Phase linear 4000. Worth the recap?

[Carbsandcaps]

Picked up this phase linear 4000 preamp a while ago. I got no sound out of it. I assumed it had cold solders and put it away for a while. Looking through my stuff for things to sell to thin the heard, I came across it again. I figured I’d give it another shot. Hooked it all up and messed with the controls and it started working. I’m wondering if I had the tape monitor on or something. Anyway it seems to be working now.

My question is would it be worth a recap at this point? I’ve heard good and bad things about these. I’d reflow all the solder joints while I’m there and use film caps where applicable. Not sure if I’m going to keep it or sell it though. Any opinions are welcome.

Also on a side note, the guy I got it from said this may have been built by Bob carver himself due to the initials dues to the initials but the look like D.C. to me not B.C. It does seem to be an early serial number though.

 

[bonzoro]

That Joystick model will give you fits. Before a recap, you gotta totally disassemble the pre and resolder EVERY pin of every connector or you'll be spinning your wheels. All the daughter boards have the worst connectors ever. I've worked on quite a few and all the solder connections were cracked (be careful putting the boards in as pressure on the motherboard will cause cracks too). The pins, both male and female get corroded and need to be tinned/cleaned. The last load of gear I bought had 2 of those 4000's with some amps and I gave them away. They are VERY time consuming and the 4000 II would be a better choice. Either way, they all have obsolete parts all over them. If you are looking for some good info, there are a bunch of threads on Phoenix. There are a few guys who love them and will spend hundreds of hours reworking them. The first one I did, I reworked the PS and recapped i, cleaned the hell out of it and an hour after I finished it, it started cutting out. Had to tear it completely apart and solder all those pins. After a couple of fights with other 4000's, I raised my price for working on them so that cured THAT

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I really like the Carver C-1/C11 when it comes to choosing. They are cheap, plentiful and once you do the Mods, you'll have a dead silent Pre with an excellent Phono section. Most Carver/Phase Linear Pre's share the nearly identical Phono Section and we have many mods for them. Plus, they have just enough bells and whistles to keep you occupied playing with them. About the time your board was built and signed, Bob was hip deep in the series II's and I doubt he would have the time or desire to build the older 4000. Good luck on the pre, and get out your microscope for crack inspection.

 

[Carbsandcaps]

Ok so let’s say I go through all of that and it’s working as it should. How is it as a preamp in working condition? I don’t know what the correlation thing means? It sounds awful when I turn it on. It also seems to have a lot of bells and whistles I’ll never use.

 

[egellings]

I'd restore it just for the experience of fixing something and getting it going again, sort of like a hobby project. Then just sell or give it to someone who'd appreciate it.

 

[gadget73]

I worked on one for a friend and thought it sounded decent. +1 on the need to do a lot of re-soldering though, all of those pin headers were broken on my friend's and it caused huge problems with noise. Didn't re-cap it, it wasn't in the budget, he just wanted it to stop sounding like a lightning storm.

The whole thing is kind of a pain to work on. I seem to remember the bottom doesn't come off, so you pull the board from the top to do all the solder work. Those input jacks are kinda crappy and odd, so not easy to source if they break. The phono inputs on my friends' were broken, and the "fix" was to steal the rear channel output jacks since he wasn't using it in quad mode. The main board is large and poorly supported so it flexes, and there isn't anything to support those cards either. Maybe it had a little bit of foam tape on the top cover originally but fair bet its gone or just dust at this point. Not a whole lot you can do for that, too much pressure on the main board will crack it, so at best you can put thin crappy foam tape back on there and hope for the best.

The auto-corrolator actually does a pretty good job on noisy records and turntables if properly adjusted, and I liked the selectable turnover points. The loudness function was also subtle, unlike many that are grossly over-boosted. I seem to remember the expander function was noisy. I don't remember what they called it exactly but it had some proprietary name. Whatever it was, it hissed and crackled. Probably bad caps or noisy transistors but zero effort was put into finding it. He didn't use it so it didn't matter.

 

[ivandezande]

Nah.

 

[W9TR]

At its best it is mediocre, and I’m being generous. It is very noisy. Sometimes even though you paid almost nothing, you realize you paid too much.

