Sunflower Fuzz (Analogman Surface Ge)

[MichaelW]

Build Rating

5.00 star(s)

After converting my 5lb Bag of Gold "Fuzz" into a 4 knob pedal by exposing the internal bias trimmer as an external control, I had an empty pre-drilled 3 knob 1590b that needed something to go in it.

Since a lot of the PedalPCB catalog uses this same knob layout I didn't need to look too far in my pile of PCB's to find a suitable candidate.

I stripped the gold metallic paint off with some acetone and repainted the enclosure with a new paint. This is a different brand of "hammered finish" than I used before (the ones I tried before would just never cure for me). This paint really worked out well, it was dry enough to handle within the hour and dry enough to build without scuffing in 2-3 hours. AND they had this cool pewter color that I like.
Happy with it so far. I have the same paint in a dark hammered finish as well. I do think that there is a technique to getting the dimples to be even in the spray, I haven't figured it out yet, maybe misting from a bit further away might do be the trick. Still I'm happy with the way this turned out.

Having built the BC108 version of this pedal, I've been sitting on this board for a while waiting for some new Ge trannies to come in from the Ukraine. I just couldn't bring myself to pay what they're going for locally. Well, I decided to peruse my stash of "mostly" mid to low gain GE trannies and managed to find a couple in the proper-ish gain ranges. Q1 is 74 hfe and Q2 is 119 hfe. I started out with a P32 in Q1 at 84 but then swapped it out for an MP28B. Q2 is one of the last high gain PNP's in my stash until my order shows up. According to the tracking it's scheduled for a Jan 2 delivery , but my past experience buying from this Ebay seller is that usually it takes about 5 weeks, so I expect them to show up soon.

This was a super quick build, super simple board with very few components. Yet it sounds awesome! I think I may play around with Q1 some more tomorrow. I biased by ear for tone and output, but I may pull out the DMM tomorrow and see what's what.

I really like the Surface layout with the external bias, I find I like it set pretty far CCW on this pedal.
I got a chance for a few minutes to put it side by side with my BC108 SandSpur Build.
I think I might like the Si version a tad more, but every time I think that, I play a Ge fuzz and I'm like "yaaaaahhhhhhhhbaby!".
So I dunno, I like them both. The BC108 for a bit more zing and articulation and the Ge version for more "rrrrrrrrrrzbzzzzzzzzz".

It doesn't look quite as "blue" in person as it does in these pics.





There's just no way to elegantly fit those GT402B's in a 1590b enclosure......
This my first pass, then swapping out Q1 after testing it a bit. May swap it yet again a little lower gain.



This where I ended up tonight before bagging it, probably more tranny swapping tomorrow and bias tweaking before screwing the cover on.



Pair of Sundials.....Si and Ge

 

[swyse]

Love the knob sizes! I've been thinking about fuzz faces for a few days now. When you set the internal bias, where do you set the external pot?

 

[szukalski]

Those knobs need googly eyes!

Great build! I recently built a Ge Sunflower with a GT402. I felt it was one of my cleanest builds. Forgot to snap a pic before sending it to a friend who wanted a FF

Love the knob sizes! I've been thinking about fuzz faces for a few days now. When you set the internal bias, where do you set the external pot?

The external pot is for fine-tuning for temperature fluctuations affecting the germanium (or just because you want different sounds). So you leave it in the middle, then bias the internal trim pot. That way, you have the most range above and below the "correct" bias point.

 

[Hirti]

Nice builds, especially love the big knobs May I ask where you bought the high gain PNP? I have quite a lot of low gain PNPs but lacking the high gains currently

 

[HamishR]

You always do a clean, quality build.

 

[MichaelW]

Love the knob sizes! I've been thinking about fuzz faces for a few days now. When you set the internal bias, where do you set the external pot?

At noon. I'm wondering if maybe I should set it at max then set the internal trimmer.

 

[MichaelW]

Nice builds, especially love the big knobs May I ask where you bought the high gain PNP? I have quite a lot of low gain PNPs but lacking the high gains currently

That's kinda my problem right now. I've bought from this seller....
Read the description for the gain ranges.

 

[szukalski]

Nice builds, especially love the big knobs May I ask where you bought the high gain PNP? I have quite a lot of low gain PNPs but lacking the high gains currently

I've had good experience with 2N1307/2N1309 from minifux1 on ebay. I've had a lot of higher gain (100+) examples from them, though I prefer the sound of Russian Ge vs American (nothing EQ can't fix, I'm sure).

