"Problem" with Q1 in Tychobrahe, 'what is it doing' ?

[petemoore]

  What's up with Q1 in TYcho ?
  It looks like a reversed polarity, upside down boost or gain stage.
  But then there's that emitter which looks like it recieves feedback from Q3c.
  Love the effect as it is, I just want it to be different, lol, no just kidding.
  I just want to understand it better so I can try to use the later part [transformer and diodes] in a similar but different way.
  Or just understand it better.
  How did it get to be 'twisted around' like it is ? Great forethough, rare stroke of luck, or some other epiphone of realization must have occured to produce this circuit. Someone almost had to have a twisted idea... 'upsidedownPNP' and NPN mixed together, feedback loop.
  Is there a logical reason behind the topology, and polarities of the 3 transistor circuit?

[Mark Hammer]

Analogguru sent me a note last month, along with links to some scans of early Roger Mayer devices that suggest the transistor actually goes the other way - i.e., the emitter and collector are reversed in most of the drawing we are familiar with.  I have yet to flip that transistor around on mine and find out what the difference is, but maybe you'd like to, and report back.  Perhaps flipping it around will aso solve the conceptual mystery for you too.

I might point out that there was a period almost a decade ago when early draws of the Bosstone fuzz had one of the transistors flipped around the wrong way as well.  It happens.

[snoof]

amz has an article on this type of thing...

http://www.muzique.com/lab/reverse.htm

[earthtonesaudio]

If you're talking about this version:
http://www.generalguitargadgets.com/pdf/ggg_toct_sc_improved.pdf

I'm pretty sure it's bootstrapping Q3.  And also remember the emitter can be an input, not just an output, hence it's also providing feedback for Q3.

But it's not backwards.  Just looks weird.

[Paul Perry (Frostwave)]

It helps if you consider that  - from the point of view of the AC sgnal - the + rail and ground, are both 'ground', in the sense that they are - for AC signals - connected together by the power supply and any filter cap.
Back in the early days, it was common to see both NPN and PNP transistors next to each other, often it helped with the bias arrangements.