Are there ever pieces that make you want to hang up your soldering iron?

saabracer23

saabracer23

AK Subscriber
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Not really. Not give up, but makes you wish you were working on anything alse. I’m completely rebuilding a Sansui 9090db right now. The Kenwood Model 600 I did last was a breeze compared to this. I’m not sure what the engineers were thinking with screw placement for these boards. It’s a very annoying puzzle.

Anyways, just venting.

Dan
 
Yes, and oddly it's been with some very highly regarded and sought-after equipment that, if I repeated the high-end names, you'd tell me I was crazy.
 
I have most definitely been there. Actually I just got finished with one that had me pulling my hair out.
I was sure I would want nothing to do with the bench for at least a year after that one went home but the next day I was tinkering on an old AM transistor radio with the memory of my annoyance quickly fading.
 
Yup, my nemeses are the pieces whose electrical problems are caused by deficient thermal design. I go through all the MP&A of fixing the electronics only to have the damned thing blow up up again because its thermals are whacked. And since I'm no thermal engineer: angry, injured, self-pitying stasis.
 
While I am not an engineer the one I sent my Marantz 2500 too is & swore that was the LAST one he'd do. Lucky me. I guess it's a complicated receiver. Maybe all totl receivers are like yours?
 
Yes, one tube amp I repaired had low level buzz in the audio, and no matter what I did, I couldn't get rid of it. I tried everything I could think of without any success and just tolerated the defect until eventually one diode in one of the rectifier diode bridges shorted out and blew the main fuse. When I replaced it, the noise was gone.

I bet I had the cover off that amp 50 times.
 
Yes, and they're called "Tough Dogs" in the repair and service industry.. Some defy logical troubleshooting and repairs. The nature of the beast, the reminder that we're humans. And what the tough repair ends up is teaching us more than ever before when we get it diagnosed and repaired properly.
 
I rebuilt a Scott integrated amp that uses 7189 tubes ,don't recall the model number
very compact , hard to work on - never again.
 
Oh, I forgot to mention that my soldering iron above burns Everclear.

So if I have a tough dog repair, I really don't care. I just drink the fuel instead of putting it in my soldering tool.
 
BGW modular construction.

1125779-bgw-750b-power-amp.jpg
 
for SS, i really like BGW. modular construction , large safe operating area for the output
devices , lots of heat sink......Unfortunately, a lot of used amps were rentals and have
rack rash and are all beat up. Just gave a 250D to relative for a present.
 
I have a soldering iron that makes me want to hang up my soldering iron. It has a separate cord that gets plugged in to the main body, uses tiny pins to make the connections. When I first bought it, it did not even work, so sent it back for repair. Got it back and found the real problem was with the connection. It keeps shutting off on me, but really is just loosing its connection. i will tear into it someday soon and just hard wire the iron cord inside the body. I have squeezed the little female pin sockets together, but that lasted one soldering session.101_4466.JPG 101_4467.JPG 101_4467.JPG
 
Yup. Dolby board on a 9090DB that someone else previously worked on. The wafers on the switch are all out of time. Something is shorted, but I haven't found it yet. I'm just about ready to go on ebay and buy another board just so I can start fresh with one that is unmolested. Grrrr....
 
Yup, ive had several. I sansui au-517 relay issue, which was solved. But then a macintosh ma5100 power supply issue, a technics su-v10 and moat recently a sansui au-x1. The last one is the only one i have handed to someone competent to work on, rather than me!
 
The Pioneer SA-9800 I have, I very nearly wanted to give up on it, and just sell it as partially restored. Now I've got it going finally, I love it.

http://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/pioneer-sa-9800-restoration-and-upgrade.420407/

The Sony TA-F5A is one that still annoys me. It keeps going into thermal runaway, and I've tried multiple times to fix this. I even bought another one, a 220v version, with the hopes of swapping the amplifier boards over. But the Pulsed Power Supply makes the board layout different from the 120v and 220v versions, enough that it's not a straight swap.

http://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/sony-ta-f5a-amplifier-restoration-big-meters.721724/

Lee.
 
Yes.

There are some very desirable units that I never want to work on again.

Some I will, but its going to cost dearly.
Some, I will not.

There are some that I will work on, but have so many weak points that anything less than a total rebuild is a waste of effort. When I quote work on those, potential customers vanish.
I hope they don't try to get them "fixed" cheap.
 
blhagstrom said:
Yes.

There are some very desirable units that I never want to work on again.

Some I will, but its going to cost dearly.
Some, I will not.

There are some that I will work on, but have so many weak points that anything less than a total rebuild is a waste of effort. When I quote work on those, potential customers vanish.
I hope they don't try to get them "fixed" cheap.
Click to expand...
I know how ya' feel there. Some of them really make me drag my feet to get started on them.
The worst is when someone cobbles up a fairly complex unit.
I managed to restore a severely cobbled Marantz 4300. That was a cake walk compared to some that I've seen.
 
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