Catalinbread Karma Suture User Manual

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WELCOME TO KARMA SUTURE!

(This user guide covers both the original Germanium and the new Silicon Karma Suture
models.)!

The Catalinbread Karma Suture line was inspired by the rare Harmonic Percolator™. Not just a
clone, we’ve expanded the potential by adding the exclusive Density and Diodes controls
coupled with months of fine-tuning to get everything just right. You’ll find great sounds
through the rotation of all the controls. No matter how you have the pedal set, the tone and
response is always alive, sensitive to your every playing nuance.!

Germanium Karma Suture follows the original recipe of a NOS germanium PNP transistor
coupled with a silicon NPN transistor for a sweet, smooth musical response. A mixed pair of
germanium and silicon diodes completes the picture, giving you a warm, asymmetrical
clipping response.!

Silicon Karma Suture ups the gain, output, and brightness with two silicon transistors, still in
PNP/NPN configuration, along with a pair of silicon diodes, configured for asymmetrical
clipping. This version will cut through the mix with epic authority!!

Whether you’re using the Karma Suture as your standalone dirt box into your amp or you’re
using it to boost, overdrive, and enhance your existing dirt pedals, you’ll be greeted with
harmonic distortion laden with even-order harmonics - sweet and musical, even with complex
chord voicings. Both models provide you with amazing even-order harmonic distortion with
distinct personalities. If you’re familiar with the difference between a germanium and silicon
fuzz face, then those qualities apply to the Karma Suture as well - germanium gives you a
thick, sweet response with a softer picking attack. Silicon provides a more immediate picking
attack with a more aggressive tone. Germanium Karma Suture cleans up amazingly from the
guitar’s volume knob, while the Silicon Karma Suture cleans up to a great light crunch ­perfect for rock riffing!!

So, you’re thinking, is it a fuzz? Yes! Is it an overdrive? Yes! Is it a sparkly boost? Yes, again!
Karma Suture’s four control layout allows you to dial in a huge range of harmonically rich
tones that sound great into clean amps and as well as overdriven amps. Or into a foundation
overdrive, such as the Dirty Little Secret. It can work equally well with vintage single coils and
hot humbuckers. !

Because Karma Suture generates predominantly even-order harmonic distortion, you will
notice amazing clarity even with extreme settings. You can even play complex chord voicings
and yet every note rings through clear! Try that with your average fuzz or distortion pedal! And
even at maximum settings, the Karma Suture retains an open and responsive character unlike
a lot of fuzzes and distortion pedals. Even though it has an open character, you can get
amazing sustain with the Karma Suture on, especially if you’re hitting a cranked up amp with
it. Harmonics come in waves, undulating in and out as you hold that epic power chord.

!

The Density control goes from a thick fuzz tone that can sound like an amp ready to
explode all the way to a tight harmonically rich overdrive that screams “rock and roll!”.

This control is the key to dialing in the Karma Suture with any rig, allowing you to fine­tune to find the exact sweet spot. !

The Diodes control allows you to set the threshold of the diode clipping circuit - from
full clipping to get the most distortion and compression all the way to no diode

clipping for a wide-open (and LOUD!) sound. !

The Input knob controls how much of your guitar signal gets to the harmonic
generator. Set it low for a lively boost, laden with even-order harmonic content. Or

crank it all the way up to get fuzz blasts! !

And Output controls the volume level. This pedal is capable of some serious output
in certain settings!!

The Karma Suture will reward your good tone intentions by lacing up your sound with
awesome harmonics that bloom and bloom, turning your power chord into a tantric
event!

!

QUICK START

To get to know your new Karma Suture, plug it straight into your amp set to a clean tone to start off.
We’ll go over where to put the Karma Suture in your signal chain later, but for now let’s just go
straight in. Try out these settings:

FUZZ MODE:

This is the maximum setting and gives the
thickest and fuzziest sound. Depending on
the guitar and amp, it can sound like an
overloaded amp ready to meltdown. But, a
quick rollback of your guitar’s volume knob
and you’ll get great clean up, from a tight
overdrive down to a harmonically enhanced
clean tone.!
DIODES 5:00, DENSITY 5:00, INPUT 5:00,
OUTPUT 2:00

TIGHT OVERDRIVE MODE:

This setting gives you a great rock sound
that cuts through the mix beautifully. Fine
tune the Density control to find the perfect
balance of tight cut and fat fuzz.!

DIODES 5:00, DENSITY 10:00, INPUT 12:00,
OUTPUT 3:00

SPARKLING CLEAN SOUND
ENHANCER MODE (germanium
model):

With low settings of the Input knob, you can
enhance your clean passages with a great
boost that is laden with even-order
harmonics. It’s that tone that is not clean but
sounds clean! Go ahead and try some fancy
jazz chord voicings and pretty arpeggios.
Every note rings through! DIODES 10:00,
DENSITY 10:00, INPUT 8:00, OUTPUT 4:00

Now try the Karma Suture with your amp cranked up to overdrive levels or into your favorite
overdrive pedal. Get ready to experience some serious harmonic bloom! Play a big power chord
and let it ring out and hear what happens! The Karma Suture sounds great into a clean amp but
into an overdriven amp… look out!!

