Fuxz Faxtory

Now, where was I. Oh yea...shamelessly ripping off a certain mr Zachary V...

After I'd managed to build a few SHO clones as shown in a previous page, I was getting very frustrated with my inability to make something with a bit more of an "effect" to it. I'm sure many purists out there collect clean boosts or boosts in general, but personally, I prefer something with a bit more mangling on my sound than a mild kick or bit of overdrive.

Feeling adventurous, I scoured the web for a nice Vero board layout for a Fuxz Faxtory.
Stumbling across a few via FSB, I went with the one that was the smallest layout. In my minds eye, I was already planning to build this into a proper "MXR" sized box, like the original, even though, also in my minds eye, I was thinking "WTF dude you can barely layout a SHO in those boxes"....However, "everyone else can manage" so I convinved myself Id give it a whirl.

Off the back of some failed Bazz Fuss builds, I was thinking, perhaps Fuzz just isnt my thing, but what the hell, I sat down with this:

After I guess an hour I'd managed to fabricate a board, which I then sat on (put in a drawer) for about a week or so before I could bring myself to add some wiring.
Using some crappy Maplin cable, I rigged this up in a very ramshackle way...

Well, whaddya know, it fired up first time! amazing. I sat down with a video camera, overjoyed at my new found ability to receive all sorts of radio interference, and make a grand mess of noise. I'll hopefully upload these videos in a later post. Worth noting is that I havent got any Germanium transistors yet, but I had read on various forums that Silicon alternatives to the AC128 would work in the circuit. I used BC558s in place of the AC128s, if you choose to do this be aware that the pinout of the BCs is CBE. Im sure that the sounds arent 100% the same, but it sounds a mess, does those siren sounds and squeally feedback etc, so I was happy enough. Socketed the transistors as usual: safer, and if I decide to source some Ge's I can swap them at my leisure :)

My girlfriend was suitably impressed, I think she too was beginning to tire of my constant flip/flop between working SHOs and failed Bazz's.

Cue a few days later, and I had received a job lot of multicolour solid core and flexible core wires, and some tasty screened cable from a lovely chap called Steve at Doctor Tweeks Emporium
I then decided it was time to do this circuit justice.

First step, le drill. I am using some nice HSS bits of the correct size that Melx hooked me up with the details for (another eBay victory). 7mm for the alpha pots, 9.5mm for the neutrik jacks, 12mm for the stomp and 9v plus, and I tried this time simply a 5mm hole for the led.

As you can see from this pic, my drilling was largely a success. I use a handheld drill, not a press. Its the best I have and works for now.

The DPDT daughter board aligned sideways in this build, led mounted directly. I think I much prefer this to flying leads. If theres one thing im awful at, its soldering flying leads to diode legs....

The next step in my method is to start laying out the wires, before solding them in place. For this build, the board needs to "float" somewhere in the case, or be stuck on the back of the pots. My plan was to use single core wire, and suspend the board...You can judge my results in a later pic.

Now, on the topic of wiring pots, I have come to a methodology that I really like. With these 16mm alphas I have, you dont get a nice looped solder lug, simply a pointy bit. You do however, have a hole above the pointy bit. I like to strip about 1/2 inch of insulation, poke it through the hole from behind, and then wrap it around the pointy bit. This holds everything in place, is neat, and allows you to join multiple lugs together easily. Ive read warnings about not soldering through the holes as that can heat damage the carbon tracks. Using this method, I feel its easier and more secure than simply trying to solder to the point bit, and doesnt just use the hole, so less change of burn. Sure, if you make a mistake its a sod to desolder, but not impossible, and looks neat, and works really well. Anyway, each to their own.

After some careful planning and soldering, all the pots were in place. Ive wired a ground between the in and out, the 9v power and grounds are in, and the ground from the pot on the right is into the output ground lug. Happy days.


A bit more work, and we have this:

The footswitch and associated board is in, the ins outs and grounds are starting to be wired. It looks a daunting scary mess, but its all good, trust me. Ive also wired from the 9v to the daughter board (required for the millenium bypass curcuitry and led).

The last part is definitely the hard part - deciding final board location and then wiring and soldering the board connections "in situ". referring back to the schematic, we have a number of pots, and some of them need to be soldered right to the centre of the board - its a space saving design after all. This task is easier when, for example, people layout the offboard wiring coming from simply the rightmost of leftmost vero holes.

Anyway, some umming aahhring and fiddling, I ended up with this! The board sits on the pot connections, and can push up against the DPDT board without any risks of shorting out. Excellent!

Everything is IN!
I plugged it in, and lo and behold, my verified layout survived the desoldering and resoldering process :)
Only bad thing was, the radio interference, which lets be honest the Fuxz Faxtory IS known for, was still present, if anything to a greater degree, once Id boxed it up.

Anticipating this, I replaced firstly the input cabling with some sexy neon orange Van Damme screened cable in the hope it would calm the beast down (around £1 a metre at Tweeks, linked earlier, good for multiple builds).

Play spot the difference with the pic above:

I understand (and from seeing, say, how D*A*M wire their pedals) that high gain fuzz or distortion devices oft benefit from screened Ins AND Outs. Now, in my case, the input alone mod has simply cured the situation 100% :) So im going to save myself the hassle of doing the output. It does look funky though. If I made another FF someday I think Id do the ins and outs for completeness.

And so, the final obligatory "LED to show it works pic"

I added some knobs, I'll put a pic with a video too later.

One last point, I bought about 20 superbright LEDs, and sorry, but they are obnoxiously bright. For my next build, the Wully Mammuth, youll see that I have gone to small, standard brightness 3mm LED, and I think I will for the foreseeable, unless I can figure out a resistor to ease the risk of blindness, especially with the blue varieties!

Adios for now, DIY chums.