The Fuzz Thread

I like a klone after a fuzz to get that ripping, sizzling, blistering tone that cuts like a knife.

Or a transparent overdrive for a more all around beefed up tone.

Either way I don’t use very much gain on the overdrive.
 
I run my fuzzes into a Menatone Fish Factory. The amp is set clean. Usually a Supro Black Magick or Hiwatt. Fender Bassman 4X10 Tweed eats fuzz pedals.
 
DrewJD82 said:
No shit! I thought they were limited for some reason, probably because the NOTADUMBLE. Sweet, now I can gain all this additional pedal building education!! :rofl
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Only the black ones were a limited run.👍
I’m hoping the NOTADUMBLE Mk 2 is black when it’s released 🤞🙏
According to John L at JHS it sounds amazing 👍
1758709664319.jpeg
 
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I actually forgot I had the Fulltone ‘70 until I saw it peaking out of a shelf last night!

Supposedly this was made as a recreation of EJ’s blue Fuzz Face I’m always yammering about, it’s definitely more aggressive than the EJ FF, can get a little sloppy on the attack and it’s got way more treble. I really couldn’t pick a favorite between the two. Now that I figured out how to get that EJ FF singing I’m REALLY enjoying playing with fuzzes. Going into a cranked Marshall circuit there’s not a ton of the ‘navigating the medium” at play, it feels more like playing a cranked Marshall than it does playing a fuzz pedal.

Might bring the pedals-only rig into a vacant suite this weekend to crank up and hear this stuff at blaring volumes through real cabs rather than studio monitors. If I’m loving what’s coming out of the studio monitors it’s gotta sound GREAT coming out of real cabs.
 
DrewJD82 said:
I actually forgot I had the Fulltone ‘70 until I saw it peaking out of a shelf last night!

Supposedly this was made as a recreation of EJ’s blue Fuzz Face I’m always yammering about, it’s definitely more aggressive than the EJ FF, can get a little sloppy on the attack and it’s got way more treble. I really couldn’t pick a favorite between the two. Now that I figured out how to get that EJ FF singing I’m REALLY enjoying playing with fuzzes. Going into a cranked Marshall circuit there’s not a ton of the ‘navigating the medium” at play, it feels more like playing a cranked Marshall than it does playing a fuzz pedal.

Might bring the pedals-only rig into a vacant suite this weekend to crank up and hear this stuff at blaring volumes through real cabs rather than studio monitors. If I’m loving what’s coming out of the studio monitors it’s gotta sound GREAT coming out of real cabs.
Click to expand...

I pulled my old fulltone 69 out of the box the other day after reading your post. My first fuzz pedal. I sold my helix lt a couple weeks ago and I am finally ready to put together my pedal board. I have been using the analogman astrotone for a long time, which I love, but I think the 69 just took its place, I don’t know if I really need both on there, because they’re similar but the 69 is just better. I forgot how great this fuzz is. While the astrotone kinda needs an OD paired with it to fatten it up, the 69 needs nothing, it sounds awesome on its own and the volume knob clean up is great too. Sounds great stacked into overdrive too. Such a fat, warm fuzz tone and it could pretty much cover my OD needs with guitar volume control too, if I had to only use one distortion pedal. I had the idea in my head that it wasn’t going to work well with humbuckers and that was totally wrong, it sounds great with humbuckers.

My only complaint is why did he have to wire these with center positive power? Just so people could fry them by mistake? Is there any benefit to using center positive power? Oh well, it’s first in line so I just use a battery and try to remember to unplug it when I’m not playing. Batteries last forever in it anyway.
 
sashimi said:
I pulled my old fulltone 69 out of the box the other day after reading your post. My first fuzz pedal. I sold my helix lt a couple weeks ago and I am finally ready to put together my pedal board. I have been using the analogman astrotone for a long time, which I love, but I think the 69 just took its place, I don’t know if I really need both on there, because they’re similar but the 69 is just better. I forgot how great this fuzz is. While the astrotone kinda needs an OD paired with it to fatten it up, the 69 needs nothing, it sounds awesome on its own and the volume knob clean up is great too. Sounds great stacked into overdrive too. Such a fat, warm fuzz tone and it could pretty much cover my OD needs with guitar volume control too, if I had to only use one distortion pedal. I had the idea in my head that it wasn’t going to work well with humbuckers and that was totally wrong, it sounds great with humbuckers.

