I've been fucking with subminiature tubes, lately. Got asked "can you make a tube Big Muff" and I said I dont know but let's give it a shot. The 6112 tube is a medium gain dual triode tube, kinda in the middle ground, gain wise, between a 12AT7 and a 12AX7. Only they're smaller and have flexible leads that you can solder directly to a board, so no socket needed. Perfect for pedals, so I bought a chunk of em.

A typical Big Muff is four transistor stages so one could replicate it with two of these tubes. I set the filaments up in series, with each tube drawing 6V, so it can be run off a12V DC supply. Typical operating plate voltage is 100V according to the datasheet. I set up a "Nixie power supply" to generate something near that voltage. And with a little experimenting and tweaking the answer turns out to be, yes, I can build a tube Big Muff. This is my personal prototype:



I've also started messing with something like what I *think* is probably going on in that Thermionics TE-01 and having promising results. Should be easy to do in a pedalboard friendly format that runs off of standard 9VDC.

Wow

Hot diggity dang

I’ve got a little Soviet IRPA sdc mic with a KM84 capsule and subminiature tube and it sounds crazy good.

Here's the finished product on the Freedom Amp Preamp. Verdict? Its insane....this boy's not right in the head. But the amps are like that too and this recreates those. It is fun to play, though! Its got kind of a mis-biased, velcro-y fuzz vibe at some settings. I could definitely believe the rumor that one of those amps was used on some Hot Snakes recordings.

I don't usually care about wirings, but yours is sex. Damn, that is some hot layout.

Dr Tony Balls wrote: Fri Feb 13, 2026 9:31 am Here's the finished product on the Freedom Amp Preamp. Verdict? Its insane....this boy's not right in the head. But the amps are like that too and this recreates those. It is fun to play, though! Its got kind of a mis-biased, velcro-y fuzz vibe at some settings. I could definitely believe the rumor that one of those amps was used on some Hot Snakes recordings.

Ben (who did the Hot Snakes recordings) on occasion does audio work for Taylor, I'm going to confirm that rumor

Looks shit hot. Nice choice on the name.

They for sale yet?

Feels like something i need