Maestro fz1a

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1.5 volts of pure 60es fuzz.
Hot on the heels of “(i cant get no) Satisfaction”‘s success, that triggered sales of the fz1 (a product that lied for its first couple of marketing years virtually in denial), once the stock left of the original model was over, the Gibson/Maestro plants started churning out this, the fz1a.
This is a bit different in sound, still with a very distinctive vintage vibe. If you play garage, this is a must have sound, as this is the pedal thats been taken up by all those garage kids on the wake of the Stones’ USA invasion circa 65!
I didnt have any layout to follow for this, so i had to do it myself from the schem.. works great!

I used some carefully selected ac128 (sub-shit standard Tungsram), oc75 x 2 (crappy chinese Motorola) germanium trannies, NOS ICEL caps, the usual carbon comps.

Q1: hfe 57, leakage 0.08

Q2: hfe 306 (yes..), leakage 0.60

Q3: hfe 2718 ahem.. 358, leakage 0.83 (i really had to wait for this one to settle, but remember these are truly shitty transistors!)


Artwork taken from a japanese 60es pop 45.

Guts:image

Maestro fz1

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Ann Margret!
Maestro fz1!
My fave fuzz (after all ive been collecting 60es rock all my life have not i).
Built on a bakelite sheet point to point.

Comparing the fz1 to the fz1a, using a fender strat neck pickup in the following sequence:

Clean – fz1 – fz1a

https://www.dropbox.com/s/lxh3iclkno2ej9s/1%20clean-fz1-fz1a.m4a?dl=0

https://www.dropbox.com/s/7dbfi0b42wlfqjx/2%20clean-fz1-fz1a.m4a?dl=0

https://www.dropbox.com/s/ddldrtx6lz1lq19/3%20clean-fz1-fz1a.m4a?dl=0

https://www.dropbox.com/s/gpopdq3o1ww7qei/4%20clean-fz1-fz1a.m4a?dl=0