Fuzz Unit with Treble Booster Circuit

Introduction

Our project group consists of Jordan Keating, Joe Henshall, Panwen shi, Weisu Zhao and  our academic adviser is Professor James Bradley. We intend to build a fuzz unit with a treble booster circuit for an electric guitar.

The function of this circuit is to provide a distortion sound as well as having treble boosting capabilities. The circuit should provide enough sustain and gain without producing too much noise and still be pleasing to the human ear.

Plan

Week 1

• Design the circuit
• Allocate roles to group members
• Begin writing the blog, log book and create a gant chart
• Meet with academic adviser
• Meet as a group to plan project

Week 2

• Begin building and testing the circuit
• Troubleshooting
• Meet with academic adviser to discuss progress and to seek guidance
• Meet as a group to solve problems

Week 3

• Continue building and testing circuit
• Begin writing the group report
• Meet with academic adviser to discuss progress and to seek guidance
• Meet as a group to structure report

Week 4

• Test the circuit with a real guitar and amp
• Test the circuit with different components to see the effect on the sound
• Start writing a poster for our project
• Meet with academic adviser to discuss progress and to seek guidance
• Meet as a group to prepare presentation

Week 5

• The circuit will be completed by then and no more changes will be made
• The report will be finished by this time
• The poster and presentation will be completed
• Tidy up the bench ready for inspection
• Demonstrate the circuit to Professor James Bradley

Week 6

• All tasks will be completed by this point
• The project will be presented and demonstrated in front of the lab instructors and the academic adviser

Week 1

The circuit will consist of two smaller circuits combined. A fuzz unit and a treble booster circuit will be initially built separately and then connected in series. The pedal will be contained in a stomp box with several foot switches for the different effects and for turning it on and off. Two 1/4" jack sockets will be used to connect the guitar leads to the amp and the guitar. The inspiration for the circuit was taken from the book "Electronic Music Projects" by R.A.Penfold.

Figure 1. A circuit diagram for the treble booster circuit

Figure 2. A circuit diagram for the fuzz unit

The project roles were also allocated this week with Jordan Keating as the project manager, Panwen Shi as the Developer, Joe Henshall as the technical writer and Weisu Zhao as the designer of the circuit. Joe has been noting our progress in a log book and the information will be later added to this blog or used to solve future problems. The group met with our academic adviser this week and we explained our plans for the project. A meeting was held earlier this week to discuss the circuit and confirmed that it was a feasible project.



Week 2

The group began constructing the circuits. Joe and Jordan worked on the treble booster circuit while Panwen and Weisu constructed the fuzz unit. The treble booster was expected to increase the gain of the signal as long as the signal was only several hundred mV in amplitude. The fuzz unit was meant to give a waveform vaguely resembling a square wave. The treble booster began to distort when the peak to peak voltage was in V instead of mV. This error was noted in the log book and the amplitude was reduced using the signal generator.

Figure 1. This is the treble booster circuit boosting the input signal

Figure 2. This is the output signal when the treble booster circuit is turned off

Figure 3. This is the treble booster circuit

Figure 4. This is the fuzz unit

Figure 5. This shows the unaltered signal coming out of the fuzz unit

Figure 6. This picture shows the altered signal. Notice how the signal has a more square shape than the previous one

The circuit was constructed in full on the sk10 board and tested. The circuit produced the same output as the previous tests

Figure 7. Shows the entire circuit

Week 3

The circuit was built and tested with a guitar and amplifier. The desired effect was produced and the group began planning to transfer the circuit to veroboard.

Week 4

The circuit was built on veroboard and tested with an oscilloscope. The resulting waveforms are shown below.

Figure 8. Here is the completed circuit

Figure 9. Shows the input signal

Figure 10. Shows the output from the treble booster

Figure 11. Shows the output from the treble booster when it is on

Figure 12. Shows the output from the fuzz unit

Week 5

The project was completed in the previous week so all that was needed was further tests to check it worked. The time this week was spent planning the report and designing the poster for the bench inspection in week 6.