Once you’ve spent some time getting to know the Karma Suture straight into your amp, come
back and read on to get more insights!

THE CONTROLS IN DETAIL

INPUT

This knob controls how much of your guitar’s signal hits the harmonic generation circuit.
Full up and your guitar’s full output drives the circuit. Turned way down and you’ll get a
cleaner sound. But, you’ll get great harmonic enhancement no matter how you have it set!
You can use this control not only to control the gain of the pedal but also to adjust for
different pickup types. If your guitar has super hot pickups and you don’t want fuzz sound,
turn the Input knob down. And unlike the gain knobs on a lot of pedals, the response is
alive and juicy no matter where this control is set!!

OUTPUT

Set this control for the desired output level. You will want to adjust it after adjusting the
other controls, particularly the Diodes control, as the output level varies depending on the
other knobs settings. !

DENSITY

This may be the most important control on the Karma Suture. It sets how “dense” or how
much of your guitar’s bass frequencies get through to the harmonic generation circuit. Set
full and the guitar’s full frequency range will drive the circuit, unleashing big fuzzed out
tones. As you turn Density down, the signal tightens up and less and less of your bass
frequencies get through. This control is great for getting a woolly neck pickup to cut
through! Set Density at minimum and you’ll get an amazingly juicy treble-boosted AC30
type of sound which is perfect for coupling a guitar with hot humbuckers with a cranked up,
overdriven amp (or pedal). And somewhere in the middle you’ll find that perfect balance of
tight treble and fat thump to get you rocking with authority!!

Definitely spend a lot of time experimenting with this control with various guitars and pickup
settings! And don’t forget about varying your guitar’s volume knob!!

DIODES

This control sets the threshold level for the germanium and silicon clipping diodes in the
circuit. Turned full up and you’ll get maximum clipping distortion and compression - great
for running the Karma Suture into a clean amp. As you turn the control down, the threshold
ceiling gets lifted so you’ll gradually get less and less clipping and compression. You’ll find
that as you turn it down, the output gets louder and louder too, due to the clipping ceiling
being raised. You’ll want to adjust the Output knob to compensate. !

A lot of pedals that utilize clipping diodes offer a switch to switch them in and out. Karma
Suture’s Diodes control allows you to switch them in and out at either end of the control’s
range but you can also fine tune exactly how much diode clipping you want! Typically, you’ll
want more diode clipping if you’re running into a clean amp and less diode clipping if you’re
running into a cranked amp or foundation overdrive pedal. Find your sweet spot!

WHERE TO PUT KARMA SUTURE IN YOUR SIGNAL CHAIN

In general, the Karma Suture likes to be up towards the front of your signal chain. Like
most fuzz type pedals, Karma Suture does NOT like buffered pedals in front of it. You
should only run true-bypass pedals before it. If you put a buffered pedal in front of it the
sound will get very bright and harsh, and you will lose touch sensitivity. You should put it
before any foundation overdrives (amp-in-the-box type pedals) so that the Karma Suture
is boosting the “amp”. If you’re using other boosts and fuzzes, experiment with the
stacking order to see where the Karma Suture fits best for you.!

A note about wah pedals: Karma Suture is a awesome with a wah before it. But with
certain wahs and guitar combinations, you may get oscillations when the wah is at the
heel-down position and the Input and Density is up full (fuzz mode). These oscillations
can be used quite effectively in the right musical context (cue up your old Hendrix live
bootlegs), but if you want to get rid of the oscillations, here’s what you do:!

Back down the Density control a bit and/or turn the Input control down a tiny bit too. In
fact, you can use the Input knob to “tune” the sweep of your wah. If your wah oscillates in
heel-down with the Input up full, play with the heel-down on the wah while backing down
the Input control. You’ll hear the sweep frequency change due to the different impedance
loading between the Input of the Karma Suture and the output of the wah . Or, crank up
the Input to get some great freak out sounds! Your call!!

You may find that octave up and down pedals, filter pedals, and other frequency-shaping
pedals work great in front of Karma Suture too. Our own Octapussy (octave-up) and
Perseus (octave-down) sound fantastic in front of Karma Suture!

GUITARS AND KARMA SUTURE

The Karma Suture has been designed to be able to work great with a variety of guitars
with passive pickups. If you’re running vintage output single coils, you’ll be able to get
away with much higher settings of the Density and Input controls. But if you’re running a
guitar with hot humbuckers, worry not! With the pedal’s controls set high you’ll get
awesome overloaded amp meltdown sounds but you can quickly tighten things up by
setting the Density and Input controls lower. With the Density control set low, you’ll slice
right through the band mix with authority!!

In particular, the Silicon Karma Suture works especially well with humbucking guitars and
downtuned guitars.

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AMPS AND KARMA SUTURE

Karma Suture will sound great into any amp, whether set clean or set dirty. In general, if
you’re plugging into an overdriven amp (or pedal) and you want to tighten up the sound,
try any or all of the following:!

