Yet another Tripple Fuzz build report with the obligatory Tim Escobedo adulation

[Threefish]

Build a Tripple Fuzz! I did! 
If you haven't been to the circuit snippets site, have a look: http://www.geocities.com/tpe123/folkurban/fuzz/snippets.html
It simple. It's fantastic. It's really good too.  I've built it pretty much as presented by Tim E, but did a bit of experimenting with transistors before settling on what I have.

I didn't have access to MPSA18's for Q1, so I tried a few other NPNs in there and compared – PN100, 2N2222 metal can, 2N2222A (the plastic one) 2N3053 metal can, MPSA06, MPSA13 Darlington, and another 2N3094. I liked the PN100 the best. A bit clearer in sound than the others (in a fuzzy way) and retaining a wheency bit more top end. All of the others were darker sounding or flabby to some degree, and a couple really too thick and indistinct.

For Q2 and Q3, I've used a 2N3904 and 2N3906 pair as specced by Tim. Curious about the use of lower gain trannies in some circuits (fuzzface and it's offshoots) or mixing non-similar gain devices (like the original Harmonic Percolator), I tried a lower gain pair for Q2 and Q3. Not really knowing what they were, I put in a BC639/BC640 pair. Yuk. They're probably all wrong for the application, but it cured my curiousity. Clean boost through most of the gain pot's travel and then a sudden transition to unattractive distortion. I swapped the above NPN's through the Q1 socket and got variously crap results. A couple didn't even crack unity gain. I dicked around with some of them in Q2 too. Nup.

So I settled on the good old ordinary PN100/2N3904/2N3906 combo.
I'm so deeply disappointed I couldn't make it sound good with any of the high-mojo metal can transistors  .

Oh, did I mention the sound? The clip at Circuit Snippets is pretty much what I got, though that clip doesn't seem to go quite as far as what I get when I max the gain pot. Pheweeee - I've never been able to produce such a glorious cacophony. If starting my muffler-less lawnmower has always been like opening the door to the mechanical ninth circle of hell, then this is it's dungeon where they torture guitar amps. I was laughing so much I didn't think about how much noise I was making (at 10:30pm), so I turned it down. I turned it up again when I realised that the neighbours could then hear my laughing. Grind! Screech! Feedback! Octave-I-think! Awesome!

The police didn't come. It's all good.

I'll be boxing it up for sure. I think a box with some fake fur all over it would be appropriate.

Thanks Tim E.!!!!!

[rove]

Hey, I thought I would chime in because I just built a tripple fuzz too.  On the Heels of a one knob fat fuzz that I liked the sound of quite a bit, but gave away to a friend, I decided to build the Tripple as I had the transistors and I need to get my vero skills up to par so I can have another go at the SuperFuzz.  I used a MPSa18 and a 3904/3906.  pretty cool sounding fuzz, my complaint was that at high gain settings the fuzz gets rather splatty, not really what I am going for, but interesting.  The first 3/4 of the gain is pretty cool, though.
I put together a RM Axis Fuzz next, and, to my tastes, it is a better sounding fuzz with more useful (to me) sound options ranging to max gain, though I used a 1k pot instead of a 2K for fuzz, so not sure what effect that may be having on the circuit (less gain?).
But hey, thats nothing on Escobedo's circuit, as I said the OKFF was great and I plan to have a go at some more of his designs (anyone try the harmonic jerkulator?  I know not an original, but seems it could be cool).  And I recommend the tripple fuzz to anyone who wants to get into that splatty area above 2pm!!

[tcobretti]

If memory serves, Tim's Jerkulator has some very important differences from the Percolator it is based on.

I guess I am gonna have to build the Tripple Fuzz.

[Ge_Whiz]

I think a box with some fake fur all over it would be appropriate.

You mean, like mine?

[Ge_Whiz]

PS The Harmonic Jerkulator is great, too, in a more garagey-trashy-fuzz kind of way. See ROG's sister site at www.home-wrecker.com.

[Processaurus]

Its worthwhile to try back to back red LEDs for the clipping in the triple fuzz, rather than the diodes, it seems to seperate the different fuzzes more, pick quiet and you get the weird crossover distortion, medium and you get that plus a clean sound mixed in, and then if you pick hard you get the more traditional OD when the LEDs start clipping on top of the crossover distortion.  I'm going to try two of the 3904/3906 sections in series and see what that sounds like, Zvex has hinted that there's something like that going on in the Machine.  "dual frequency tripling... crossover distortion"

EDIT: Or maybe have the two in parallel, with two drive settings, to stagger where the crossover distortion's threshold happens...

Tim's on top of the bang for the buck game, thats for sure.

[Threefish]

You mean, like mine?

  Hehe - yeah, a bit like that. Good stuff Ge_Whiz.

Something I forgot to add was that being too impatient to work out the vero layout myself, I used TCobrettis layout (thanks  )
http://aronnelson.com/gallery/TCobrettis-Stuff/TimeE_Trip_Fuzz_Vero.
It's labelled "Not Verified" - you can remove that now! No probs at all, started up first time.

The Harmonic Jerkulator is my next project.

[tcobretti]

I'm glad it worked.  I have that layout and a pcb I made, but haven't gotten around to building either yet.  So you can tell I want to build it but keep getting distracted.

[Doug_H]

The Tripple is a fun fuzz. One of my faves from a while ago.

[Ge_Whiz]

Note - mine is a 'Tribble' fuzz. 

[rove]

I used Dragonfly's layout fwiw. I tried lifting the diodes and couldn't tell a difference, gonna throw some LEDs in and see where that gets me!

[MartyMart]

+1 on the Tripple Fuzz, thar's a very fine sounding circuit

MM

[Processaurus]

I tried lifting the diodes and couldn't tell a difference,

Lifting the diodes should make the higher gain settings sound cleaner and much louder, because they aren't chopping off the signal at +/- .7v

[rove]

Lifting the diodes should make the higher gain settings sound cleaner and much louder, because they aren't chopping off the signal at +/- .7v

That's what I was expecting as I pretty much always use the diode lift (comp cut) on my screamer clone, but didn't notice anything, Used a switch so I could switch them to ground or off as I wanted to be able to hear a direct comparison.  Unboxed right now, but I do want to try out with some LEDs as I said earlier, so will throw it back together soon...

[JonFrum]

Note - mine is a 'Tribble' fuzz. 

I assume you have a house full of them...