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Who here knows how to repair amps? I've got my friend's Hot Rod Deville here. Turns on, tubes light, everythings a go and then... no sound. no sound at all. checked the speaker connections, tried both inputs, to no avail. Any ideas?

thanks!

Do the tubes make noise if you tap on them with the eraser side of a pencil? My HRD died like that once. It turned out to be a cold solder joint on the power amp tubes section. I'd say take it to a tech. You kill yourself fucking with the ammount of stored current in an amp. Shit's real.

Off topic. I used to rebuild subaru engines at a local shop. The owner thought it eas funny to throw charged capacitors from the starter assembly at you forcing your instinct to catch... dick head.

Astricii wrote:Do the tubes make noise if you tap on them with the eraser side of a pencil? My HRD died like that once. It turned out to be a cold solder joint on the power amp tubes section. I'd say take it to a tech. You kill yourself fucking with the ammount of stored current in an amp. Shit's real.

Off topic. I used to rebuild subaru engines at a local shop. The owner thought it eas funny to throw charged capacitors from the starter assembly at you forcing your instinct to catch... dick head.

Haven't tapped on the tubes yet. I'll try that. I'm at work right now so I can't test it yet. I know that there's a lot of stored current, but how does one graduate to the ability to handle things like that? Is there a way to safely discharge that electricity? I want to repair amps but there's like this mystical status that must be reached first. I gotta know.

Thanks.

You have to discharge the big electrolytic caps, we used to put (PLASTIC OR WOODEN HANDLED) screwdrivers across the leads to discharge them at school for fun but you could potentially end up welding the screwdriver blade to the leads or damaging the solder joints. Neon lamps rated for enough power could work too, as well as fuckhuge reisistors if you happen to have them laying around the house. If you aren't 100% confident messing with that kind of current, I'd just save yourself the anxiety and possible injury and take it to a qualified tech. Or even have someone with experience walk you through it for your first few times.