•

Turn the Density control down. This will reduce the amount of bass and prevent farty
or pinched-off sounds.!

•

Turn the Input control down. This will lower the amount of drive and help tighten things
up.!

•

Turn the Diodes control down. This will open up the sound and reduce diode
compression. However, the volume level will jump up as you lower this so compensate
by adjusting the Output control.!

•

And finally, turn your guitar’s volume control down a bit. In fact, you can run the Karma
Suture at more extreme settings for fuzzy, amp-overload goodness, and then with a
twist of your guitar’s volume knob get a great, tight, harmonically-rich overdrive sound!

POWERING UP THE KARMA SUTURE

Just use a standard 9 volt DC center-negative power supply for pedals. You can run it up
to 18 volts if you want but you may or may not get oscillation and other misbehaving
sounds. If you like that, go for it! Otherwise, it has been tuned to sound the best at 9
volts.!

For even better tone and response, run a 9 volt battery instead. The pedal draws very
little current so a battery should last a good long time if you remember to unplug it or at
least bypass the pedal so that the LED is not on. You’ll notice a warmer tone and better
dynamics with a battery.

DESIGNER’S NOTES, ORIGINAL GERMANIUM
EDITION, February 4, 2014

I was wanting to come up with a cool new fuzz and tried a bunch of ideas on the
breadboard, different old circuits, to see if there was anything that jumped out at me. I
came up with some very cool sounds during my experiments but one idea really
literally jumped out at me! It was an obscure and rare circuit known as the harmonic
percolator. Whenever we take on an old existing circuit, we only take it on if we feel
we can add something to it, extend it, contribute back to the pool of great guitar
sounds. So I used that circuit as a starting point and began a several month period of
experimenting and tweaking and I’m really stoked about what I came up with! I’m a
guitarist first and a pedal designer second so what I come up with has to satisfy the
most difficult customer I know - myself! Plus, we had a little stash of NOS germanium
transistors. This turned out to be the perfect application for them!!

But what I ended up with was more than just a “fuzz”. Oh, it can do that as good or
better as most fuzz pedals out there, but it can also do so many more things. My
original goal was to make a fuzz that played well with single coils or humbuckers, into
clean amp or into a dirty amp, stacked into more dirt or just by itself. I met that goal
but also ended up with a circuit that could get great overdrive or distortion type
sounds as well as an amazing sparkling cleanish boost that enhanced any passage
that you would normally play with a clean sound. Wow, I thought, can’t wait for
everyone to check this thing out! They’ll freak out! So, I hope you are in the camp of
“OMG this thing is freaking me out, it’s so cool!” :-D !

It sounds great at any volume, but for maximum “OMG”, play it into a loud rig! As
mentioned in the user guide, this circuit generates even-order harmonics. So
everything is aligned harmonically to the notes and chords you’re playing. That’s why
it works so well for complex chords and arpeggios, as well as more conventional
“fuzz pedal” playing techniques like power chords and single note soloing. And if you
love getting controlled feedback, you’ll really love Karma Suture. For me, it’s become
one of those pedals that I want to always leave on. Because when I turn it off, the
sound seems flat and lifeless all of a sudden! And since it responds so well to my
guitar’s volume knob, I *can* leave it on all the time. !

Oh, and what’s up with the name? I don’t know! I was working on the circuit one night
and the term “karma suture” suddenly entered my mind. Yes, it’s a pun but I don’t
know, the sound I was hearing just seemed to fit that name. So there you have it. Play
this pedal and your karma will be stitched up and you’ll be good to go until….. until
you turn it off ;-)!

I hope Karma Suture inspires you to not put your guitar down. Drop me a note at
[e-mail] and let me know what cool sounds you’re coming up
with!!

Peace!!

…Howard

DESIGNER’S NOTES, SILICON EDITION, July 31, 2016

When I came up with the original Germanium Karma Suture recipe, I knew that more
sounds could be conjured from this amazingly simple, yet mysterious, two transistor

circuit. So, a few months ago it was time for me to hit the breadboard again and see
what I could do with it now. I started experimenting with different transistors, diodes,
and biasing and was drawn to the powerful, cutting sound of an all-silicon recipe. The
germanium model already had the sweeter, lighter sounds covered. It was time for

something loud and aggressive! Now, fuzz type pedals and humbuckers don’t always
traditionally get along so I dialed this version in specifically to work especially well with
humbucker guitars. And down-tuned guitars too. I love sludgy down-tuned guitar

sounds but a lot of pedals sound muddy when tuning down to D or C#. So I tuned
Silicon Karma Suture to work great in that setting while not losing anything when
playing single coils and standard tuning. !

But my favorite thing to do with either model is to plug it into a cranked up amp and
then play a big open power chord and let it sustain. When I hear those waves of even-

order harmonics “percolating” away, I get amazed by the idea of the electric guitar all
over again. It just sounds so epic! !

I’m really excited about this new version of the Karma Suture. It sounds thick and rich
while paradoxically bright and cutting at the same time. You won’t get lost in the mix

when you turn it on! !

Enjoy! Be loud. Be proud.!

…. Howard