Jon Patton's Hamlet Delay

Here's another design from Jon Patton. It's a delay based on the popular PT2399, with an always-on preamp. The preamp is designed to have a flat EQ and won't alter your tone. So the In and Out pads go to the input/output jacks, instead of the switch. You could still wiring this for true-bypass (just jumper the footswitch pads), but it's designed to use a DPDT. Use one side to turn the delay on/off and the other for the LED indicator. Check out his build doc for a thorough and much better explanation of the circuit, a diagram for the footswitch wiring, as well as the schematic. In his layouts he has the Level and Tone controls as trimmers on the board. I chose to move these off-board, as it seems like useful controls to have externally.

'64 Vox Tone

Here's a little overdrive designed by Fred Briggs of the La Revolution Deux blog. Here's what he had to say about it.

Here's another (nearly) new one from me. It's a tricked out super mod of the old Electro Harmonix LPB-1 circuit that produces some lovely singing overdrive tones reminiscent of an old VOX from their 1960's heyday. I took the Lovepedal Englishman (A supposed Vox AC30 / AC15 emulator) as a base and went from there - Firstly I wanted a little more gain, hence the 4k7 collector resistor. Along with more gain I wanted more emphasis and clipping on the higher mids to replicate that treble laden Vox overdrive hence the 82nF bypass cap and the 47k/22nF mids filter at the end of the circuit. These changes make the circuit sound livelier and give it more character. The use of the *super* low forward voltage SB340 diode in combo with the BAT46 diode produces harmonically rick asymmetrical clipping, the levels of which can be controlled using the "Headroom" control. The headroom control also allows a nice rich low end to be retained while allowing the top end to be clipped, as you roll back the clipping a nice tube like "note attack sag" effect becomes prominent - it's quite pleasing and cool to play with. The use of the 2N3565 transistor is due to some tests carried out a while ago where it was found that the 2N3565 sounded best in these sort of applications, you can replace it with a 2N5088 or BC108 or, in fact, any decent gain NPN transistor.

DeadAstronaut Tremshifter

Merry Christmas Eve-Eve, everybody! Hope everyone has a safe and happy holiday. Here's an awesome tremolo circuit designed by DIYSB member DeadAstronaut. Cody asked me if I could do an etch-able layout since DeadAstronaut has sold out of PCBs for the effect. Check out the original thread on DIYSB for the schematic and more info.

Edit 3/2/16: Added missing resistor in the filter LFO and corrected traces in trem LFO.

EarthQuaker Devices Acapulco Gold

Here's a fun distortion from EarthQuaker. Tonally, it's based on a cranked Sunn Model T amp and uses 2, 386 chips. It cleans up nicely with the guitar's volume, so a good mod would be adding a pot before the input. John K did this and used a reverse log 1M pot.

SolaSound ToneBender Mk III

For #FuzzFriday I give you the SolaSound ToneBender Mk III. The Mark III was a smoother and less aggressive follow up to the famous Mk II Professional. SolaSound built it for several other companies–Vox, RotoSound, Park, etc. There are plenty of layouts for this classic fuzz out there already (there's already 2 on this blog), but I drew this up for a 2-in-1 box I'm putting together (this into a Catalinbread RAH) and thought I'd share. So here's a modern layout for the ToneBender Mk III. Originals used PNP germanium transistors, so the perf side reflects positive ground layout, but the PCB side shows negative ground if you want to use NPN transistors. For more info on the circuit check out this page.

Here's the drilling template for it.

EchoPathetic

The EchoPathetic was designed by FSB member Allesz (designer of the Crap-Fi Delay and Dirty Punk Repeater). His previous designs use the PT2399 delay chip, but this one is full analog. There's an input buffer based around one side of TL072, then the signal goes onto the 3102 and 3205 chips. It's designed to be a buffered effect with the footswitch just turning on and off the delay section, but I figure more people will want to build it with true bypass. For more info, check out this thread over on FSB.

Jon Patton's Snow Day Overdrive

Here's a cool design by Jon Patton (seriously though, everything he designs is pretty awesome). He was kind enough to share his work and offer a full circuit explanation over on DIYSB and Madbean's forum too. Check out the thread here or here for his schematic and other goodies.

FuzzHugger FX Phantom Octave

The Phantom Octave is an octave/ring mod type fuzz that's very interactive with guitar pickup selection and volume/tone controls. The LED pads are for the one that's under the knob in the video below. You could use it as the on/off indicator, but it might be hard to tell if it's on when signal isn't passing through it. Should be able to squeeze it in a 1590A. From the manufacturer:

Equal parts mysterious and ghastly, the Phantom Octave is a shape-shifting octave fuzz 
monster! No controls? They're not necessary--they're at your fingertips! The Phantom Octave is 
extremely interactive with your pickup selection, picking intensity, and your guitar's Tone 
control. Like its namesake, the octave will disappear with picking intensity and by rolling back 
your guitar's Tone control. Octave effect is strongest with low-output single coil pickups.

Lovepedal Superlead

The Superlead is Lovepedal's take on the Marshall Guv'nor. It has a simplified tone stack compared to the Guv'nor, but has a switch to select between silicon diodes and LED for clipping. Great for 80's metal tones.

On an unrelated note, I made a Facebook page for the blog. I figure you guys can post build pics there more easily if you want and I'll post the layouts over there as well. So head over and give it a like if that's your thing.

Death by Audio Reverberation Machine

Here's a cool dirty reverb effect by Death by Audio. It uses a Belton brick like many other designs, and offers clean reverb with the gain control turned all the way down. But when you increase the gain, fuzz is infused to the signal. You can mount the Belton brick to the board from the solder-side (best to do this once the rest of the board has been populated). It'll probably be too tall with the brick to fit in a 1590B, but a 125B should work just fine.

Bass FuzzDrive

Here's a cool bass fuzz designed by Derringer over on DIYSB. It's based around the classic DIY Bazz Fuss with built in blending circuit. Derringer mentioned that it might need a booster after it. The good ol' LPB-1 should do nicely. Just put it between the Blend pot and Volume pot. Here's the schematic.

Split 'n Blend

Got a request for more blend effects, so let's start with a simple one. You can use this as a daughter board to add a blend control to an existing pedal (or incorporate it into something else you're building), or use it as a stand alone blending pedal. 2N5457 should work just fine for both transistors.