Tools, Tones and Toys for Guitarists
The Sola Sound Tone Bender MKI was one of the first fuzz pedals available in the UK. Designed by Gary Hurst it was the British response to the American made Gibson Maestro Fuzz Tone FZ-1. Although the circuits are similar (Gary Hurst based the circuit around the FZ-1 structure) the Tone Bender has a much … Read more
Request. This will allow you to use the better quality PNP germanium transistors, but keep a negative ground so it can be daisy chained with all you other NPN effects.
The Vox Tonebender circuit ranks as one of the earliest Fuzz Pedals available. Here’s some info from http://www.legendarytones.com/fuzz%20feast1.html: “The oldest fuzz in our collection, this 1966 Vox Tone Bender was made famous by that group of British lads known as the Beatles. This unit is a simple design, uses two germanium transistors and is built, and … Read more
The Dallas Rangemaster is probably one of the best known vintage effects out there. A simple germanium treble booster it was used throughout the 60’s to boost the inputs of typically “dark” sounding British amps of the time to create a huge wall of overdriven valve tone. Used by a load of guitar greats for … Read more
Designed by culturejam on FSB and CW, this is what he wrote: Inspired by the Crap-Fi Delay by allesz, I decided to see if a similar simple circuit would work at lower delay times for reverb and slapback. It does. Once the basic circuit was up and running, earthtones helped me refine it and make … Read more
Requested by a few people. This uses a vactrol but it might work with a roll your own LDR if you want to give it a try. The spec of the VTL5C1 is 600 ohm on resistance and 50M ohm off resistance. If you would prefer a tempo rate LED instead of a standard always … Read more
It’s supposed to do Dumble, Marshall and the original Zendrive tones – I’ll tell you now; it’s a straight Zendrive clone with a clipping diode switch and using the 4558 opamp instead of the AD712 op amp in the original Zendrive. More info on tanabe.tv: http://www.tanabe.tv/top/kudou/index-e.html Here’s a cheeky Mag review: Here’s a demo of the … Read more
[Updated 4th July 2014 – correction to treble control resistors] And an even simpler version using true bypass switching, and so omitting the buffer components. Verified.
Here’s a Wah Wah I’ve built. It’s based around the old Vox Wah (How can you tell!?) but it’s got a few cool extras: 1) Input and output buffers so you can use it with all your stompboxes without it playing tricks on you. 2) Adjustable “Blend” control which allows you to blend in some … Read more
[Updated 4th July 2014 – correction to treble control resistors] This is an easier build and is perfect for someone who wants the Klon tones without having to mess around buying charge pumps and curing squeals. This came from a thread on FSB where earthtonesaudio wrote the following: The charge pump in the Klon seems … Read more