Vintage Fender Fuzz Wah

A thoughtful coworker gave me this after learning that I was into fixing and restoring old guitar gear. The issue was that the wah part wasn’t working. I traced it to a loose set screw on the wah pot’s shaft. It was an easy fix.

The Fender Fuzz Wah is a pretty impressive beast from a design standpoint. Lots of chrome and heft. In addition to fuzz and wah the pedal acts as a volume pedal that is activated by moving the pedal mat side to side. I find this side to side action a little awkward to pull off very well. I’m guessing it would take some practice to get fluid swells out of this.

I would put the date of this pedal somewhere in the late 60s or early 70s range. It may be a ’73 going by the codes on the caps.

How does it sound? Not quite as good as it looks. I was hoping the fuzz was going to be something akin to Fender’s Fender Blender fuzz but that’s not the case. It sounds more like an overdrive. A little like an MXR Distortion Plus. The wah is just ok too. Nowhere near as expressive as my Crybaby. It is pretty fun to use the fuzz and wah together though.

The location of the switches makes activating the effects a little tricky. You have to have a good aim with your toe. I have not used this pedal in any recordings yet but discussing it here makes me want to dig it out and see if I can find a cool use for it. It’s a pretty sweet piece of Fender History and I am happy to have it in my collection.