Yardbirds pedal..

[Locrian99]

Ok so I want to make my uncle a pedal as a gift. Recently we were chatting and he offered to give me his ragin Cajun 10” which I may or may not take him up on but it dawned on me I’ve made 25+ pedals and have made nothing for him. So he plays a g&l tele and has a cheap little fender amp. I know he is all about the yardbirds. Which makes me think tonebender, my germanium transistor knowledge is nil and my pnp knowledge is less. Anyone got some suggestions here’s for a place to get the transistors (doesn’t need to be before Xmas) and a good board that’s somewhat fool proof.

 

[music6000]

 

[Locrian99]

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This looks just about perfect! I’ll go sniffing around the comment thread for transistor stats.

 

[giovanni]

A good option is the Ge Sunface. For the transistors you basically just need to match hFE and leakage, part number is not super important.

 

[Synchrony Pedalworks]

If you are looking for transistors, I would go to Stompboxparts or Small Bear/SynthCube. I have gotten great transistors from both. Amplified Parts is another good source , but they do not measure the HFe.

 

[Locrian99]

The sunflower fuzz looks good as well and I like the idea of a pcb for cleanliness etc in build.

 

[spi]

Take a look at the Carbon Black (Black Ash)--a silicon based tonebender. Easy to source parts, and don't have opposite power polarity.

 

[Locrian99]

Take a look at the Carbon Black (Black Ash)--a silicon based tonebender. Easy to source parts, and don't have opposite power

Looks much easier and if I decide to just strip board it I don’t have to buy anything lol. I’ll try it out on a breadboard.

 

[HamishR]

I'll often build Ge circuits designed for PNP transistors with NPN transistors. You just use a negative ground and reverse the electrolytics basically. I have a stash of good AC127s and a heap of Russian MP38s so don't have to worry about positive grounds. My favourite Tonebender is a Marshall Supafuzz I built with MP38s. It was originally built by Sola Sound (who made the original Tonebenders) but with a few bigger caps, so it has a fatter sound.

 

[Locrian99]

I’m going to breadboard the black ash thing and see what I think then go from there. In the mean time I have a couple halo boards from aion figure I’ll throw him together a muff til I get this figured out.

 

[Locrian99]

I'll often build Ge circuits designed for PNP transistors with NPN transistors. You just use a negative ground and reverse the electrolytics basically. I have a stash of good AC127s and a heap of Russian MP38s so don't have to worry about positive grounds. My favourite Tonebender is a Marshall Supafuzz I built with MP38s. It was originally built by Sola Sound (who made the original Tonebenders) but with a few bigger caps, so it has a fatter sound.

I’ve heard of people doing this.

 

[HamishR]

Carbon Fuzz is good too.

 

[Locrian99]

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Carbon Fuzz is good too.

What hfe ranges should I be looking for that?

 

[HamishR]

I don't really know. I used 2N3903s which are really old - they have colour coding on them! They're mostly under 200 I think - around 160-180.

 

[jjjimi84]

I would recommend the dung beetle, it can cop some really great yardbirds sounds and all kinds of other cool tones.