They were not used much in the eighties that I remember, but the eighties were not the best time for guitarists who would have used that sound, and EHX was not in business for most of that time either. But the eighties is when the value of the old Muffs started to increase. The nineties brought them back to the market, and back to the fore front with a lot of grunge/alternative bands.

Here is a partial list of some Muff users.
http://www.kitrae.net/music/music_big_muff.html#MuffUsers

Well, no one knows for certain, but based on what Billy and Flood have said, Billy loved the Big Muff tone he got on SD, but had trouble with the Muffs when they toured – they compete with the bass low end and is hard to hear live. He dropped the pedals and switched switched to using a Mesa Boogie Strategy power amp, a Marshal JMP-1 preamp, and an Alesis 3630 compressor to drive more gain into the Marshall for the live fuzz/overdrive sounds.

He got a similar low end fuzz tone like the Muff with that setup. When they went into the studio for Mellon Collie he had the same setup, but Billy also has just about every vintage fuzz and modulation pedal known to man, so he uses lots of different stuff on each song. Lots of old EHX pedals. You hear ring modulators, the Micro Synth, Fender Blender, phasers, and kinds of stuff, not just one pedal. It is different on every song.

Most of the rhythm stuff seems to be the preamp distortions, but I still hear the Muff on a few tracks, like JellyBelly and Here is No Why. The rhytm tracks are multi tracked numerous times, so you can’t quite get that exact sound from a single pedal either. I don’t hear the Muff used for any of those solos, but with all the modulation Billy uses you could use any number of fuzz pedals with the same modulation effects and get similar sounds.

Those sound like replacement Daka-ware knobs from Davies. The originals did not have white in the indicator line, or the brass screw, but the current ones do.

See my note about pasting the url above.

At least one of those knobs were used on home hi-fi amplifiers. One of the V1 silver knobs with the long pot shafts I have pictured on my site are the exact same knobs on an amp my father had in our home in the early seventies. I think it was a Magnavox or Phillips Electronics. Some vintage Muff owners have emailed me telling me similar recollections about knobs they have seen.

There are actually two different versions of those reactor tower shaped knobs seen on that Bad Stone. One had an indicator line and one did not. There are a few other of the odd knobs that were made in two versions as well, with and without the line.

The variety of knobs E-H has used never ceases to amaze me. Ten years ago I would have thought many of these knobs were after market replacements, but I find more and more that so many of them were actual production.

Be sure you get that nasaly, Mascis mumble down.It’s an important component that goes along with collecting Muffs

Nice stuff by the way. We need more pics!

The RAO, CW, and some green green CW all used the first version, and fit the first version die cast box. The second edition green Civil War Muffs changed to the new die cast box – the one with ridged sides, and got a new battery door to fit it. The first edition green Russians used this same box and door. One door was wider and longer than the other. Neither had much of a detente to hold them in place.

Here is the later one, from the green Russians.

And here is the earlier one from the RAO and Civil War Muffs. Some of these were red plastic.