A lesson learned....

[Dragonfly]

I love fuzz pedals....i like the nasty ones, the smooth ones, etc...and in my quest for the ultimate fuzz for me, i've built TONS of 'em. One that never quite "did it" for me was the venerable Fuzz Face...sure it was good, but it always fell short of what i was looking for. Namely, a nice high gain fuzz that cleans up well and isnt muddy...but it still has to be "smooth".  Yeah, i know youre thinking "change the input and output caps", Q2's resistance to ground, etc, etc. Well, for some reason (though i cant explain why) i never felt "compelled" to really mess with the circuit...after all, it's supposed to be the "Godfather" of fuzzes

That brings us to tonite.....

So i had some free hours, plenty of parts, and a hot soldering iron...basically a recipe for trouble ...and for some unknown reason, i decided to build a "plain old Fuzz Face", exactly as the schematics go, no mods or anything. In fact, the only thing i did was use sockets for Q1 and Q2, which is fairly standard practice...so nothing special at all. My whole "goal" in this build was to test a bunch of PNP transistors...mostly a ton of Germanium ones i have here. Some rare, some considered "Holy Grail transistors", some that my father gave me (among other things, he's an EE) that i had never even heard of, and some quite commonly available.

With that in mind, i built the circuit, gathered my PNP transistors, and set about to testing. Also, keep in mind that "conventional wisdom" states that as long as theyre within a certan hFE range, germanium transistors are said to sound quite similar to one another, so people generally use the different types interchangably.

My "test rig" was my standard home rig...a Les Paul and a Tele through a 1956 narrow panel tweed Fender Harvard.

Here are the types of trannies i tested, and had anywhere from 10-25 of each available, so there was LOTS of swapping going on. And i can assure you that regardless of what conventional wisdom says, there was certainly tonal differences in the Germanium trannies, even when they were very close in hFE.

*AC128
*OC44
*NTE102
*NTE103
*NTE126
*NTE158
*2N501
*2N396
*2N1526
*2N3906 (the only silicon tranny tested)
*and some "unidentified ones" i got from Small Bear

I felt like i was swapping transistors forever

anyway, i wont go into the long and boring details, as many of these are wierd, obsolete, and obscure transistors...but let me just say that i was surprised with the results...

After lots and lots of back and forth testing, i found the EXACT sound i was looking for...and it wasnt from the oddball trannies or the "Holy Grail" trannies !!! For me, and the higher gain, clear tone "i" was looking for, i preferred the sound of the 2N3906 in Q1, and one of the the NTE158's in Q2 !!!!  Surprised the heck out of me...turns out that you can not only use trannies to get more or less gain in this circuit, but also as "EQ's" in a sense.

Another thing i noticed that almost ALL of these transistors, even those with dreadfully low gain, sounded quite good qith the 2N3906 in Q1...it seems that you can take an otherwise useless (in this circuit) tranny and have it sound pretty darn good in Q2, as long as theres a 2N3906 in Q1 ! Sure, some still have more gain than others, but i was even able to use some low gain (hFE in the high 50's to low 70's) and get a great, bluesy fuzz sound! Not what "i" was looking for, but quite useful none the less.

So heres the moral to the story.... TRUST YOUR EARS, NOT WHAT SOMEONE TELLS YOU, OR WHAT YOU READ !  i had basically given up on the Fuzz Face, even though i had matched sets of transistors specifically selected for it...but these little common 2N3906's and NTE158's taught me a valuable lesson tonite !

As always, YMMV ....  

[Ge_Whiz]

Hmmm... Clearly, the Force is strong in this one...

[bioroids]

Cool  

It all depends on what kind of sound you want to get I suppose.

Me, I'm still playing my good old Easy Face, wich is esencially what you described (2N3906 on Q1, Small Bear selected transistor on Q2) (with a switch for the input cap)

Did you tried piggybacking a Si trannie on Q2? I never done that but it's supposed to be really great

Luck!

Miguel

[Dragonfly]

Cool  



Did you tried piggybacking a Si trannie on Q2? I never done that but it's supposed to be really great

Luck!

Miguel

nope...just tried 'em the "old fashioned" way

[stm]

Just for the record, can you post the actual HFE's of both trannies?

