DPM
11-20-2006, 12:39 PM
This is a long story, so please bear with me.
Last Friday, I had my stereo system on twice. The first listening session lasted about three hours, and there was no sign of impending doom. In fact, the system had been running fine for the whole first week I was at my new address. Anyway, after the first listening session of the day was over, I shut the system down for several hours and went out for awhile.
Upon my return, I fired the stereo back up and put on a live concert DVD (Kissology). Immediately, I noticed that the soudstage was skewed to the left, but I (mistakenly) put it down to the low-fi nature of the concert recording and soldiered on. (The volume wasn't loud.) About twenty minutes in to the show the right channel in my amp went dead, and I could smell burning plastic and solder. In a panic, I ran up to check what was wrong and found that the right side of the chasis was very hot to the touch, and the signal light for that channel was off. I quickly shut the amp down, but it was too late. The right channel was down for the count. Aaarrgghh!!
It was here that I made my second mistake. After several minutes of cursing, I pulled the broken amp from the rack. I figured that it had merely blown some faulty circuit. I then hooked up a backup amp--a Proceed Amp 2--to resume my listening. As soon as I powered it up its right channel went down too. (Thankfully, the Proceed has fuses for each channel, so it may have fared better than my first amp.) It was now clear that the right speaker was causing some problems.
My question is, what could go wrong inside the speaker that would take out an amplifier channel? The reason I ask is that my brother, who has more knowledge than I concerning the ins and outs of electronics, will be visiting me over the holidays. And we will be opening up the speaker in question. What should we be looking for? I've already GENTLY pressed on the woofer and mid drivers and could hear no rubbing. So I think that they are probably OK.
The speaker is a Hales Transcendence 8: a three-way tower that is set up for bi-wiring, and that is how I was using it. I guess I should also point out that when I made my relocation the movers may have been a bit rough or clumsy. (Take your pick.) Because when I opened its box the speaker was misaligned inside, so I have to assume that it may have taken a fall. Still, it ran fine for a week until all of this happened.
Another thing to consider is that it is quite possible that the first amp blew its channel on its own and took out the speaker. Then the speaker took out the second amp.
What a freakin' mess.
Anyway, your comments, personal experiences and helpful hints would be appreciated. Since Hales the company has been out of business for a while now, and no one seems to know where Paul Hales himself can be reached, I'm on my own in repairing the speaker.
Thanks.
DPM
Last Friday, I had my stereo system on twice. The first listening session lasted about three hours, and there was no sign of impending doom. In fact, the system had been running fine for the whole first week I was at my new address. Anyway, after the first listening session of the day was over, I shut the system down for several hours and went out for awhile.
Upon my return, I fired the stereo back up and put on a live concert DVD (Kissology). Immediately, I noticed that the soudstage was skewed to the left, but I (mistakenly) put it down to the low-fi nature of the concert recording and soldiered on. (The volume wasn't loud.) About twenty minutes in to the show the right channel in my amp went dead, and I could smell burning plastic and solder. In a panic, I ran up to check what was wrong and found that the right side of the chasis was very hot to the touch, and the signal light for that channel was off. I quickly shut the amp down, but it was too late. The right channel was down for the count. Aaarrgghh!!
It was here that I made my second mistake. After several minutes of cursing, I pulled the broken amp from the rack. I figured that it had merely blown some faulty circuit. I then hooked up a backup amp--a Proceed Amp 2--to resume my listening. As soon as I powered it up its right channel went down too. (Thankfully, the Proceed has fuses for each channel, so it may have fared better than my first amp.) It was now clear that the right speaker was causing some problems.
My question is, what could go wrong inside the speaker that would take out an amplifier channel? The reason I ask is that my brother, who has more knowledge than I concerning the ins and outs of electronics, will be visiting me over the holidays. And we will be opening up the speaker in question. What should we be looking for? I've already GENTLY pressed on the woofer and mid drivers and could hear no rubbing. So I think that they are probably OK.
The speaker is a Hales Transcendence 8: a three-way tower that is set up for bi-wiring, and that is how I was using it. I guess I should also point out that when I made my relocation the movers may have been a bit rough or clumsy. (Take your pick.) Because when I opened its box the speaker was misaligned inside, so I have to assume that it may have taken a fall. Still, it ran fine for a week until all of this happened.
Another thing to consider is that it is quite possible that the first amp blew its channel on its own and took out the speaker. Then the speaker took out the second amp.
What a freakin' mess.
Anyway, your comments, personal experiences and helpful hints would be appreciated. Since Hales the company has been out of business for a while now, and no one seems to know where Paul Hales himself can be reached, I'm on my own in repairing the speaker.
Thanks.
DPM