My challenge is finding leaky PNP..

 

[Feral Feline]

Love the pewter colour.

Colour reminds me of my friend's cat, who was named "Pewter".


Here's an idea for laying out the transistor on the right (going towards the jacks) to be like the one on the left (going towards the footswitch) — solder that big red chiclet on the other side of the board, if there's room — looks like it'd clear the pot still. With the C3 chiclet laid down on the back side, you'd be able to lay the right-side trans down over the resistors toward the footswitch.

 

[MichaelW]

Love the pewter colour.

Colour reminds me of my friend's cat, who was named "Pewter".


Here's an idea for laying out the transistor on the right (going towards the jacks) to be like the one on the left (going towards the footswitch) — solder that big red chiclet on the other side of the board, if there's room — looks like it'd clear the pot still. With the C3 chiclet laid down on the back side, you'd be able to lay the right-side trans down over the resistors toward the footswitch.

Or skip the chiclet and just use a regular box film cap but put it underneath. Then there would be plenty of room to lay the 402B down. But....I haven't fully committed to that tranny yet hahahaha.....

 

[MobyOctopad]

I've had good experience with 2N1307/2N1309 from minifux1 on ebay. I've had a lot of higher gain (100+) examples from them, though I prefer the sound of Russian Ge vs American (nothing EQ can't fix, I'm sure).

My challenge is finding leaky PNP..

If memory serves correctly, those GT403s @MichaelW linked to are supposedly some of the leakiest of the Russian transistor types. I'm in the middle of a move right now or I'd test my batch of them, but maybe someone else has a batch to confirm whether or not that's true?

 

[MichaelW]

If memory serves correctly, those GT403s @MichaelW linked to are supposedly some of the leakiest of the Russian transistor types. I'm in the middle of a move right now or I'd test my batch of them, but maybe someone else has a batch to confirm whether or not that's true?

Could be, I just picked that link randomly for the seller. I have no experience with those

 

[andare]

I don't understand the need for two 5k bias pots. Why not just have a 10k external pot, bias it properly then attach the knob so it points up? Or am I missing something?

EDIT: I just noticed that Analog Mike asked me to hook him up with some Polish transistors on TGP after I mentioned they were cheap and sounded great in a FF. LOL like I have a lead on the quantities he needs

 

[Harry Klippton]

I don't understand the need for two 5k bias pots. Why not just have a 10k external pot, bias it properly then attach the knob so it points up? Or am I missing something?

EDIT: I just noticed that Analog Mike asked me to hook him up with some Polish transistors on TGP after I mentioned they were cheap and sounded great in a FF. LOL like I have a lead on the quantities he needs

I've always thought of it like the whole bias sweep isn't "usable" so the internal trimmer keeps the sweep of the external knob in the habitable zone

 

[MichaelW]

I've always thought of it like the whole bias sweep isn't "usable" so the internal trimmer keeps the sweep of the external knob in the habitable zone

With my limited experience with the BC108 and Ge versions I would concur with Will. The "in-line" bias split the biasing into two sections with the internal one getting you "in the ballpark" then the external one for adjustments as needed or desired.

I like that I can set the internal bias for my preference for a smoother sounding fuzz and still be able to adjust the external for "mo smoove" or more towards the gatey sound. I would bet that other folks would have different "sweet spots".

 

[Harry Klippton]

I dislike external bias controls on fuzzes all together. That's why my sunface has no sundial

 

[Big Monk]

I dislike external bias controls on fuzzes all together. That's why my sunface has no sundial

I’ve abandoned external bias pots altogether in my Fuzz Face designs. I don’t like starved or gated sounds and the rest all sounds the same.

Pretty much 3-7 vDC mostly sounds the same with the general statement that the most change seems to occur between 4-6 vDC.

 

[andare]

You guys all make great points.

I've seen how much gain and leakage can vary with germanium transistors, just breathing on them makes them leak more. However in practice I haven't noticed that much change in tone. I guess it becomes an issue under hot stage lights.

I see a bias knob more as a way to get cool effects rather than for correcting bias issues. I dig gated tones.

 

[ChrsGuit]

After converting my 5lb Bag of Gold "Fuzz" into a 4 knob pedal by exposing the internal bias trimmer as an external control, I had an empty pre-drilled 3 knob 1590b that needed something to go in it.

