TS808 & ?????

[inefficiency]

I considered doing some sort of boost with an EQ. Maybe Fulltone fatboost or a TC Spark or something.

Germanium Giant? I do not follow. We got a layout here somewhere?

[Silver Blues]

Yeah man, it's a rework of the Greer Green Giant given the Ge treatment.

Here

[inefficiency]

So, just a green giant with germanium bits instead of silicon?

I'll have to give it a shot.

[Beaker]

Yeah, MP38 transistor, and D9 series or D310 or D311 diodes.

Massive collaborative thread on it here:

http://guitar-fx-layouts.42897.x6.nabble.com/Greer-Green-Giant-tp13051.html

Lists several mod layouts courtesy of Zach, and worth a read through.

Even if you don't include it in your double pedal, it's certainly worth a build.

[inefficiency]

Very nice!

Ok, I think I may have to go for the germy giant with SWTC.

Will let you guys know how it goes!

[Vince]

That double trouble sounds great.... hmmm I may have to build a double TS808.... call it 16016... patent pending....

[inefficiency]

I'll be giving a double trouble a go at some point.

Might make each one slightly different. Maybe just different diodes in each - or maybe even the same diodes, but multiple switchable ones you can have loads of combinations.

Anyone ever put germanium diodes in a TS-type circuit before? I'm finding more and more that for overdrive I always prefer germs over silicon. They're just so smooth and nice. Transistor-wise I generally prefer silicon though, cause I like a nice aggressive fuzz .

[rocket88]

Agreed. We did a hell of a job on the germanium giant. Just ignore the layouts with the swtc. I have to do some reworking and add a gain recovery stage because there is too much output loss. One thing to remember is that if you have the diodes fully engaged and the volume maxed, you will be just a hair above unity gain, due to the use of Ge diodes. This is hands down one of my top 5 favorites. And that's coming from me who love nothing more then a massive fuzz pedal. This is clear and you can get the right amount of grit, and the warmth from the Ge transistor and diodes.......drool.

I'm going to play with it to make it a 2 transistor effect to help regain the output, just have to make sure you don't loose any of the magic that's there. Really it was beakers idea, I just built the layouts and messed with to get it where I thought it was good. I couldn't have done it without him and everyone else involved in the project. It's the only effect in torn to sell when I've been asked to build it, because it was a huge community effort.

[inefficiency]

So, it's a hair above unity gain without the tone control?

Hmmm.... That could be a problem. Might need to use something else for the time being, because I could really do with the output.

Definitely getting the D311s put in though!

[Beaker]

Only the SWTC version suffers from a volume drop, the other versions have plenty of output.

The "blend" knob adds more clean signal to the (fixed) fuzz as you turn it clockwise. The volume climbs as you do this. So at "max clean" setting (blend knob fully clockwise), you get a huge volume boost. At "minimum clean" setting (blend knob fully anti-clockwise), you get a small volume boost.

The sweet spot (for me at least) is anywhere between 9 o'clock and 3 o'clock (quite a big range eh?), you can still get  more than enough volume.

[inefficiency]

Cool stuff.

That's kinda irritating, because I really would like a tone control. The symmetry would please me .

I might just make an always-on boost and add that as well. You just introduce it by turning it up. I guess the order would go boost>giant>ts808.

[Beaker]

There is a version Zach put up, that includes a tone control.

[inefficiency]

Yeah, I know, but there's the deal with the volume loss.

Couldn't the volume loss just be sorted with another transistor? Probably not a germ, but would that fix it?

[Beaker]

Yeah sure, the original used a 2N3904, and I tried 2N5088 and2N2222 as well before trying a Ge MP38 in it. Any of those with give you more volume.

For what it's worth, I built one with the tone control, but took it off again as it sounded so good (i.e. transparent) without the tone control, that to me at least, it wasn't worth it.

As I mentioned in the thread, it's the diodes rather than the transistor choice that seems to add the magic mojo ingredient to this - and you don't get much more magic mojo than a huge pair of D311 nuclear submarines sitting on your board.

[inefficiency]

haha yeah, those things look sick. That's probably the main reason I ordered them .

I think I'm going to go for it and will most likely just socket everything. Looks like I may need to order some more strips of those..... back to the bargains thread, I guess!

[rocket88]

the volume loss is just the nature of the beast when it's a passive tone control. trust me and beaker when we both say it's really not needed. i find the sweet spot to about 9-12 o'clock with my basses. i get just enough grit and Ge goodness. trust us, build it and you'll thank us .

but if you want one that has the tone control i'll modify the layout to have a gain recovery stage, so you can boost back up the output. but the sad thing would be that it would no longer be a 1 transistor wonder.

[inefficiency]

Yeah, that's a shame that that's what it would take.

So far the only 1-transistor drives I have made are the em-drive and the paramount. The Em-Drive makes a nice little "tone-enchancer" or boost, but the paramount kinda sucked when I made it. It just didn't seem to sound like it should. I kinda wonder if there's a really specific hfe they measure for when they make it or something like that.

Apart from that there's the SHO, which is great, but I'm looking at drives right now.

[inefficiency]

Actually, looking at the Germ giant, I have a question.

Volume 3 and Tone 1 both go to Clean 2? So tone 1 is connected to the board and to clean 2 which in turn has a link to volume 3? All just daisy-chained up?

[rocket88]

I think so, but I'll have to recheck it. Remember, that if you do it don't do the one with the tone control until I add the gain recovery stage, otherwise you'll loose too much output. I'll be able to do it tonight, since I'm probably going to be off work tomorrow, due to the snowstorm heading into nj and up the east coast. Last I heard it's going to be 12-24". Fucking hate winter, but it will give me plenty of time to build all day.

Btw, what causes the lower output is the Ge diodes. If you doubled up on them or if you replaced them with Si, LED, or schottkeys you wouldnt have the problem, but loose some of the magic IMHO.

[inefficiency]

Ah, I thought the low output was caused by the transistor. I guess it makes sense that it may be both. I did add some clipping diodes to an Em-Drive once and when they were switched in, there was a lot of volume drop.

I was planning on building one just to experiment. I was going to try a few different transistors to see what happens.

If you could do that layout tonight, I can build it up and let you know how it sounds most likely within an hour of seeing it.