I was curious about your findings on the test points after setting the idle current properly. I never did that myself and do not feel like dismantling the beast just for exercise.
But as the saying goes, "curiosity killed the cat..." if you do not feel like doing it, do not take the chance.
I played around with this pretty much all weekend.
I monitored MVDC at R39 and the testpoints ID-CT simultaneously for several hours. I began to monitor temp of the heatsinks at the ONE HOUR mark.
My findings are this....
At start up......................R39 - 10mvdc..........Test Points - 10mvdc
1min after start up.........R39 - 15mvdc..........Test Points - 15mvdc
10min after start up.......R39 - 40mvdc..........Test Points - 40mvdc
1hr after start up............R39 - 48mvdc..........Test Points - 48mvdc..........95*F at the heatsinks
5hrs after start up..........R39 - 49mvdc..........Test Points - 49mvdc..........98*F at the heatsinks
8hrs after start up..........R39 - 50mvdc..........Test Points - 50mvdc..........99*F at the heatsinks
10hrs after start up........R39 - 50mvdc..........Test Points - 50mvdc..........99*F at the heatsinks
No further changes were noted after the 10hrs mark.
I am not convinced that it makes much difference wether you use R39 or the test points considering that they both give the same exact readout 100% of the time. Furthermore, I would like to see how and why 40mvdc at 10min is way too much.
My question is this.....................the guy you consulted with that told you to adjust to 10mvdc at R39, when did he tell you that you should see the 10mvdc? How many minutes after start up?
The manual says 40mvdc at 10min.
You said you have 15mvdc at R39.....how much idle time did you give the tx8500 before you obtained that reading?