"Fuzz 292" Silicon FF Style Fuzz

Silicon fuzz is famous for being a wild ride - high gain, sizzling treble, and a propensity for squealing feedback. I do love the immediacy of silicon fuzz - the fast attack, stability at any temperature (you can get amazing "velcro fuzz" tones) and the overall "cut" and presence in a mix. So the task was to maintain the Good, mellow out the Bad, and lose the Ugly. 

So we started with the amazing Colorsound "One Knob" Fuzz. What a simple design! One knob to control it all: UP for loud, DOWN for not so loud. The “fuzz” amount was simply set to max, and you would plug it in and rip. Dial back the saturation via your guitar’s volume knob. The big, splashy sound of this circuit is exactly what we wanted for our silicon fuzz when dimed. 

So we tweaked the formula (transistors, filter capacitors, bias values, etc) to taste and brought in a few more essential controls for tailoring the tone.

The key to our “Fuzz 292″ is a 3-way voicing switch; treble-boosted fuzz, a standard moderate gain voicing, and high gain fuzz-fever freakout. So at the flick of a switch, you can change the overall character of the Fuzz 292 and how it reacts to your picking and guitar volume knob adjustments. 

In addition to the (naturally necessary) volume control and 3-way voicing switch, we added both a tone and bias control for a “3-knob Fuzz 292”. This is perfect for players who always control the amount of fuzz gain via their guitar.

We designed the tone control so it doesn’t reduce the gain or output of the pedal. Use this to tame the “brightness” of the fuzz, or let it all all through for a classic 70′s fuzz-fry.

The “bias” control lets you shape the character of the fuzz further. Bend the character from a smooth, overdrive-like fuzz into a gated, “ripping velcro” fuzz tone. Important to know: The harmonic content of a fuzz increases right up to the edge before it sort of "gates out". Get the fuzziest sound by skirting that edge between sustain and cutoff, tune in a smoother "overdrive" style sound by dialing further into the sustain area, or just go "velcro" by pushing past the bias point into the cutoff zone.

The “4-knob Fuzz 292” adds a gain control to the top panel. If you prefer to play with the volume on the guitar maxed out, or to have the fuzz gain dialed in to a particular level for a stomp-on-the-fly setting, this will fit your needs.

Want a different control configuration on your Fuzz 292? Just write and ask. We can adjust the gain structure and customize the 3-way switch, add self-oscillation controls, and have a few other dirty tricks up our sleeves.