BLues Breaker Report

[petemoore]

I decided to do the third part of the feedback loop trilogy to day/night.
 It seems this is a good thing, it's in the three circuit box now, something got bumped to make way, now it's the PHaze 90, BB, and Hot Silicon.
 Someone was asking how to get the BB to distort more {I remembered as I looked at the two diode pairs]...taking out two diodes [one going each way now] makes it more distorted/less output...that's the way I have them in there now....sounds great.
 It could have been an SD-1 or Tube Screamer...I think any one of these is fine for using, ala different, all nice, smooth,...I think the order of distortion hardness is:  
 1 TS
 2 Blues Breaker
 3. SD-1
 The order of the first two I'm not so certain about ..[opinions?]..the SD-1 has the  most  distortion of the three
 I like the way the tone knob wired right up and worked right on the BB...those TS tone knob tapers I never seem to get to work 'right, I just tune the circuit and just don't worry about the  limited amount of tone control.
 Opamps tried are TL072 and JRC4558, either one is great, TL082...eh, not too bad, lacks character and definition IMHO. I sure I'd like a 5532 if I had one.
 I think it's great sounding, very fun to play pedal, and of course quite TS like.
 My comparison is not really fair, the TS still has a TL082 buried in it, Id probly like it more with a different type opamp in it.
 The BB and the SD-1 are far enough apart tone wise to warrant building each, more different in tone that BB Vs TS.
 If I had to recommend a TS type build it would be the Blues Breaker, seemed easier to wire and get the tone knob to work right, they both sound great.
 I'm not real specific about which one enough to say I even like any one of the three 'better...having all three is nice, any one of them can easily be made to sound superb..if you like Tube Screamers.
 "Nice Sounding", a 'Happy' Overdrive tone...even Mom really likes it!!!
 I like them cause they have excellent dynamics [even though there is a compression effect], great note definition even with full chords [well very good as OD's go], enough drive to play leads/but not enough to drive old ears to want to leave ! ! !
 Great OD/Boost effect...I say 'build one' !!!