My long term temporary amp has developed a fault, sometimes the sound only comes out of one channel and I have to move the volume pot up and down to clear the fault, I assume the pot just needs cleaning.
Any tips on doing this? Is it as simple as just spraying some dust spray on it?
I don't want to spend any money on it, as its 12 year old base spec Yamaha, its not worth much.
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Blow on it. High tech solution - compressed air in a can. Same result.
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You need servisol or ipa and clean off the contacts. Leave it to dry for a while before switching it back on.
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Thanks, I will get the isopropyl on it :)
Not having any luck with my amps :( This is something I can fix myself though.
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How much would a decent amp cost? New I mean. Just curious.
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The temp amp would cost about £230 new, but really to get something as good as my old one I would need to spend over £350 new unless I find something with a bit of a discount (e.g an old model).
The Yamaha I have now is perfectly ok for the time being, once my credit card is paid off I can think about replacing it, but being sensible till then.
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I was wondering because I hoped you wouldn't just buy a new one on the credit card and not pay it all off before interest. So the £350 become over £500 before you know it. None of my business I know. :-)
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Not going to happen, hence buying a 12 year old one for £40 cash :).
Providing I fix the volume pot which just needs cleaning it should be a good amp, in no rush to replace it. Plan was to replace it once my car is paid off.
Still got the Cambridge too which is a nice mid range amp so still got the option to get that repaired.
Learnt my lesson the hard way with credit cards :)
Last edited by: RattleandSmoke on Sat 28 May 11 at 00:55
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i needed a new amp last yr and went to richer sounds and the one that was recomended by what hifi was 450 pounds.
they didnt have it in stock so came home and went on ebay. there was one due to finish in the middle of the night up at £20 with no bids, i waited up and got it for the £20. when i collected it , it still had a reciept for £499 and was only 10 months old. the ladys husband had left her and she was selling his things off and didnt care what she got for them.
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Very odd, usually bargains like that are well spotted. I am guessing it was an unusual model and she put it in the wrong section.
Still not sure what to do about my Cambridge, because Richers want £40 just for looking at it.
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ive got an old cambridge i thinks its called an a1. worked perfectly for yrs but now blows fuses everytime its switched on. not worth repairing now so off to the tip i think
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I have an Arcam Alpha 7 amp on which the pots were ruined not long after I bought it 14 years ago by SWMBO drying the washing in front of the multi-fuel stove in the lounge!!
I did buy what I assumed was switch cleaner (but wasn't!) from Screwfix some years ago, and that made it worse :(
Only thing to do would be to renew the pots myself but - would aftermarket jobbies be the same I wonder.
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Mine is the Cambridge Audio 640A, which uses partial class A operation, it draws a whopping 650w from the mains in peak use! The problem is it has been cutting out and my local TV/HIFI shop don't know what the cause is and have suggested to take it to Richersounds.
They retailed at over £300 when a new model, but I bought mine in a clearance sale for £150.
£40 seems too much of a gamble, but I wonder if they can't fix it they would give you vouchers towards a new one or something?
I just don't have any luck with amps, I always regret selling my old Marantz PM6010 OSE for £35 for spares as the balance pot needed replacing. Should have got that repaired.
I also have an old Rotel 870 pre amp which is worth quite a lot of money, I use that for headphone output and phono stage.
So the logical solution would be to buy a second hand power amp, but then the Rotel would not have enough inputs as I have:-
CD player
PC
Blueray Player
DAB
Turntable
PVR
All connected into it.
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What you (and I) need Rattle, is a 'little man' who has retired from the tv/audio game, but still keeps 'his hand in' to pay for a few ounces of bacca and the odd pint of beer.
I do know of such a not-so little man - my brother but ... I'd rather ask Barack Hussein Obama to lend me a fiver!!
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I am sure my uncle is capable of fixing it, he can fix power supplies on flat screen TVs etc despite not working in the electronics industry for decades. He has fixed things before but I wouldn't like to ask him as he is always busy doing other things.
Haven't seen him for 18 months so I can't really ask him.
There is a local HIFI shop near me which just do HIFI's but I ask them to put a new cable on a pair of headphones once, they got the channels mixed up. So if they cannot even solder a simple wire I am not trusting them with a HIFI amp.
They will probably just bypass the protection circuit to get it working!
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We're both engineers Rattle - more than capable of soldering a few connections to some new pots, but I wonder if some aftermarket pots from say radiospares or rs components, would alter the sound quality of our amps in any way, I very much doubt it though.
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As an engineer you know that the "sound" does not travel through the pots, so it can not alter its tonal quality in any way, all the pots provide is changes to the voltage bias of other components. It is true however a poor pot could inject "noise" or instability into other parts.
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>>As an engineer you know that the "sound" does not travel through the pots, so it can not alter its tonal quality in any way<<
A car engineer, but yes - I take your point,
I think I'll replace them though b'cos the Alpha 7 amps still fetch good money ~
tinyurl.com/3rsdmru (ebay)
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Cleaning out volume pots - Alastairw
