Marshall - Supa Fuzz (196x) [gut shot picture thread]

Post by **modman** » 19 Nov 2014, 21:34

Have a look at was is definitely a FAKE 'original' 60s Supafuzz.
The case is real, but the board looks DAM-ish. At least the perf is too modern and too shiny too...

Compare to the perf used in this real one.... http://www.fuzzeffect.com/fuzzeffect_019.htm

https://www.ebay.com/itm/original-1960s ... 4897.l4275

]

Electric Warrior · Post by **Electric Warrior** » 19 Nov 2014, 23:07

Looks fine. Nothing modern about the vero board. It just hasn't oxidized much (no surprise - it's kept inside an enclosure) and even if it has dulled a little it still reflects the flash well. I've seen lots of shiny vero..

The only problem I have with this pedal is the really high price.

mictester · Post by **mictester** » 20 Nov 2014, 08:55

It's a fake. I have two real ones, and neither has this layout. Also, the Veroboard is just a bit too clean.

Component cost ~£20, case cost ~£50. Profit? Spectacular!

There was someone making these cases for about £50 a while ago. A friend of mine made a couple of pedals in this kind of case - I must ask for details of the supplier.

Incidentally, these pedals sound pretty crappy - there were MUCH better fuzzes around at the time!

Electric Warrior · Post by **Electric Warrior** » 20 Nov 2014, 10:29

There's nothing wrong with the layout and the board is as clean as many others. Noone's ever made a 100% convincing enclosure either.
Sourcing all the correct components would be quite a pain. Especially for £20.

mictester · Post by **mictester** » 20 Nov 2014, 18:17

The "correct" components? Three OC81Ds - I've got a whole boxful that cost me 10p each (no - you can't buy any!). A slack handful of carbon composition resistors? I've got loads of them, and used to buy them for 15p / 100! The capacitors aren't a significant problem either (and I'd defy ANYONE to hear any difference between 1960s capacitors (that still work) and modern parts). The resistors can also be substituted without any sound change, by the way. The only expensive component is the footswitch!

It's actually a pretty poor circuit - it has the (slight) advantage of being reasonably tolerant of leaky and low gain germanium transistors, but it's NOT the great fuzz that some people claim. I have two of them, and seldom get them out of the cupboard - in fact I'm giving one to an old friend - who had one stolen a little while ago - as a Christmas present! He's going to be very pleased when he finds out that it's "worth" thousands!

Electric Warrior · Post by **Electric Warrior** » 20 Nov 2014, 21:52

Sure, you could make a lot of compromises, but that wouldn't make you a convincing fake. If you don't use exactly the same components as a specific vintage unit, it still needs to fit into the bigger picture somehow.

Post by **modman** » 20 Nov 2014, 22:47

Electric Warrior wrote:If you don't use exactly the same components as a specific vintage unit, it still needs to fit into the bigger picture somehow.

This is not the first sentence you write that is grammatically correct but utterly devoid of meaning. Indeed, this veroboard is IMHO not "fitting the bigger late 60s picture"...

: supafuzzcomp.png (172.7 KiB) Viewed 4213 times

I also have an argument to support it - the veroboard used in the ebay pedal was not around in 1967-8, even though it was invented in 1967:

The original Veroboard used FR-2 synthetic-resin-bonded paper (SRBP) (also known as phenolic board) as the base board material. Some versions of stripboard now use higher quality FR-4 (fiberglass-reinforced epoxy laminate) material.

All original veroboard early fuzzes have the FR-2 type, not the FR-4 from the pedal in the Ebay auction.
Now you come with a counter argument, pictures that show me wrong or else or just stop wasting people's time...

nightraven · Post by **nightraven** » 20 Nov 2014, 23:04

are you actually the admin of this site?

Electric Warrior · Post by **Electric Warrior** » 21 Nov 2014, 00:32

I don't get why you'd think this is FR-2 and not phenolic. The board material looks just like any vero board that Marshall used for these. Looks identical to the vero material that Sola Sound used for the MKII/Supa as well, although I haven't seen any Marshall made ones that had the Vero company and patent information print (yet?).

Also it's kinda silly to put a picture of a Sola Sound made Supa next to a Marshall made one to illustrate how one is "fake".
Better put it next to one of these:

beedotman · Post by **beedotman** » 21 Nov 2014, 08:17

^ I agree with EW

Electric Warrior wrote: Also it's kinda silly to put a picture of a Sola Sound made Supa next to a Marshall made one to illustrate how one is "fake".

Post by **modman** » 21 Nov 2014, 12:21

Are you saying this is phenolic board?

Or that there are fibreglass boards used in 60s Supafuzzes?
In addition, why is the board mounted with the copperside up? Every Supa I've seen had it the other way around.

nightraven · Post by **nightraven** » 21 Nov 2014, 14:25

Damn, my supafuzz has a different layout to the sola sound pedal you cobbled together in MS Paint as well - is it also fake?!

Electric Warrior · Post by **Electric Warrior** » 21 Nov 2014, 15:22

I believe it's phenolic. FR-4 is usually translucent, isn't it? I guess the structure you can see there comes from sawing a larger piece of board into pieces.
But even if it's not phenolic: it's old.

