pinkness would have it), I was expecting to find something the size of the Ludwig.  But no, it fits on a postage stamp.  One for the backlog, methinks.

Good to have you back.   

[italianguy63]

WB Jimi!  MC

[pinkjimiphoton]

thanks guys!

hope ya dig the fuzz

[jubal81]

Can't sleep so thought I'd take a swing at a schematic. How's this look?

[RunBeerRun]

Wow that looks really cool. Are you going to be selling stuff now?

[Ice-9]

Welcome back Jimi, hope all is well now. And back with a new fuzz to boot.

[jdub]

Was hopin' everything was OK with you, man...welcome back 

[pinkjimiphoton]

Can't sleep so thought I'd take a swing at a schematic. How's this look?

almost perfect. ditch the ground connection on the snarl pot and add the 1u cap to ground instead from the node where the top of the pot meets the 3.9k resistor and you got it perfect!! thanks bro, nice job!!

[pinkjimiphoton]

ok, jubal81, here's the corrected schem. other than missing one cap and adding one ground connection on the snarl control, you nailed it.
thanks bro



this is correct to what i built and matches my hand drawn schematic node for node now.

thank you!!

[pinkjimiphoton]

Wow that looks really cool. Are you going to be selling stuff now?

i've always been selling stuff beers, depending on what it is. i tend to make everything FREE for diy people to build their own, but reserve the right to sell my stuff commercially if i choose to.

i'm no "boot-tweaker" kicking out thousands of tube screamer clones  

but yes, if someone wants me to build them a pedal, bet your ass i will charge them for my time and components. (provided they aren't friends or something) you should too.

i don't sell other people's stuff. just my own. well... an occaisional fuzzface or 20

dirtyBAD!!! has been my "company name" since the early 90's when i started doing tube amps. i'm still  more of a muso than a builder.

[Mark Hammer]

1) Thumb problems following a colonoscopy?    How far up were they looking, man? (actually, people think the colonoscopy is hard, but it's not; it's the day before that's the killer - I'll leave those interested to seek out the details)

2) Why not just use 560nf instead of C6/C7.  You may not find it at Radio Shack, but it IS a common value.

3) The "Comp" switchwould appear to enable/disable clipping, without producing a pop.  Two degrees of "Comp" can be achieved by using a 3-way toggle to either fully bridge R8 or bridge it with a smaller-value resistor for reduced clipping action.  Consider 3k9 to 4k7.

Oh, and welcome back dude.  We missed ya.

[midwayfair]

Yay, Jimi's back!

Jason, thanks for the schem. The 560nF caps do exist if you want to replace the parallel caps. (Jimi, caps in parallel add together .)

[pinkjimiphoton]

1) Thumb problems following a colonoscopy?    How far up were they looking, man? (actually, people think the colonoscopy is hard, but it's not; it's the day before that's the killer - I'll leave those interested to seek out the details)

i dunno, but i think they found amelia airheart up there chillin with jimmy hoffa.... some alien hoobajoob or something...

2) Why not just use 560nf instead of C6/C7.  You may not find it at Radio Shack, but it IS a common value.

that works that's what happens when you're sitting there playing with a breadboard. i don't have any 560n caps here, i figured 100 and 470n were common values other peeps would probably have, so i left it as it was. 560 is definitely close enough to 570 for rocknroll!! i've just learned sometimes it's easier to use more than one component to get a value than to try and FIND the value you need. adjust accordingly!

3) The "Comp" switchwould appear to enable/disable clipping, without producing a pop.  Two degrees of "Comp" can be achieved by using a 3-way toggle to either fully bridge R8 or bridge it with a smaller-value resistor for reduced clipping action.  Consider 3k9 to 4k7.

yep, that's all it's there for really. keep the "pop" out when ya switch it. the diodes make minimal difference. they DO add a bit of compression, which evens out the sweep of the saturate control somewhat... without them, it's louder on zero than at 10.  tonally they don't do a whole lot, tho the difference is noticeable. originally, i had a 10k pot as a variable resistor between the clipper and ground... some peeps may prefer that, it makes it easier to dial in the octaves (multiple octaves at some settings) but i didn't feel wasting the pot was justified on it. some one else may feel it's valid tho. like Mark says, you can add or remove resistance at will. 10k is probably big enough to take the clipper out of the signal almost completely. switch was easier, and it's already GOT three knobs, so.....

Oh, and welcome back dude.  We missed ya.

thanks bro. missed you guys. i've checked in now and again, but was pretty much out of commision until i got my work area set up again... a good 9 months i wasn't tinkering.

hope you guys dig the fuzzy goodness. will try and shoot a little video today or tomorrow so you can hear the thing.

[pinkjimiphoton]

Yay, Jimi's back!

Jason, thanks for the schem. The 560nF caps do exist if you want to replace the parallel caps. (Jimi, caps in parallel add together .)

hi jon!

still gotta build the harmonic tremolo!!

[duck_arse]

I'd swear I typed earlier how it was good to see you back jimi, and a comment about spelling, but it seems that post "got the arse". so here's another, saying how it's nice, etc.

[pinkjimiphoton]

I'd swear I typed earlier how it was good to see you back jimi, and a comment about spelling, but it seems that post "got the arse". so here's another, saying how it's nice, etc.

LOLOLOLOLOLOLOL!!! hi D.A.!!!

[garcho]

Funny to see this for me now, as I peruse the forum for the first time in a while. I've been working, touring, traveling and moved across the country myself and haven't touched anything DIY for months. I had to build a workbench and deal with box hell after the move but I finally have the basement back in business. My work shop has never been this organized! It's time (and cash  ) consuming like nothing else but moving really forces you to take stock and get yer shiz together. Glad to see you're alive and kicking Jimi, I'm gonna have to make the multi-Jimi fuzz pedal one of these days. PolyPhoton™. Cheers!