Apocalypse Audio Four Horsemen

Stumbled across this circuit a little while back and thought it would be a nice change from most of the opamp-based overdrives out there. Should fit nicely in a 1590B.

Apocalypse Audio Green Bomb Fuzz

For Fuzz Friday, here's a cool variation on the Fuzzrite circuit by Apocalypse Audio. It takes the classic Fuzzrite, adds some extra gain, and a pretty clever tone control. More info and the schematic can be found here.

Apocalypse Audio Thundertone

Fuzz Friday! Here's a cool fuzz based on the old Supro Thunderbolt amp using NPN germanium transistors by RnFR from the Apocalypse Audio blog. Here's what he had to say about it:

I have been thinking about modeling the Supro Thunderbolt with FETs, but then thought- I just got in these cool new Tesla GE's, why not use those? So that's what it is, the preamp section of the legendary amp used by Page and supposedly Hendrix, done up NPN germanium style. I had to eliminate a few resistors towards the end to bring up the volume and lowered the value of an emitter resistor to up the gain a bit. Also, I made the resistor on the input variable so you can adjust the input impedance for guitars with different pickups.

The real gem of this circuit is the tone pot- totally counter-clockwise you get a nice full range tone with plenty of mids. As you go clockwise it goes to a very muffled tone, and as you go even further, it goes to a very thin, cutting tone. There are some very cool sweet spots, and a lot of versatility. I like it better than a regular muff style control, but it does cut plenty of signal- hence the two gain stages after it.

It's a cool sounding circuit. Nicely voiced and does a good overdrive type sound. If you don't have the trannys, you could change out the 33K Rc's to trimmers and adjust to taste. The Tesla trannies are extremely consistent, so no trimmers needed.


Here's the schematic for reference.

Mona Lisa Overdrive

Here's a light-medium gain overdrive designed by RNFR from the Apocalypse Audio blog. Here's what he had to say about it:

I thought I would build something that would turn on the guys that were into the lighter side of things- something different than my usual wall of fuzz tones.  With the MLOD, you can get a heavy boost, or a light overdrive reminiscent of vintage microphone preamps.  The fancy thing about this circuit is the lack of coupling caps in the audio path- something usually reserved for mic pres and hifi circuits.  This lends itself to the "transparent",  uncolored sound happening here.  If you encounter any oscillation at the highest gain settings, simply raise the value of the 100 ohm resistor near the gain control to lower the amount of maximum gain. 


Use sockets for the transistors. I'd start with J201s or 2N5457s for Q1 and Q4, and 2N2222 or 2N3904 for Q2 and 2N2907 or 2N3906 for Q3.