My only complaint is why did he have to wire these with center positive power? Just so people could fry them by mistake? Is there any benefit to using center positive power? Oh well, it’s first in line so I just use a battery and try to remember to unplug it when I’m not playing. Batteries last forever in it anyway.
Click to expand...

It uses PNP transistors which is why it needs positive ground. He could have used a charge pump to provide the circuit with -9vs from a standard center negative supply though.

If you know someone who's handy with a soldering iron they could fit something like this and then you can run if off your regular PSU. There's plenty of room in the enclosure for this.

1000145960.png
 
Very interesting. I guess I don’t understand why the power input couldn’t just be wired in reverse? Don’t they have adapters to reverse the polarity on a 9v cable?
 
sashimi said:
I pulled my old fulltone 69 out of the box the other day after reading your post. My first fuzz pedal. I sold my helix lt a couple weeks ago and I am finally ready to put together my pedal board. I have been using the analogman astrotone for a long time, which I love, but I think the 69 just took its place, I don’t know if I really need both on there, because they’re similar but the 69 is just better. I forgot how great this fuzz is. While the astrotone kinda needs an OD paired with it to fatten it up, the 69 needs nothing, it sounds awesome on its own and the volume knob clean up is great too. Sounds great stacked into overdrive too. Such a fat, warm fuzz tone and it could pretty much cover my OD needs with guitar volume control too, if I had to only use one distortion pedal. I had the idea in my head that it wasn’t going to work well with humbuckers and that was totally wrong, it sounds great with humbuckers.

My only complaint is why did he have to wire these with center positive power? Just so people could fry them by mistake? Is there any benefit to using center positive power? Oh well, it’s first in line so I just use a battery and try to remember to unplug it when I’m not playing. Batteries last forever in it anyway.
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I have one as well and yeah, it does sound that good. Just a killer fuzz. Keep that on your board !
 
sashimi said:
Very interesting. I guess I don’t understand why the power input couldn’t just be wired in reverse? Don’t they have adapters to reverse the polarity on a 9v cable?
Click to expand...

PNP is positive ground, it's not just a polarity difference. You either have to install a charge pump like the one I posted above or flip all of the polarised components e.g. Electrolytics too. Even then it needs to be fully isolated.

If you just swop polarity and hook it up to your PSU then you'll be mixing the power and the grounds and everything will short out.

1000145961.jpg


There's tons of room in the enclosure where you could install a charge pump. You'd be fine to hook it up to your negative ground PSU then.
 
Good to know, thank you. Shows how much I know about electronics :rofl

So how is it that a regular 9v battery can be used?

I have the mkii so less room inside.
 
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sashimi said:
Good to know, thank you. Shows how much I know about electronics :rofl

So how is it that a regular 9v battery can be used?

I have the mkii so less room inside.
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I just use a reverse polarity voodoo labs adapter. You can by a complete cable for reverse polarity only. Or buy the female to male adapter and use your regular power supply. It will need a non-daisy chain supply (isolated). See below.

PXL_20250805_192506344.jpg
 
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SillyOctpuss said:
PNP is positive ground, it's not just a polarity difference. You either have to install a charge pump like the one I posted above or flip all of the polarised components e.g. Electrolytics too. Even then it needs to be fully isolated.

If you just swop polarity and hook it up to your PSU then you'll be mixing the power and the grounds and everything will short out.

View attachment 52537

There's tons of room in the enclosure where you could install a charge pump. You'd be fine to hook it up to your negative ground PSU then.
Click to expand...

Oh wow, that’s pretty much a straight up Fuzz Face circuit with a mid knob, isn’t it?
 
DrewJD82 said:
Oh wow, that’s pretty much a straight up Fuzz Face circuit with a mid knob, isn’t it?
Click to expand...

Pretty much. The knob he calls Bias is actually effecting the input impedance and is called Clean by Analogmike. The contour would be more likely to be called Bias by other builders. The output cap has been increased from 10nf to 100nf, I've usually seen this done to add lowend into silicon fuzz face pedals. You don't generally see it with germanium fuzz face pedals.
 
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