Sweetness Germanium and Silicon Fuzztone
Reproduction of Frantone's The Sweet
The Sweet was Fran's ultimate BMP variant. And she definitely knew the BMP as she developed the New York BMP while working at EHX.
This is a faithful reproduction of the original with two small changes:
The Q4 transistor that Fran used is a ghost (house numbered Fairchild). Measurement on an original returned an NPN silicon with an Hfe of 66. So for these I settled on an NOS Fairchild 2n3563, which matched perfectly.
Q1 had an MPSA18, which overloaded the Germaniums when the Sustain was above 75%. I’m guessing Fran just wanted to squeeze every bit she could out of the Germaniums. I went with a slightly lower gain transistor to make the full range of the Sustain usable. An NOS 2N3565, same as found in the Foxx Tone Machine.
The result is absolutely sweet. I may have sacrificed hitting the absolute top of the Germanium's capabilities, but the lower gain settings are now magical. And there is still plenty of top end.
Reproduction of Frantone's The Sweet
The Sweet was Fran's ultimate BMP variant. And she definitely knew the BMP as she developed the New York BMP while working at EHX.
This is a faithful reproduction of the original with two small changes:
The Q4 transistor that Fran used is a ghost (house numbered Fairchild). Measurement on an original returned an NPN silicon with an Hfe of 66. So for these I settled on an NOS Fairchild 2n3563, which matched perfectly.
Q1 had an MPSA18, which overloaded the Germaniums when the Sustain was above 75%. I’m guessing Fran just wanted to squeeze every bit she could out of the Germaniums. I went with a slightly lower gain transistor to make the full range of the Sustain usable. An NOS 2N3565, same as found in the Foxx Tone Machine.
The result is absolutely sweet. I may have sacrificed hitting the absolute top of the Germanium's capabilities, but the lower gain settings are now magical. And there is still plenty of top end.
Reproduction of Frantone's The Sweet
The Sweet was Fran's ultimate BMP variant. And she definitely knew the BMP as she developed the New York BMP while working at EHX.
This is a faithful reproduction of the original with two small changes:
The Q4 transistor that Fran used is a ghost (house numbered Fairchild). Measurement on an original returned an NPN silicon with an Hfe of 66. So for these I settled on an NOS Fairchild 2n3563, which matched perfectly.
Q1 had an MPSA18, which overloaded the Germaniums when the Sustain was above 75%. I’m guessing Fran just wanted to squeeze every bit she could out of the Germaniums. I went with a slightly lower gain transistor to make the full range of the Sustain usable. An NOS 2N3565, same as found in the Foxx Tone Machine.
The result is absolutely sweet. I may have sacrificed hitting the absolute top of the Germanium's capabilities, but the lower gain settings are now magical. And there is still plenty of top end.