 

[maxhifi]

Pros:
-looks kinda like a Marantz 7
-Made in US
-lots of neat features, some of which work really well
-sounds pretty darn good
-4 channel support if you're into that kind of thing

Cons
-unreliable connectors
-caps are junk
-kind of cheaply made
-really complex so any restoration work is labor intensive

I'd say it depends on how bad you want a project and what other preamps you have. I changed a component here or there to keep mine alive but never did a full restore. It's been sitting 15 years and it's unlikely I will ever restore it, given how much work it is and what it's worth to me.

 

[Carbsandcaps]

Well after the pros and cons from you guys, I decided to sell it. I’ve got too many projects and I know I would t get back the time and money I’d have to put into it. Thanks for the input as always!

 

[damacman]

Good call.

 

[maxhifi]

Your sansui tube items mentioned in other threads look like more appealing projects to me, I think it's the right call.

 

[krautmaster]

At its best it is mediocre, and I’m being generous. It is very noisy. Sometimes even though you paid almost nothing, you realize you paid too much.

Typical Bob Carver design, not worth your time or $$, move it along... there are some people who like his stuff though I don't know why...

 

[bonzoro]

Ok so let’s say I go through all of that and it’s working as it should. How is it as a preamp in working condition? I don’t know what the correlation thing means? It sounds awful when I turn it on. It also seems to have a lot of bells and whistles I’ll never use.

Bob Carver liked his "Do-Dads" and fancy names and it was another name for Noise Reduction. If you are not attached to it, have fun and practice with it but I'd sell it and use the cash for a better Pre. The Star Trek Joystick model needs to warp to another location to pass it's problems to somebody else.

 

[gadget73]

yeah, noise reduction. It does it in two parts. There is a low frequency part that will kill the rumble in a turntable, and a high frequency part that will kill surface noise or tape hiss. I thought the top end filter sounded like a wet blanket over the speakers but the low end part did nicely to take the mud out caused by crappy turntables.

Probably neither part is all that useful or necessary with a better source but my friend who owned it had a junky turntable and it lived in his very dusty garage so his records were a mess.

I don't specifically remember if it had problems with the joystick or not. I know everything was screwed up when I first worked on it, but I don't remember if I had to do anything beyond cleaning the controls that the joystick drives. I know it was just a couple of cheapie pots that were involved, and the whole mechanism seemed like it would be very difficult to repace the pots on.

I guess the fact that the 4000 and its paired PL 700-II was offered to me when he passed and I declined probably says something about it. I didn't need them and I knew I'd never be able to bring myself to sell them. I hope they went to someone who is getting use out of them though.

 

[Carbsandcaps]

Well I ended up selling it for a few buck more than I paid for it so I’m happy.

I always thought highly of carver stuff until I got a carver mxr-2000 receiver. It weighed as much as a botl yamaha 2 channel there’s absolutely no way that thing put out 200wpc. It had so many gimmicks on it. It sounded terrible no matter what I did. I ended up selling it for about what I paid for it on eBay. The guy messaged me when he got it and told me the “sonic holography” wasn’t working and he wanted a $100 refund to get it fixed. I didn’t feel like dealing with it so I sent the refund. That was the last carver product I’ll ever own.

 

[bonzoro]

Well I ended up selling it for a few buck more than I paid for it so I’m happy.

I always thought highly of carver stuff until I got a carver mxr-2000 receiver. It weighed as much as a botl yamaha 2 channel there’s absolutely no way that thing put out 200wpc. It had so many gimmicks on it. It sounded terrible no matter what I did. I ended up selling it for about what I paid for it on eBay. The guy messaged me when he got it and told me the “sonic holography” wasn’t working and he wanted a $100 refund to get it fixed. I didn’t feel like dealing with it so I sent the refund. That was the last carver product I’ll ever own.

The Holography circuit didn't work correctly on NEW pre's. There is mod kit's to complete it to where it works correctly. I installed these mods in 100 of the Carver pieces. Buffalo Bob had lots of gimmicks to give the stoners **** to play with while jamming. I also installed many Power Supply mods to fix the crap coming out of Carver as the Bean Counters continued to butcher the industry just to get another dollar per unit.

 

[BmWr75]

I've got a PL 4000 preamp that has been refurbished. It will has some noise in one or both channels (can't remember) which sounds like transformer hum. As a result it is mainly a dust collector.