What's so special about the EH Ram's Head Big Muff?

[skiraly017]

I hear and read people raving about the Ram's Head version of the Big Muff. Any ideas why? Thanks.

[Mark Hammer]

Over the years, the transistors were changed in the basic circuit, resulting in some tonal differences.  Given the variation in transistors and passive components, though, you have to wonder whether the frenzy for Ram's head Muffs is a product of rumour or reality.

As a scientist, my doubt is provoked when I realize that no one has ever sat down with a pile of ram's head muffs, as well as similar randomly selected examples from other issues, and done blind parametric comparisons to identify what was consistently characteristic of THAT issue vs THIS issue.  The trouble is that too often someone gets used to a certain tone from THEIR pedal, tries out a single example of a different issue belonging to a buddy, gets surprised by the differences between their pedal and the other one, and the rumour mill gets started.  In fact, they may well own a real stinker from their issue and the buddy owns a real rarity from a different issue that sounds uncharacteristically good.

[Sir H C]

I agree, but I can say that the op-amp one does have a unique sound that is noticably different (and the ICBM captures that sound exactly).  Since that one is more consistant because of the design, I could see that one being the best to get repeatable results.

[Branimir]

MY two cents about the muffs.

I've A/B compared usa reissue muff (all stock) and my diy clone (tonepad layout), I used green russian schematic, and BC549c transistors, block capacitors, 1% (or 2%) tolerance resistors.

The difference was first and foremost - volume, I guess the BC549c's have much higher hfe than the stock transistors, doesn't matter much until the last stage (first two are already squashed by signal cutting diodes), but that last gain stage doesn't feature clipping diodes and it does swing the signal a bit louder.

About the muff hype, I think it's just market orientated, take for instance, that D.A.M. company, they're respected in the "stonerrock" market, and people buy their fuzzes because they are tweaked towards that kind of audience.

It's easy then for people with oranges and sunn's to buy those pedals since the constructor knew what he wanted these pedals to sound like, and used probably similiar equipment to test and mod the pedals to get that kind of voicing. (tonestack changes, filtering between stages and so on).

Sometimes I found it hard to believe that someone buys a big muff to get that pink floyd soloing tone! While on the other hand, the same pedal can be abused with low tunings like mad and sound nothing like dave, heh.

I also think that there's no muff that sounds the same. Same appllies to all distortion devices, since there's too much harmonic content going on, and small chages in circuitry (or rather to say, imperfection of the components), does audible difference in the end.

Like my DS-2, and my friends' ds2, they're about the same thing, but I can hear the difference, not much, not really important but some would say "hey, this pedals sound great".

Anyways, 90% of the guitarists are deaf and there are 143 ways to get "that" tone, and if you convince them that it's "this" pedal that will do it, the salesman will have a good fishing day

To finish this thought, today's components are much more "perfect" than the ones used 20 years ago, sometimes it can sound good, sometimes it's too sterile, but what I think it happens with this "reissue" pedals, custom built, is this upgrade of components.

If one can get a good sounding distortion/fuzz/whatever pedal with modern high tolerance components, there is a much bigger possibility to duplicate that tone. Since the second build will 99% the same like the first one, you guess, because all the components are in 1% tolerance, I imagine this could go much further with metal-film resistors and stuff like that.

Now, that the constructor/modder or whatever we call him, has a good basis to start of (big muff schematic), he can spend the whole afternoon swapping in and out bunch of components and finally choose which one sound the best, and have really good chance that the next pedal built with this specs will sound about same. Heh try to take bunch of 20 year old components and built two exact pedals, they will sound different. Take todays avalaible components , build two exact circuits, and the pedals will sound much more alike.


Not to say, transistors nowadays aren't noisy lkike the ones before 20 years ago.

I've expirienced that with my diy pedals, I have, (un)fortunatly lots of old resistors lying around (10% tolerance and such), and old opamps/transistors, so sometimes I build pedals with components lying around my desk, and sometimes I just go to the local electronic shop and buy 1% tolerance resistors, block capacitors and so on.

All the 'old' component pedals are a bit noisy, distortion devices, that is, and on the other side my diy muff is not even as close noisy as my opamp muff, or even ds-2.

Last project that I built, was small stone, if you don't play, you can't even hear if the effect is engaged (pickard!) or not. That's almost hi-fi

Sorry for a long post, I bolded the actual smart part, so you don't have to read the rest

[toneman]

chiming in....
i thought the "triangle muff" , the muff with the knobs in a triangle instead of a straight line, was the "best"   
This was the 2nd fuzz i ever bought.  I still have.   
My first fuzz was the CrownFuzz.  U would know it as a UniVox.  I still have also.   
Sure, trannys are better made today than yesteryear, but a 5% resistor is still the same.   
Now, i have many fuzzes..... I've always wondered why 
And, i'm still building more ..... still, i wonder why    

Oh, and the "rams head"...that''s the PI symbol...   Big Muff Pi    U know: 3.141798.......

[NoFi]

Oh, and the "rams head"...that''s the PI symbol...   Big Muff Pi    U know: 3.141798.......

