Skreddy Pedals BC109

Adjustable but not refined—an angry, raw, vintage-style 2-transistor fuzz with extra controls and tweaks to let you recreate oodles of classic fuzz sounds with minimum hassle

The Skreddy Pedals™ BC109 FUZZ is made from silicon transistors for power and temperature stability, but it's darkened so you can get germanium-ish effects out of it too.

The 2 transistors are piggybacked for better tone (smoother, lower noise than single transistors), giving this circuit 4 transistors total. 

The extra controls let you emulate different classic fuzz tones from the 60's and early 70's along with improvements for some of the issues those early fuzzes had (noise reduction, adjustable tone, and input impedance selector switch).

This can be a rude, biting fuzz or a creamy-sounding fuzz or a fizzy, nasty velcro fuzz, depending on how you set it up.  If you want good guitar-volume clean up, turn the bias up high.  If you want 60's style mayhem, turn it down low.

No special power requirements, just regular negative ground 9v.

Classic Fuzz Tones

• From thin and buzzy to clear and cutting to rich and thick and syrupy
• Selectable input resistance lets it work great with humbuckers and get along with other effects too
• Stable at all temperatures but very sensitive to guitar volume knob changes
• Just leave the fuzz knob cranked or backed down a touch
• True bypass, LED, standard 9v power jack

Controls:

VOLUME

Gives you a LOT more output volume than most classic fuzzes, with unity gain around noon and plenty of boost beyond that.

BIAS

Lets you go from buzzy and low-fi to clear, louder, and more present. Sometimes referred to as a "MIDS" control since it does give you more (or less) of those too.

VOICE

Lets you go from bright and articulate to smooth and syrupy with that lovely upper-harmonic emphasis you hear in classic fuzz recordings. It's really nothing more than an extra guitar tone control. This fuzz sounds so sweet with the tone rolled down that you will love having this dedicated control right where it's at, freeing up the guitar knobs for all your other applications.

FUZZ

Sets the gain for this whole thing. Most fuzzes of this type sound best with the fuzz turned either all the way up or dialed back just a touch from max (in my opinion).  Gets milder and darker as you turn down.

HB / SC

Adds either a little or a lot of resistance to the input in order to keep a humbucker pickup from swamping the circuit and causing it to have a gated attack. But it's also useful for helping this fuzz work together with other effects (like to keep a wah pedal from making that siren sound you get from driving it into a vintage-style fuzz, or that extreme, trebly fuzz you get if you use a buffered pedal in front, for example).

Notes:

To get lower-gain, overdrivey sounds (like some germanium-equipped fuzzes), just set the impedance selector to "HB".

Volume stays at unity gain, around noon, more or less, depending on the bias setting, which will interact with and require adjustments to the volume.

Fuzz stays either at max or backed down just a hair.  Your guitar volume will go from all-out fuzz at 10 to distortion at 9, heavy overdrive at 8, and all the way clean down at 3 or so.

These settings were worked out using a Stratocaster guitar.

Clock settings: 5:00 = max, 7:00 = min

Obviously your mileage may vary; just think of these as starting points...

*Sounds kinda like…	bias	voice	hb/sc
Eric Johnson/silicon Fuzz Face	10:00	9:00	SC
Jimi Hendrix/germanium Fuzz Face	9:00	2:00	HB
David Gilmour/silicon Fuzz Face	4:00	1:00	SC
Jimmy Page/Tone Bender	8:00	8:00	SC

*These names are just used for comparison purposes; no artists have endorsed this product, and Skreddy Pedals does not own the names "Fuzz Face" or "Tone Bender."

Power

9v battery is not included. If you use a battery, then remember to un-plug the input cable from the pedal’s input jack when not in use to prevent draining (or you can also just plug in a power-supply, which disconnects the battery).

You may supply external power through an AC adapter. All Skreddy Pedals accept the industry-standard 9v DC plug (5.5mm barrel x 2.1mm center coax), negative tip. Please use a quality, regulated, filtered power supply.