owlexifry
Well-known member
i was always impressed by the Ritual fuzz when i was trying out 1-knob fuzz face variants, so when i came across the Oath - and then the Destroyer - i was quite intrigued by the lineage/associated variants.
[Oath = Revelation SuperBass w/ fixed/no controls = Pharaoh w/ no tone circuit & final output gain stage]
the Black Arts Toneworks Destroyer is a Ritual and an Oath in one box, with the Ritual slamming the Oath.
in the genuine product(s) there is only a volume control for the Ritual, and the Oath is preset/hardwired at full volume
in this build I have included an external (linear) volume control for the Oath, and used a log taper for the Ritual volume.
the only other Oath mod is a 39K input resistor - as per the Black Arts Pharaoh that it's based on (instead of 470K that appears to be in numerous genuine unit gutshots i’ve seen)
it’s a silicon fuzz face and a big muff in one box, so it was pretty hard to not wanna build one.
I'm sure many are familiar with the silicon fuzz face/Ritual fuzz sound, but hot damn - that oath/revelation superbass is epic - unrelenting, thick, full bass yet still mid-forward, growling distortion.
and together - boy howdy, what a gigantic thick wall of fuzz and sustain.
and with judicious control of the Ritual volume, you can control how insanely thick and burly you want it, or you can back it down to something smoother than what the Oath is capable of on it's own.
here it is.
behold the grind
the ritual schematic is well known and verified, but i was shit out of luck finding a verified schematic for the Destroyer or an Oath.
this has been an absolute PITA for the execution of my build - because none of the layouts have schematic references, and they all appear to have different ideas about what the schematic is.
I recall breadboarding it all last year based on a few vero layouts and x1 fuzzdog schematic for the Revelation SuperBass (which i’ve now found appears to have an error), really liked it, made a vero board, and then left it for about a year until recently i thought i’d get back to it.
once again i was a dummy and just assumed the vero layout i was following and built the board for was correct..
i built it per the layout and then during testing found the Oath just sounded too blown out - like crazy amounts of blocking distortion if i didn’t dial down the guitar volume. wasn't great.
this sent me on a spiral of further investigation for the Oath schematic/layout, examining gutshots, and finding new gutshots i didn’t see last year during breadboarding, and i can now conclude based on what im seeing in photos:
- the Oath & Revelation SuperBass layouts and schematic that indicate a 100R emitter resistor on Q1 must be incorrect.
multiple gutshots confirm that this is 1K. (my breadboard build appears to support this too).
- the Pharaoh / glyph fuzz that the Revelation SuperBass is supposedly based on also has a 1K in this position.
- despite Black Arts never actually ever saying this, a myth has been parroted all over that the Oath is a Revelation SuperBass with all of the controls fixed at max/dimed. it appears that while the gain and volume are indeed dimed, the pregain control appears to be set at minimum - as indicated by a 470K appearing before the 10uF input cap. since the Oath is built on a Revelation board, gutshots of Revelation SuperBass builds have also been reviewed when considering input routing.
so I built the Oath on a breadboard to investigate and confirm, and compared some of these values:
- 1K vs. 100R
- 470K vs.no input resistor
- 390K v. 39K input resistor (per Pharaoh)
- 470K input pulldown resistor v. none (as alleged in a couple vero layouts)
in the end, a 470K input resistor just didn’t make sense to me. it sounded ok, but it was just too weak and lacked sustain compared to 0 or a 39K.
- i decided to go with a 39K as per the Pharoah (and I will continue to be confounded by the 470K input resistor seen in numerous gutshots)
- and a 1K emittor resistor on Q1. (100R sounds awful)
had to retrofit the 39K, so I went with a big boy 1W for physical stability lol.
Oath
it's just occurred to me - an Oath could probably be built on a Glyph Fuzz board with just a simple jumper mod.
(Ritual)
[Oath = Revelation SuperBass w/ fixed/no controls = Pharaoh w/ no tone circuit & final output gain stage]
the Black Arts Toneworks Destroyer is a Ritual and an Oath in one box, with the Ritual slamming the Oath.
in the genuine product(s) there is only a volume control for the Ritual, and the Oath is preset/hardwired at full volume
in this build I have included an external (linear) volume control for the Oath, and used a log taper for the Ritual volume.
the only other Oath mod is a 39K input resistor - as per the Black Arts Pharaoh that it's based on (instead of 470K that appears to be in numerous genuine unit gutshots i’ve seen)
it’s a silicon fuzz face and a big muff in one box, so it was pretty hard to not wanna build one.
I'm sure many are familiar with the silicon fuzz face/Ritual fuzz sound, but hot damn - that oath/revelation superbass is epic - unrelenting, thick, full bass yet still mid-forward, growling distortion.
and together - boy howdy, what a gigantic thick wall of fuzz and sustain.
and with judicious control of the Ritual volume, you can control how insanely thick and burly you want it, or you can back it down to something smoother than what the Oath is capable of on it's own.
here it is.
behold the grind
the ritual schematic is well known and verified, but i was shit out of luck finding a verified schematic for the Destroyer or an Oath.
this has been an absolute PITA for the execution of my build - because none of the layouts have schematic references, and they all appear to have different ideas about what the schematic is.
I recall breadboarding it all last year based on a few vero layouts and x1 fuzzdog schematic for the Revelation SuperBass (which i’ve now found appears to have an error), really liked it, made a vero board, and then left it for about a year until recently i thought i’d get back to it.
once again i was a dummy and just assumed the vero layout i was following and built the board for was correct..
i built it per the layout and then during testing found the Oath just sounded too blown out - like crazy amounts of blocking distortion if i didn’t dial down the guitar volume. wasn't great.
this sent me on a spiral of further investigation for the Oath schematic/layout, examining gutshots, and finding new gutshots i didn’t see last year during breadboarding, and i can now conclude based on what im seeing in photos:
- the Oath & Revelation SuperBass layouts and schematic that indicate a 100R emitter resistor on Q1 must be incorrect.
multiple gutshots confirm that this is 1K. (my breadboard build appears to support this too).
- the Pharaoh / glyph fuzz that the Revelation SuperBass is supposedly based on also has a 1K in this position.
- despite Black Arts never actually ever saying this, a myth has been parroted all over that the Oath is a Revelation SuperBass with all of the controls fixed at max/dimed. it appears that while the gain and volume are indeed dimed, the pregain control appears to be set at minimum - as indicated by a 470K appearing before the 10uF input cap. since the Oath is built on a Revelation board, gutshots of Revelation SuperBass builds have also been reviewed when considering input routing.
so I built the Oath on a breadboard to investigate and confirm, and compared some of these values:
- 1K vs. 100R
- 470K vs.no input resistor
- 390K v. 39K input resistor (per Pharaoh)
- 470K input pulldown resistor v. none (as alleged in a couple vero layouts)
in the end, a 470K input resistor just didn’t make sense to me. it sounded ok, but it was just too weak and lacked sustain compared to 0 or a 39K.
- i decided to go with a 39K as per the Pharoah (and I will continue to be confounded by the 470K input resistor seen in numerous gutshots)
- and a 1K emittor resistor on Q1. (100R sounds awful)
had to retrofit the 39K, so I went with a big boy 1W for physical stability lol.
Oath
it's just occurred to me - an Oath could probably be built on a Glyph Fuzz board with just a simple jumper mod.
(Ritual)
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good to see my findings might have some value beyond just a one off build