Friday, 4 June 2021

Analog Man Astro Tone Fuzz

 Analog Man's take on the old and quite rare Sam Ash Fuzzz Boxxx/Astrotone Fuzz. Bigger input and output caps and a resistor swap at the tone control should make this a different animal compared to the vintage pedals which suffered from lack of bottom end and a useful tone control. Various transistors has been used, often in "black dot" casing. Try NPN silicon with hfe 150-400. 




17 comments:

  1. Fired right up. Tag it as verified. It is a bit underwhelming to me as a fuzz but I'll have to try different transistor pairs. Used 2n2222 one time and 2n5088 another for testing.

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    1. Thanks, man. Taggged. Yes, this one offers no "wall of fuzz". I built the Fuzzz Boxxx a few years ago and it was more like a fuzzy overdrive which sounded decent in loud tube amps.

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  2. I built this pedal with a different layout. From what I see the values are not entirely correct. Both 1M Resistors need to be 1,2M. And the Electrolytic Cap needs to be 100u instead of 47u, and connects ground with 9V.
    I used 2n3904 with HFE around 170 and it sounds like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ocOwbyJWgco

    "Analogman values: The Analogman version of the Astrotone uses 1M2 for R1 and R4, 470R for R6, and 470n for C1 and C4."

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  3. For reference purposes: https://aionfx.com/app/files/docs/astra_legacy_documentation.pdf

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    1. Thanks for the headsup. I based the values from Fuzzdog's schematic but I think Aion has the real values. Both 47uf and 100uf will do fpr power filtering but the 1,2M at Q1 will probably increase the gain just a bit.

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  4. Just finished one using a 2N2222 (220hfe) for Q1 and a BC208 (400hfe) for Q2. Sounds great!!

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  5. According to AnalogMan, the transistors used on this one are 2N3566 - glob-top trans. Something like this:
    http://www.banzaimusic.com/2N3566-Work-alike.html

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    1. I actually own one of these and the transistors are 2n3566. I think the tone is a 10KW instead of a 10KB.

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  6. I'm gonna build this just cause, but the original was underwhelming. The Sam Ash Fuzzstainer on the other hand is an underappreciated beast.

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  7. could you make a layout for this?https://www.pedalpcb.com/docs/GeneralTso.pdf

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    1. Interesting! The scheme is saved. But I don't know when I can draw a layout since I'm pretty nuch swamped by other things right now...

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  8. Would it be possible to have a layout for the Pedalpcb Sunflower? It’s just the current Sunface, but it has the onboard clean trim, bias and external sundial.
    Cheers
    Ben

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    1. Sure! Will draw a layout in a couple of days so it might be uploaded here at the end of the weekend.

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  9. Just built this,and all seems fine. Hopefully that's my unlucky streak over for a while!

    Thank you 🤗

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  10. https://youtu.be/Mvkj1kGM3uY

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