More low end UberDrive

[Wizardofwoz66]

Buddy of mine asked me to build him an UberDrive with more low end retention - what's the best way to do this? Looking at the schematic, a few options stick out, increasing C1 or C2, decreasing C3, decreasing C4, increasing R9/decreasing C5? I know removing C6 is popular though unless I'm dumb, that would increase high end I think? Thanks for any input!

Derek

 

[neiltheseal]

I would start by increasing c3. That’s what I do on tube screamers.

 

[Wizardofwoz66]

I would start by increasing c3. That’s what I do on tube screamers.

Nice, thanks! Maybe a noob question, why does increasing that cap help to retain lower frequencies? I had missed that it was between signal/Vref, I thought it was signal/ground based on how his schematics are typically laid out, if it was signal/ground then decreasing it would help to retain low end but not sure why increasing it when between signal/Vref increases it. If there's a helpful link (something on Electrosmash etc) I'd be interested in checking it out too.

Thanks!
Derek

 

[Wizardofwoz66]

I would start by increasing c3. That’s what I do on tube screamers.

Nevermind, I see now. I missed that this was not a junction lol. Makes a lot more sense now

 

[neiltheseal]

I honestly don't know why it works, (I'm not a theory guy) all I can say is that it does.

Here is my tube screamer schematic with a bass control. The bass pot adds quite a lot of bass to the circuit, so much that I had to adjust the tone section to compensate for it.