[GreenEye]

I had a similar experience of sorts on a much smaller scale.  Tried out a germanium NTE101 as Q1 in the Hornet and it sounded like crap.  Instead of wasting more money on expensive and rare germaniums just to find one that sounded halfway decent, I dropped in a 2N5088 in its place (which is the same as Q2), and it worked great.

[jayp5150]

I just built a silicon FF, and got it to be the way I wanted it with a 2n3904 at Q1, and a 2n5089 in Q2.  Of course, I really didn't have much else on hand, but that seemed to work really well for what I wanted.

I'm one step further than you, Dragonfly, I didn't even think I liked Fuzz at all!   I've been an idiot for the past 13 years, I guess.

[H.Manback]

I've built a Fuzz Face and currently use a 2SB175 in Q1 and a 2SB178 in Q2, both Japanese trannies, and they sound very good.... on the right amp!

The most annoying part of the Fuzz is the unbelievable variety in tone with different amps. The thing sounds okayish on my practice amp, a fender sidekick 25, but when I tested it on a Marshall Valvestate the sound was incredibly full and heavy in a good way. Unfortunately I haven't had the chance to try it on a whole range of amps, so I don't really know what really suits a fuzz face.

Also I completely agree with you on the listen for your self moral of your story. It is tempting to read what others have experienced and take that as the one truth, but the reality is, some hate Silicium Fuzzes (me included, I don't like the harshness it gives to the fuzz), some love m. In the end you have to figure out what you like best.

It's like saying the 6L6 is the best output tube in a certain amp.

[Paul Marossy]

Very interesting. Thanks for sharing that with us.  

[aron]

Thanks for the info!

Very cool!

[Paul Perry (Frostwave)]

The most annoying part of the Fuzz is the unbelievable variety in tone with different amps. The thing sounds okayish on my practice amp, a fender sidekick 25, but when I tested it on a Marshall Valvestate the sound was incredibly full and heavy in a good way. Unfortunately I haven't had the chance to try it on a whole range of amps, so I don't really know what really suits a fuzz face.

Does a fuzzface have an unusually high output impedance?
I'm just wondering why the sound should be amp dependant (that is, more so than usual).
If it DOES have a high output impedance, it may be possible to tweak it with a small cap on the output, or more resistance in series with the output, or both..

[BD13UK]

I've only messed about in a very amateur fashion as I dont have the skills to do high class work but I stuck 2x AC128's in a FF circuit nothing fancy just the original scheme and it sounded really nice, wasn't toooo fuzzy but enough for my requirements, I dont particularly like extreme fuzz and this reminded me of Hendrix circa the Experience album and it cleaned up really well also which was great for someone who didn't have a clue about what he was doing in all honesty

[mojotron]

After lots and lots of back and forth testing, i found the EXACT sound i was looking for...and it wasnt from the oddball trannies or the "Holy Grail" trannies !!! For me, and the higher gain, clear tone "i" was looking for, i preferred the sound of the 2N3906 in Q1, and one of the the NTE158's in Q2 !!!!  Surprised the heck out of me...turns out that you can not only use trannies to get more or less gain in this circuit, but also as "EQ's" in a sense.

Actually, I had played nearly 30 years before I tried a fuzz face - which sounds wierd, but I was a fusion player for many years, used BOSS + my DIY gear - I was almost always happy... Then I tried a really crappy JH FF, but there was something in the sound I liked... so I decided I would build one.... boredom I guess...

After a month, I went through the same exercise - with about 150 different Ge transistors - cost a fortune! But, I had the same thoughts - there are some guidelines, but you have to trust your ears... I ended up with a Q1 with an NTE102 (hfe=70) and Q2 with an NTE102a (hfe=160).... Q2 has a really soft sound and Q1 is kind of brittle - the 2 together with the gain differential got the sound I wanted - which was equally good as a  low end boost (on the boutique fuzz circuit w/fuzz @ 50%, contour @ 0% and use bias @ 0-50% as a gain knob) this so cool that most of the time I'm playing I only have this pedal going into the amp - great breakup.... As a fuzz (everything but the volume 100%) I like a big output cap - and it is a mean it guets w/really nice 2nd harmonic and feedback at about  40% volume......

The other observation I found was that on a Si circuit, most transistors sound very much alike.... I use some BC109s, but I like 2n3904 for Q1 and 2n5088s for Q2.... it is totally what your ear wants....