Since a lot of the PedalPCB catalog uses this same knob layout I didn't need to look too far in my pile of PCB's to find a suitable candidate.

I stripped the gold metallic paint off with some acetone and repainted the enclosure with a new paint. This is a different brand of "hammered finish" than I used before (the ones I tried before would just never cure for me). This paint really worked out well, it was dry enough to handle within the hour and dry enough to build without scuffing in 2-3 hours. AND they had this cool pewter color that I like.
Happy with it so far. I have the same paint in a dark hammered finish as well. I do think that there is a technique to getting the dimples to be even in the spray, I haven't figured it out yet, maybe misting from a bit further away might do be the trick. Still I'm happy with the way this turned out.

Having built the BC108 version of this pedal, I've been sitting on this board for a while waiting for some new Ge trannies to come in from the Ukraine. I just couldn't bring myself to pay what they're going for locally. Well, I decided to peruse my stash of "mostly" mid to low gain GE trannies and managed to find a couple in the proper-ish gain ranges. Q1 is 74 hfe and Q2 is 119 hfe. I started out with a P32 in Q1 at 84 but then swapped it out for an MP28B. Q2 is one of the last high gain PNP's in my stash until my order shows up. According to the tracking it's scheduled for a Jan 2 delivery , but my past experience buying from this Ebay seller is that usually it takes about 5 weeks, so I expect them to show up soon.

This was a super quick build, super simple board with very few components. Yet it sounds awesome! I think I may play around with Q1 some more tomorrow. I biased by ear for tone and output, but I may pull out the DMM tomorrow and see what's what.

I really like the Surface layout with the external bias, I find I like it set pretty far CCW on this pedal.
I got a chance for a few minutes to put it side by side with my BC108 SandSpur Build.
I think I might like the Si version a tad more, but every time I think that, I play a Ge fuzz and I'm like "yaaaaahhhhhhhhbaby!".
So I dunno, I like them both. The BC108 for a bit more zing and articulation and the Ge version for more "rrrrrrrrrrzbzzzzzzzzz".

It doesn't look quite as "blue" in person as it does in these pics.

View attachment 36234

View attachment 36235

There's just no way to elegantly fit those GT402B's in a 1590b enclosure......
This my first pass, then swapping out Q1 after testing it a bit. May swap it yet again a little lower gain.
View attachment 36237


This where I ended up tonight before bagging it, probably more tranny swapping tomorrow and bias tweaking before screwing the cover on.

View attachment 36236

Pair of Sundials.....Si and Ge
View attachment 36238

I'm about to tackle a sunflower for a friend of mine... I really didn't want to go through all the trouble with germaniums... but willing to if it's worth it. Do you have any suggestions on Silicon or Germaniums I should try? PCB simply states "BC108" for Q1&Q2, but the more I read, the more I'm inclined to believe there is much more to it than that... such as HFE...

If I were going the "dummy" route and just looking for generic transistors, regardless of type, what would be my best course of action. Especially without buying a ton of transistors that i'll never use exceptfor this one build... I have a CCT if necessary

 

[andare]

I'm about to tackle a sunflower for a friend of mine... I really didn't want to go through all the trouble with germaniums... but willing to if it's worth it. Do you have any suggestions on Silicon or Germaniums I should try? PCB simply states "BC108" for Q1&Q2, but the more I read, the more I'm inclined to believe there is much more to it than that... such as HFE...

If I were going the "dummy" route and just looking for generic transistors, regardless of type, what would be my best course of action. Especially without buying a ton of transistors that i'll never use exceptfor this one build... I have a CCT if necessary

For germanium shoot for Q1 HFE 80, Q2 hfe 120, leakage below 100uA. Bias Q1c to 0.7V, Q2c to 4.5V (those will be negative if you use PNP) and adjust by ear.
I've had good results with AY33-AY34s but that is what I have available to me. Part number is not important.

For silicon you can use both transistors at 250-300 hfe. They don't have leakage. Q1c will bias at 1.2V or so and Q2c can be 4.5-5V but adjust by ear as always. I like 4 or less for ripping gated tones.
Part number is not really important here too. Any BC transistor will sound good. Theoretically BC183 sound darker than BC107/8/9 but that depends on the hfe and bias.