Help with a Harman Kardon Citation Receiver Please.

Bucky Badger

AK Subscriber
Subscriber
Hey Guys, I just picked up this receiver and man is she something'. It is in very nice condition and as you can see it looks like Georgia O'Keeffe did the veneering on the top..... (ya' sure she painted flowers) LOL
Anyway, the owner told me that it was given to him but he has never gotten it to make a sound. It powers up but no sound. :scratch2:
So I took it and opened her up only to find that 5 of the 9 fuses were gone. (might explain the 'no sound' symptom.) The bottom of one of the trans. had labels on it to tell you the value of the fuses but the other trans had no values. So I called HK and after being transferred to a # of folks I ended up with their chief tech. He was really nice and got out the schematics and told me each individual value. Thanks HK. :yes: Now this receiver has the 5x20mm fuses.(look like regular Buss fuses but shorter. Found some locally and put them in. WooHoo, she sings again but a few of the dial lights are out and the pots need cleaning. So to replace the dial lights, it looks like you have to remove the top panel which means that you will have to re-string the tuner. BUMMER. If anyone knows better please let me know before I go down this path.
It looks like whoever was in there before tried the same thing and screwed up the dial string. As you can see from the pics, The tension spring is just hanging off the string, not attached to anything and the string is as tight as a drum.
So, to make a long story even longer, is there anyone out in AK land that could possibly take a pic of there tuning wheel so I could see just how it's supposed to be?
Thanks for reading this and hope it all makes sense.
Pic 1 shows the fuse's and bottom of the trans.
Pic 2 shows the tuning wheel with the spring just hanging on the string.
Pic 3 shows the wheel again. Spring doing nothin'.
Pic 4 shows the tuning string attached to itself... shouldn't one end be attached to the wheel and the other end be attached to the spring that should be attached to the wheel??? This string connection shown is at dial midpoint. Dial pointer is 1" forward(down in the pic). You can't see it in this pic.
Pic 5 is the top veneer. I think I see an oyster opened up...:D
I do have all of the knobs, they are just off of the face for cleaning.
 

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Yeah that top DOES look a little Erot....Uhhhhh Exotic!! SWEET!!!

Kinda hard to explain how to string it. Better with a pic. Unfortunately can't help there.

You might be able to access the lamps thru the front. Remove the faceplate, and see.

Larry
 
Thanks for the suggestion Larry,
Unlike most receivers, you can't pull off the face like you normally would. The face looks to be screwed into the frame by 2 screws Directly Under the light bay. I hope a service manual tells me more. Maybe someone out there has changed the lights in this animal before and could walk me through it????

And, if you rotate your computer screen around you can see a lot of fun things in the veneer.:naughty:
 
I hear ya. BUT, the string is so tight right now the spring would be/is basically useless. I wonder if I should cut one end of the string where it is connected,(see pic #4) and put the spring in-between. :dunno:
I just need to see a pic of that little spring in action.
Thanks for the idea. There is a post coming out of the wheel that the spring might go on but after that there is no place to connect the spring to the string.
 
Now I do. THANK YOU SO MUCH ECLUSER. You are something special. This should help a lot. I still might need the help of someone who has changed the lights before but this should make the job easier.
Thanks again. :thmbsp:
 
Wow, that dial string looks like it was restrung from the freshness of the string. Those loop/joints, however, appear to be original. Glad you got it running with the fuses.

However, I'd be questioning how the fuses were found to be removed and the dial string 'dinked' with. Seems to me that these might be symptoms of something else. I'd suggest you look around and see if there something else that's been swapped or reworked.

Lastly, those Molex connectors were used on a number of HK gear at the time - like the Citation 17 preamp. I'd recommend you DeOxit all of the pins and their mates to be sure they're in good shape. Also, inspect each and every one for arcing if they carry higher current - such as in the power supply and power amp section. It could account for fuse swapping......

Cheers,

David
 
Thanks dshoaf, I will check those Molex connectors. I think what happened was that a dial light or 2 went out and the guy tried to replace them but couldn't. He then went to the fuses and took them out to replace. I'll bet that he couldn't find the correct fuses, (it took me 4 phone calls to find the right size, 5x20mm), and just left them out and that was it..... I'm just guessing.
I also noticed that the top plastic dial cover has been pryed up in an attempt to get at the dial lights that way. It isn't broken and I will glue it back down.
Thanks again for the info you guys. You are a real help. Thanks be to AK for having this great site. :thmbsp:
 
Whoa, that's a rare bird. Congratulations! AKer, Arkay has one of those but he lives on the other side of the galaxy. There may be one or two others here with the same unit, I'm sure they'll be along.
 
Hey Guys, I just picked up this receiver and man is she something'. It is in very nice condition and as you can see it looks like Georgia O'Keeffe did the veneering on the top..... (ya' sure she painted flowers) LOL
Anyway, the owner told me that it was given to him but he has never gotten it to make a sound. It powers up but no sound. :scratch2:
So I took it and opened her up only to find that 5 of the 9 fuses were gone. (might explain the 'no sound' symptom.) The bottom of one of the trans. had labels on it to tell you the value of the fuses but the other trans had no values. So I called HK and after being transferred to a # of folks I ended up with their chief tech. He was really nice and got out the schematics and told me each individual value. Thanks HK. :yes: Now this receiver has the 5x20mm fuses.(look like regular Buss fuses but shorter. Found some locally and put them in. WooHoo, she sings again but a few of the dial lights are out and the pots need cleaning. So to replace the dial lights, it looks like you have to remove the top panel which means that you will have to re-string the tuner. BUMMER. If anyone knows better please let me know before I go down this path.
It looks like whoever was in there before tried the same thing and screwed up the dial string. As you can see from the pics, The tension spring is just hanging off the string, not attached to anything and the string is as tight as a drum.
So, to make a long story even longer, is there anyone out in AK land that could possibly take a pic of there tuning wheel so I could see just how it's supposed to be?
Thanks for reading this and hope it all makes sense.
Pic 1 shows the fuse's and bottom of the trans.
Pic 2 shows the tuning wheel with the spring just hanging on the string.
Pic 3 shows the wheel again. Spring doing nothin'.
Pic 4 shows the tuning string attached to itself... shouldn't one end be attached to the wheel and the other end be attached to the spring that should be attached to the wheel??? This string connection shown is at dial midpoint. Dial pointer is 1" forward(down in the pic). You can't see it in this pic.
Pic 5 is the top veneer. I think I see an oyster opened up...:D
I do have all of the knobs, they are just off of the face for cleaning.
 
I have acquired #35 and I had the same question about changing the fuse lamps. Actually it is much easier than I thought. Remove cover, remove the black short side panels, remove the 4 screws holding the top window on each side of the receiver, remove the 2 screws, one on each side holding the top dial strip to the housing. The fuse light housing and board will tilt back enough to remove all the fuse lamps. I used a dental pick to get under each fuse lamp and pulled up carefully. Reverse order to reassemble.
 
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