jimijames
New member
So, I got a BYOC ESV fuzz, and I decided to do too many modifications to it. Getting everything to fit in the box was a problem, so I played it for a while with everything free-standing outside of the box. It worked for a while but then it shorted out and burnt out the germanium transistors. Maybe the silicone ones too. (I put in two switches so you could switch between the AC127s that came with the kit and the bc108s that were more common in the late 70s IIRC). The switches weren't the only mods but I won't bore you with the details.
Which brings me to my current predicament. I've tested all the resistors and caps with my multimeter and they check out great. So, I'm just two transistors away from a working fuzz circuit.
I know the nkt-275's and the ac128's are the holy grail but finding real ones is incredibly rare (from what I've heard) and matched pairs even more so. I'm not looking to break the bank just to get the pedal working again, so I've been looking over at small bear electronics for some replacements.
Thing is, they have 65 different products under "germanium transistors" (which is the link above), and I'd like to choose something that sounds good but I've been out of the pedal-modding game for so long I don't rightly know which one to pick, or if one or the other will make a difference I could notice. Doesn't have to be high gain at all - I'm just looking for something that's thick and musical without sounding too grainy. The ESV demo in the gearmandude video is actually more gain than I need - like I said, I'm just looking for a good classic fuzzface tone that doesn't sound artificial.
Any and all suggestions are welcome. Thank you in advance and if there's any more information I can provide please let me know.
Which brings me to my current predicament. I've tested all the resistors and caps with my multimeter and they check out great. So, I'm just two transistors away from a working fuzz circuit.
I know the nkt-275's and the ac128's are the holy grail but finding real ones is incredibly rare (from what I've heard) and matched pairs even more so. I'm not looking to break the bank just to get the pedal working again, so I've been looking over at small bear electronics for some replacements.
Thing is, they have 65 different products under "germanium transistors" (which is the link above), and I'd like to choose something that sounds good but I've been out of the pedal-modding game for so long I don't rightly know which one to pick, or if one or the other will make a difference I could notice. Doesn't have to be high gain at all - I'm just looking for something that's thick and musical without sounding too grainy. The ESV demo in the gearmandude video is actually more gain than I need - like I said, I'm just looking for a good classic fuzzface tone that doesn't sound artificial.
Any and all suggestions are welcome. Thank you in advance and if there's any more information I can provide please let me know.
