Tools, Tones and Toys for Guitarists
Not strictly my layout, as this is a copy of the original Sola Sound Tone Bender MKII board. This is a little different to most MKII schematics, as it has a 10k resistor from base to ground on Q1, and a 47k on the collector of Q2. I’ve read that this is best for leaky … Read more
And on the eighth day… well not exactly that long ago, but close – and yes others came before, but it’s hard to not acknowledge the Arbiter Fuzz Face as being a giant of vintage fuzz, a design icon if you like, with possibly the most widely recognised enclosure ever made. It’s hard not to like a Fuzz … Read more
I just realised that I had not posted a Sola Sound Tone Bender MKII layout… I did the Marshall Supa Fuzz earlier, which is kind of same same but the layout caters for larger mojo parts, and even the D*A*M MKII hybrid for a silicon / germanium monster. For completeness, here’s the MKII. SOLA SOUND TONE … Read more
The Park Fuzz Sound is a two knob Tone Bender MKIII – I guess they thought who turns the fuzz down anyway, and it will save money on knobs and pots. PARK FUZZ SOUND – POINT TO POINT LAYOUT
So yet another variation on the Tone Bender MKIII… but which one came first? This quite possibly predates the Sola Sound Tone Bender MKIII, and was supposedly designed by Gary Hurst. The originals were built on tagboard, and you can find a very accurate replication of this here NTK213 transistors aren’t essential – like … Read more
A slightly smaller point to point layout for the Sola Sound Tone Bender MKIV than the other in my post (for bigger mojo parts). Of course you can build any Tone Bender MKIII or MKIV from this layout. SOLA SOUND TONE BENDER MKIV – COMPACT POINT TO POINT LAYOUT NOTE: voltages shown are … Read more
Apart from sounding cool, the main claim to fame for the WEM Project V is that it was used by Brian Eno. It’s a little known but quite amazing sounding guitar effect from the late sixties / early seventies. WEM PROJECT V DESIGN It’s really quite different to the usual suspects in terms of circuit design … Read more
Basically the Marshall Supa Fuzz is a Sola Sound Tone Bender MKII, but with some different capacitor values and it uses Mullard OC75s for all three transistors. It sounds killer, and cleans up really nicely using the volume control on the guitar. When you hear the fuzz, it’s hard to imagine the clean sound, the fuzz … Read more
The Colorsound Tone Bender Distortion, one of the lesser known Tone Benders – which also happens to be a recent D*A*M collaboration with Colorsound (Macari’s Music), who released a faithful reproduction using original circuit boards after some were found in a basement. More information can be found on the D*A*M forum which is a very handy … Read more