Hi all,

I've been reading lots on this and need opinions as the reading I've done to date seems inconclusive. I know the actual answer here is to fiddle and see what I prefer (and I will ) but discussion here would help my understanding.

In my pedalboard, I have the Carl Martin Quattro (a 1 meg input impedance buffer, a few effects and a buffered fx loop) and a Carl Martin chorus (which has the same buffer style). These buffers are excellent quality and I believe them to be a good thing as they stop the loading of guitar pickups..... All my other pedals are true bypass so, combined with the buffered pedals, we have good things happening in theory....... I use good quality leads, I make my own patch leads using decent plugs / cable. As such, there is no noticeable difference between my bypassed pedalboard and going straight from guitar into the amp as all the top end gets preserved. So far, so good.

My question concerns vintage style wah and vintage style fuzz. I have home made clones of vintage fuzz pedals that are true bypass. I have a Whipple wah (more or less a Clyde clone with true bypass and a hand wound inductor).

IMO, the wah sounds incredible. In my pedalboard at the moment it isn't so impressive - I have it AFTER the first Carl Martin buffer.

Am I right in thinking that a lot of what a wah is doing is actually altering the loading on the guitar pickups and therefore putting a buffer between guitar and wah messes up this little bit of magic???

I am also of the opinion that my home made vintage fuzz pedals sound a bit warmer and fuzzier when they are driven direct from the guitar vs being put after a buffer..... I'm guessing that, again, this is because part of their charm is that they do indeed load down the pickups and if I involve a buffer then a bit too much top end comes through? As they are true bypass there should be no problem putting them earlier in the chain as the leads are short and the only time they will 'tone suck' is when you want them to. Correct or flawed thinking?

I then read that vintage style fuzz won't wah properly when put after an unbuffered wah..... Opinions?

I was thinking of either

Guitar > wah > fuzz > homebrew overdrives > Carl Martin Quatrro > carl martin fx loop with chorus,homebrew phaser, flanger and Octaver > back into the Carl Martin fx loop in for tremolo and delay > amp. Phew!!!

OR

Guitar > fuzz > wah > same as above

OR

Any other suggestions?

Many thanks

Gary

I knew I read something recently, took some headscratching but I finally remembered. It was another article on a site that Huge Longjohns linked to the other day.

To True Bypass or Not to True Bypass. Some good info there, with contributions from some boutique pedal makers too.

And if you are interested in pedals and DIY, you really should have The Guitar Effects Oriented web page. Lots of good how to's and articles there, including a very good section on how wah pedals work as well as true bypass.

Andy

--------------------
When the going gets weird, the Weird turn Pro.

Looking at an inductor based wah (after Dunlop) the input has a 68k isolating resistor in the base of the first transistor and although this transistor is in a feedback loop I would have thought 68k would pretty well isolate the pickups from the impedance gymnastics of the input, being some 10times the impedance of a guitar with pots at max. However, how things go at intermediate pot settings on the guitar is in the lap of the Gods!

The "vintage" fuzz circuits are an engineer's nightmare! These are going to be VERY interactive and results will depend hugely on the source Z. Really this is such "bad" design that it was circuit "bending" two decades+ before the term was coined!

If you want consistant results, buffer everything. If you want to be away with the faries...Do the other thing!

Dave.

Edited by ef37a (20/06/12 02:11 PM)

Thank you both for your thoughts.

Zen - some great reading there..... The second link especially will keep me busy.

After a brief read.....

An interesting but obvious point with a wah is that it will 'tone suck' when off unless you true bypass it. This also must mean that it 'tone sucks' when ON but the thing is that this time it's intentional..... What I'm getting with the buffer up is that it's a heck of a lot brighter. Too bright in fact. The 2nd link under the 'tone suck' section says that tone suck when bypassed can be cured by either true bypass or a buffer. But of course the buffer affects what the wah is fed when it's actually on.... Experimentation needed.

Dave - I agree that fuzz is a potential nightmare from a consistency point of view. I'm just thinking that it's 'known' that they pull the input down so they build 'em brighter than needed and if you second guess them with a buffer then maybe the results won't be quite as planned either? Interesting that Zen's first article pretty much says 'don't ever put a buffer before vintage fuzz as it'll be bad'

I'll have a play and see if I can figure out the best way forward here.... I love the delay, tremolo and compressor on the Quattro and I love my home brew pedals too (I've more boards ordered and really enjoy the building side of this fantastic hobby). As such I really need to find a way to make them all play nicely together as I don't want to ditch any of it

Edited by Gary_W (20/06/12 06:46 PM)

I've just been having a blast through my rig (well, until I was given a yellow card by my long-suffering wife )

I'm still not settled on a 'final config' but it's been enough to tell me that, with my pedals, the fuzz should definately NOT come after a buffer.

Thing is, I built 3 clone pedals from boards at MadBean. One is a D*A*M Meathead, one is a Z-Vex Fuzz Factory and the other is an overdrive called a Dirty Little Secret. I've housed all in one box, all artworked etc.

I've then fitted this box on my pedalboard. Since doing so I haven't had a sound I've liked out of the Fuzz Factory. As it's a weird, fussy thing I was figuring it was just me / the settings (you can get amazing sounds out of it - amazingly good and amazingly bad!!).

Turns out that it loathes buffers in front of it. Feed the guitar straight in and it does what it says on the tin. But, after a buffer, it's just a noisey toppy thing....

The Meathead fairs better after a buffer but it still prefers life BEFORE one rather than after! Again, the top end becomes a bit on the shrill side and it's just got less (er) balls.

I then played with the wah before and after the buffer. If it's before the buffer, it's a lot warmer / fatter. With a buffer in front of the wah, its sweep changes a fair bit and the top end becomes much more shrill. I prefer it without the buffer up front.

I've then been playing with 'wah first or fuzz first?' I need to experiment more here as the red card was coming so haven't formed an overall opinion but feeling so far is that fuzz first wins. Fuzz after wah seemed to up the noise level / feed back a fair bit. Fuzz first seemed kinder on the ears!

So it looks like a fair old rearrange and re-wire is in order. I'll play more before I make the changes just to see what else needs shifting!