Help Pick-a-Fuzz

[pryde]

Hello Fuzz lovers

I am looking for suggestions on my next fuzz adventure  . I already have a KILLER Fuzz Face and Tonebender MKii that I love so just looking for something different, cool, unique, so on.

My loose criteria is:

nothing overtly wacky and mostly unusable (glitch, splaty, farty stuff)
something that offers a different tone/flavor than my FF or TB
I don't want anything I have already built/tried:

-Big muff (don't remember what version I tried, might be open to another try)
-fuzz factory
-silicone FF
-soulbender
-Wolfshirt (maybe open to another octive up/down fuzz though?)
-mid-fi clarinot

Obviously I like germanium, classic stuff but am open to Si as well. Initial thoughts are:
Harmonic perk
buzzaround
maestro Fz-1
tychobrane octavia
Standard fuzz  

What say yee? thanks for all your input!

 

[gtr2]

Actually, I recently played a colorsound overdriver and really liked it.  Brian has a pcb for one.  The cherrybomb I believe, I need to pick one up on my next order.

Josh

[stecykmi]

FY2 shin ei companion fuzz

the wooly mammoth is also sweet, but i much prefer it for bass.

[Haberdasher]

if you want to try something different in a muff i can etch you a rog 22/7 or a darkside
lunar module is enjoyable
the perc is different enough to stand out.  I would recommend.
the colorsound od is a bit fizzy for my taste and all the gain is bunched up at the end.   but it is one awesome clean boost!
don't forget about snack shack and sabertooth

[juansolo]

Ah fuzz, my favourite subject. Everytime I order a board from bean I chuck another Mudbunny on there to try a different muff.

Muffs can be HOOOOOOOGELY different from one another. But my advice would be to go with the Skreddys. Some of them are truly epic. The P19 is stonking for soloing, the Lady is just the meanest, deepest thing I've ever come across, the Mayo being a great all rounder. You could even try our TBN (*still* can't think of a name for it!). All the Mudbunny numbers for those are in my muffs spreadsheet.

The Cherry Bomb (Colorsound Overdriver) may be an OD, but wind up the Bass, Vol and Gain and it gets evil. Massive output and yet still quite defined. Beast of a thing.

Josh's Buzzsaw is the daddy of late though. It can turn out a multitude of vintage fuzz tones, without the drawbacks of Ge transistors. I can dial in my fuzz face tone to the point that you can't tell which is which. But it's way more versatile than that. I highly recommend building one of these if you love fuzz.

[juansolo]

the colorsound od is a bit fizzy for my taste and all the gain is bunched up at the end.

C10K gain pot sorts that out perfectly. We've done that on all ours.


Thumbs up on the 22/7 though. Can be a bit noisy, get a Fairchild CMOS if you can as it seems to fare better than the others out there when it comes to noise.

[raulduke]

I agree with Juan; If you haven't tried out the Mayo circuit yet, do it!

Its a fantastic Muff (the best?).

Also, the Catalinbread Merkin is worth a try.

[Bret608]

These all sound good. Among the list you mentioned though, I would highly recommend a Harmonic Percolator or Buzzaround. The Percolator in particular is just a different flavor than most things out there.

[GermanCdn]

I've built a lot of fuzzes as of late, although truthfully they're not my favourite.  That being said, the ones I've found really stand out as of late are Josh's Buzz Saw (Bee Baa) and Brian's Retrograde (Octavia).  The Buzz Saw can alternate between a traditional-ish style fuzz and almost a DS-1 type distortion, actually quite versatile.  As far as the Retrograde goes, the stand alone fuzz is quite nice, and I've wired up the octave to a second foot switch, and it's just nuts.  In a good way.

Anyway, those would be my two suggestions for the time being.  I've got Jacob's Standard Fuzz in the queue, just waiting for a couple of transistors.

Curtis

[pryde]

Awesome suggestions...a lot of stuff to chew on. I will look into all the recommendations.

So, I will for sure check out Josh's buzzsaw based on a few recommendations. Also, I do love Skreddy stuff (I have a Cosmo) so maybe a muff variant is in order as well.

Speaking of Catalinbread, besides the Merkin has anyone tried the Manx Loaghtan? I think its a muff with a baxandall tone circuit. seams pretty cool?

[GhostofJohnToad]

I'm kinda in a fuzz mode myself.  I've been real interested in the Manx as well. 
I am currently building a Mayo on the mudbunny board.  Going to try all carbon comp resistors and ceramic disc caps like skreddy recommends; of course I won't have the trannys but ah well it'll still be fun.

Two more fuzzes to consider: the Pharaoh and the Musket.  I built a vero Pharaoh, just haven't had the time to get it tested.  Had to debug my Triple Wreck first.  Glad I did, it rocks!

[BraindeadAudio]

Make a muff with a mid knob and use full germanium diodes for clipping, 1n34a. Wire in a power starve knob as seen on Beavis audio, and have fun. At more extreme settings using hi power 70s tube heads (Ampeg V4/SUNN model T/Hiwatt) youll get a really crushing tone depending on the transistors you use.

[Ettore_M]

This won't be helpful, but I've built Beavis's Fuzzlab Jr (Yeah! The one with the 10 pots and two switches!  ) and playing with it, I was getting some of the best fuzz tones I've listened! Even though, it can be really versatile (10 knobs!!) and thinking that it's a Fuzz Face with a LPB booster before it, it's TOO complicated and a pain in the ass to build! 

Hector

[dwstanford]

My suggestions are:  civil war muff, meathead, fuzzrite (merkin fuzz version), mkiii tonebender, rangemaster (not really a fuzz, but in fuzz territory. My favorite pedal ever.)

[pryde]

THanks for all the suggestions here. Here is what I have on deck to build:

Skreddy Mayo
Skreddy P19
1776 Buzzsaw
Retrograde

I may or may not keep them all, not sure till I play em for a while. Really looking forward to the Muff variants.