Tools, Tones and Toys for Guitarists
I’m stoked to be back and super stoked to do so with this awesome and very popular pedal from our friends at Xotic Effects. I’m sure many of you have had experience with the “Tremendous Trio” that is the BB Preamp, AC Booster, and this here champ of a stompbox the RC Booster. The Reason … Read more
Here is the ColorSound Bass Fuzz for today’s #fuzzfriday post. It’s pretty much an amputated Big Muff. It’s been tuned for bass guitar and has the gain recovery stage removed (for simplicity I suppose… that and the BMP can be just excessively loud). The first gain stage also doesn’t have the typical diodes a normal … Read more
Here’s an overdrive I stumbled across while browsing the Free Information Society site. It was designed by Jake Nagy and was quite popular in the DIY world at while back. Here’s what he had to say about it: Blue Magic is a very low to medium grit, tube-like, overdrive pedal that is based on a … Read more
Pawel from turretboard.knucklehead.dk (aka sinner from FSB) has very kindly offered for us to post some of his layouts which no longer fit with the theme of his website, and so we’re starting off with the Aria Super Fuzz Sustainer. I can’t find much in the way of marketing info so don’t know what Aria … Read more
The ROG Eighteen is an overdrive/distortion circuit based on the classic 18watt Marshall amp of the late 60s. It uses JFETs in place of tubes, like many other ROG amp-based drive effects. J201s are specified, but socket and try some other JFETs (2N5457, MPF102, etc.) The Volume control will probably act more like a gain … Read more
The ReezaFRATzitz is a high gain overdrive/distortion circuit based around a CMOS chip, most likely a CD4069N or 74HCU04. This layout reflects a modded version by FreeStompboxes member thn.technik with added Bass and Mids controls. Here’s a link to his schematic and build pics. You might be able to squeeze it into 1590B, but you’d … Read more
Here’s a light-medium gain overdrive designed by RNFR from the Apocalypse Audio blog. Here’s what he had to say about it: I thought I would build something that would turn on the guys that were into the lighter side of things- something different than my usual wall of fuzz tones. With the MLOD, you can … Read more
Here’s a cool vintage fuzz circuit from the mid 60s–the WEM Pep Box. It’s probably best known its use by John Lennon during the Revolver sessions. There are two versions of this effect, the first using germanium transistors and the later using silicon. I’ve drawn up layouts for both iterations of the circuit, as there … Read more
Here’s a really simple “transparent overdrive” circuit that was a must have a couple years ago. People compared it to the Klon and Timmy drives. Originals use paper in oil caps, which some claim sound better than modern film or ceramic caps. That’s a debate for another time though. I’ve drawn it up so you … Read more
Here’s a weird one for you–the Shin Ei Octave Box. It’s apparently an all analog clean octave down effect. I’m not going to pretend to understand how it works, but there are a lot of transistors. Originals used 2SC644 and 2SC666 transistors, which I think were in the massive TO-3 package. I’ve drawn the layout … Read more