The picture is bad but the "Ram's head" is on the bottom right of the centre one.


And i agree with what has been said, BM are so inconsistent it's just not sensible to say "Ram's head" are better or worse than "Triangle knobs" or later versions.

[Mark Hammer]

In 1970 or 72 we were happy just to have something in the ballpark.  We didn't know or care about tolerances, and I suspect the industry was pretty much the same in its attitudes.  All of us have since changed.  That has a good side and a bad side.  The good side is that no one has to go searching for a "good" Boss, DOD, or boutique pedal the way they often did for Fuzz Faces or BMPs.  The bad news is that we tend to miss out on those happy accidents that can deliver up unique sounds with unique personalities.  I'm a big fan of serendipity, and whenever she leaves town I'm always sad to see her go.

[petemoore]

  Here are some comments I dreamed up that 'may have' happened during the BM designing days...
  We have no way of knowing what guitar and amp this thing'll be used with, these can change the tone so much anyway, all we really need is
1  High Gain and Distortion
2  Enough output
3  Control over 1 'n 2, and Tone
  It'll probably turn out more consistant, unit to unit, than the Fuzz Face...and sound better without having to diddle with transistorsz and bias's.
  IT'll be years if not decades before enough of these get back close enough together for anyone to Really sort out the differences, having to be using 'laboratory conditions' [Same Guitar and everything peripheral to the BM Units] to make any convincing claims...even then the 'luck of the draw' with what guitar and amp may overshadow product inconsistancies.
  We're going to have parts tolerances differences, why not make the design 'loose' enough so that we'll be able to spend more time shipping, and less time building/tweeking these things, BTW we have competition, this is a great design in that aspect.
  If these things are connected correctly, the box will work. [the beauty of this statement is that it is short].

[vanessa]

I hear and read people raving about the Ram's Head version of the Big Muff. Any ideas why? Thanks.

From what I've found in schematic research, the "Ram's Head" had one significant change that seems to up the volume over the "Triangle"; otherwise to me they sound almost the same. Instead of the 390k resistor before Q4 use a 470k. I've also found this value used in the "Green Russian" versions. This my account for people talking about the volume increase of the Russian version over others.

[captntasty]

I can't say for sure about the ram's head ver. but the difference between a Sovtek green and Sovtek black was significant as far as components go.  The Green Sovtek used what I guessed was Russian MilSpec components - capacitors, resistors, etc were beefy and probably tighter in their tolerances.  The Black ver. employed very run of the mill (dare I say cheap?)components.  I always assumed this accounted for the difference in sound between the two - always preffered Big Green.

[Dirk_Hendrik]

I hear and read people raving about the Ram's Head version of the Big Muff. Any ideas why? Thanks.

From what I've found in schematic research, the "Ram's Head" had one significant change that seems to up the volume over the "Triangle"; otherwise to me they sound almost the same. Instead of the 390k resistor before Q4 use a 470k. I've also found this value used in the "Green Russian" versions. This my account for people talking about the volume increase of the Russian version over others.

I have both of em here right now for resoration. For me the most striking difference is that the coupling caps in the triangle are 0.1 uF and 1.0 uF electrolythics in the Rams head.

At least that's what they were supposed to be  all electrolythics measured in the nF range as they were completely dried out, resulting in a poor and unstable sustain. Something I've seen more often in Ramsheads.

[christian]

I have both of em here right now for resoration. For me the most striking difference is that the coupling caps in the triangle are 0.1 uF and 1.0 uF electrolythics in the Rams head.

Double schematic, from GGG.
So, values in the blocks are the "triangle"/green and non-blocked are from the "Rams head"?
The right-most muff in the picture above is the opamp version, I have one. I have to defend it a little, it does make a pretty convincing fuzz sound

So, ok for the schematic, the tone-stack is all different too, the green version has a bigger mid-notch, and it also biases the transistors with a 100k resistor from base to ground, and the clipping capacitor is smaller.
I'll take, that the middle one,  "Ram's head" is lot fatter and fuzzier sounding than the triangle?

ch.

[aron]

I think that it's pretty impossible to say that ALL types of a Big Muff sound better than others. However, you can say that _my personal_ 70's version was better than the NYC version I tried at the store (and cut my finger on) 

[vanessa]

I have both of em here right now for resoration. For me the most striking difference is that the coupling caps in the triangle are 0.1 uF and 1.0 uF electrolythics in the Rams head.

At least that's what they were supposed to be  all electrolythics measured in the nF range as they were completely dried out, resulting in a poor and unstable sustain. Something I've seen more often in Ramsheads.

I've seen the 1.0uf substitution in the "rams head" but what I hear people rave about is the volume boost. What I hear people rave about with the "triangle" is the smooth synth like sustain; part of this tone comes from the use of the 0.1uf's and the .05uf after the diodes. I think the reason the first version of the "Green Russian" is so popular is it has the "triangle" (for the most part) values with the "rams head" volume increase.

[alteredsounds]

I posted this a coupla days ago.  I recently got a Rams Head and find it has a very strong octave effct that I find hard to dial out.  Any1 else notice this?