You may not have seen any other Supa vero boards mounted with the copper side up yet, but that just means you haven't seen all that many Supas. The Sola Sound version always had the component side up.
When Marshall started making them they used a new layout, a different enclosure, different components and they mounted the boards differrently. All the boards in the picture I posted are mounted with the trace side up.

You might have seen the later PCB version. They mounted those with the components facing down, too. At some point (around 72 I believe) they switched to an FR-4 pcb and mounted the pots on the board -vertically.

phibes · Post by **phibes** » 22 Nov 2014, 19:56

EW's right. That's a transitional model. Didn't all those have the copper side facing out?

sinner · Post by **sinner** » 22 Nov 2014, 21:49

...and shiny like a dog's dong? Bitch, pliz. This thing should be close to their 60's of age, no way the copper shine like this.

Ew, FR2 IS phenolic

mictester · Post by **mictester** » 25 Nov 2014, 00:36

Dammit. I'm going to have to go into the cellar to get the two GENUINE ones out and see how they're assembled. As I remember, the components are visible rather than the solder-side of the board. One of them has a paper layout on the board, with the components poked through - it looks like it might have been a training aid for the people constructing them.

Just for fun, I assembled one on a breadboard earlier. I tried several transistor combinations, and frigged the bias to get sensible voltages, but the thing still sounded crap! It's a sort of buzzy, farty fuzz, with a bit of hiss thrown in for annoyance. i won't be building one of these!

DrNomis · Post by **DrNomis** » 25 Nov 2014, 01:28

mictester wrote:Dammit. I'm going to have to go into the cellar to get the two GENUINE ones out and see how they're assembled. As I remember, the components are visible rather than the solder-side of the board. One of them has a paper layout on the board, with the components poked through - it looks like it might have been a training aid for the people constructing them.

Just for fun, I assembled one on a breadboard earlier. I tried several transistor combinations, and frigged the bias to get sensible voltages, but the thing still sounded crap! It's a sort of buzzy, farty fuzz, with a bit of hiss thrown in for annoyance. i won't be building one of these!

I'm guessing that the reason for the farty-sounding fuzz is probably because the third transistor is biased so that it's collector-voltage is very close to the supply voltage, the Marshall Super Fuzz circuit is similar to the MK II Tonebender, my MK II Tonebender sounds pretty smooth and it's Q3 collector-voltage is about 6V or so, you could try tweaking the biasing a bit to get rid of the farty-ness......

Electric Warrior · Post by **Electric Warrior** » 26 Nov 2014, 11:17

sinner wrote:...and shiny like a dog's dong? Bitch, pliz. This thing should be close to their 60's of age, no way the copper shine like this.

Ew, FR2 IS phenolic

It's a flat, smooth surface. It reflects light. And it's not unusual for copper tracks to not tarnish that much.
Have a look at this ca. 1969 Shatterbox board. The copper got a bit darker where it was exposed to air (i.e. everywhere except around the screw holes. It must have been mounted on a rubber washer). If you'd hit it with light from a different angle it would reflect it just as much as the traces on the board in that supa.

I know FR2 is phenolic. The 0.15'' pitch stuff that Vero is currently making is still phenolic, just lighter in color.

mictester wrote:Dammit. I'm going to have to go into the cellar to get the two GENUINE ones out and see how they're assembled. As I remember, the components are visible rather than the solder-side of the board. One of them has a paper layout on the board, with the components poked through - it looks like it might have been a training aid for the people constructing them.

Just for fun, I assembled one on a breadboard earlier. I tried several transistor combinations, and frigged the bias to get sensible voltages, but the thing still sounded crap! It's a sort of buzzy, farty fuzz, with a bit of hiss thrown in for annoyance. i won't be building one of these!

Just because you own one or two genuine units that were assembled in a certain way doesn't mean there weren't units that were assembled differently.

I guess I like buzzy, farty fuzz with annoying hiss... http://naturalbornyoers.com/forumpics/mkII.mp3
stock circuit, didn't need to do anything to get the voltages right. And correct voltages won't magically make it sound right. With the wrong transistors I can make it sound like crap with the voltages still being in the right ballpark.

nightraven · Post by **nightraven** » 26 Nov 2014, 17:38

mictester wrote:Dammit. I'm going to have to go into the cellar to get the two GENUINE ones out and see how they're assembled.

is this the same cellar where you exhumed your WEM fuzz? please post photos of that already. )
I gotta get myself one of those. Imagine having a cellar that magically spawns vintage fuzz pedals whenever an argument is failing ))

Electric Warrior · Post by **Electric Warrior** » 20 Dec 2014, 23:52

Nyquist5 wrote:Hey there,
Nothing that isn't known about this SupaFuzz, but it uses AC126 so I thought I'd share the guts with you. One Electroytic cap does not seem original and the pots have been changed. It has been well used and abused. Apart from that, it seems stock. The sound is pretty mushy due to failing electrolytic caps but the owner wanted to keep them in.
[ Image ]
[ Image ]
[ Image ]
[ Image ]

Turns out the caps are all original. Someone on TGP has a Supa with the exact same electrolytics.