[PedalPCB Ungula] Hoofing It! Cloning the EQD Hoof...

Fingolfen

Well-known member
Build Rating
5.00 star(s)
Well, I'm either early or late for Fuzz Friday, but I just got this one together and I really like how it came out... for a lot of reasons...

PedalPCB Ungula - Triceratops - 01.jpg

I started with the PedalPCB Ungula board for this project and used mix of vintage and modern parts. The resistors are all modern 1% metal film 1/4W - mostly Yageo, but there are a couple of KOA Speer ones thrown in. The film capacitors are almost all vintage Panasonic, apart from a couple of modern Kemet 6.8nF ones. The MLCC capacitors are all new production. The 2N1308 transistors are in the classic package, but it wasn't immediately clear to me if these are new or old production when I picked them up from Amplified Parts. The 2N3904 transistors are all new production.

PedalPCB Ungula - Triceratops - 02.jpg

The wiring follows sort of my "new" standard for PedalPCB boards with additional ground connections on the board. All of the jack grounds (center negative ground and input and output jack grounds) go to the board. I've been attaching the wires and wrapping the lead in heat shrink tubing on the audio jacks before soldering the ground wire to the board to minimize the ground line length. The PCB itself is attached to the 3PDT daughter board with ribbon cable, and then the input and output leads are run to the jacks.

PedalPCB Ungula - Triceratops - 03.jpg

When my wife was painting up one of the batches of dinosaurs she painted, she worked up a triceratops with what sort of looks like Holstein cow markings, and I thought it would be fun to be the namesake for this particular pedal. I added the details on the top with a mixture of simple geometric shapes and licensed clipart. I even added a triceratops footprint in the bottom corner.

As to the sound, it's a fairly heavy fuzz pedal, but like many fuzz effects, the strength of the effect appears to vary a bit with the pitch of the notes being played - at least on my Boss Katana amp. I need to experiment a bit more with my other amps and guitars to understand the full range of the pedal. Based on some of the demos I've seen, I think it is going to pair better with my Les Pauls and their humbuckers than the hot single coils on my Chapman.

I gave this build 5 stars - very straightforward - very well laid out, and anything with big old style transistors just looks cool!

Original blog reference (with a little more preamble): https://steggostudios.blogspot.com/2022/12/hoofing-it-cloning-eqd-hoof.html
 
Looks great!
Have you measured Vc on Q2 & Q3? How are Q2 & Q3 marked (p/n, LDC. mfgr logo)? All of the 2N1308s I have are marked on the top. Nothing special about 2N1308; EQD has used other p/n Ge trannys. Mine has MP38 in it at the moment,

EQD Hoof internals.jpg

I found the range on the SHIfT control to be much more useful if C10 is increased to 15nF or 22nF.
 
I haven't - I should go back and do that. I'm also going to be building a hoof reaper, and will try your suggestions out on that build as well.

I'll dig up the markings on the transistors, I have more. :D
 
That Reaper is a weird circuit. Although it resembles the Burns Buzzaround, the biasing on Q2 is completely different because D1 is silicon. I experimented with it a while back and the leakage on Q2 is critical. Too much or too little and it's very gated. C6 is backwards on the schematic and board. At least EQD got the diodes in the Octave-Up circuit facing the right way this time.
 
I'm using the War Scythe board for the builds at this point - what do you see as good leakage for Q2 on the reaper side?
 
Something that will bias Q2-C in the middle. Iceo around 500μA is a good starting point. Kinda depends on the desired tone. If you want some splatty gating, then go for Iceo much higher or much lower. Not my favorite circuit. Definitely worth breadboarding first. The 2nd stage could easily be modded to "bee" a Buzzaround. Just look at the Gnat schematic and you'll see what I mean.
 
Back
Top