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[QUOTE=Little Jay;712803]I think what every tech should do when someone brings in an amp with intermittent problems us to reflow all suspicious looking solder joints. 99% chance the problem will be solved. (You can't endlessly reflow solder joints, at some point you need to suck away the old solder and re-solder). [/QUOTE]
IMO I don't disagree, but a lot of the amp tech's are old school PTP guys and are less agreeable to this.
[QUOTE=Since I am aware of this problem and annually inspect my Blues Deluxe and reflow suspicious joints I haven't have any problems anymore. I do prefer turret or eyelet boards btw, but production amps hardly come with those anymore. [/QUOTE]
You are very fortunate to have those skills as a guitar player. My guitar instructor has those skills. He went to the Berkeley School of Music, but before that he went to school for electronics.
[QUOTE=The Fender '65 and '68 RI series are a little better in the sense that tube feet and jack-sockets are not soldered directly to the PCB[/QUOTE]
I am giving serious consideration on a Limited Edition '65 reissue from Sweetwater. A great amp in theory, but the issues in this thread scary the heck of me. I bought a demo model, but just sent it back. Issues with the pre-amp tubes. Switched out the V1 with a JJ I had. Some of the problems went away. Then I was getting a distortion playing certain notes and a interment crackle.Last edited by Wildcat; 11-17-2016 at 09:09 AM.
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11-17-2016 09:06 AM
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This may sound overly simplistic, but I recently bought a new Supro amp. It worked perfectly fine for the first 90 minutes or so, then it completely cut out. I turned it off, and the next day it happened exactly the same way. That time as I was reaching to turn the amp off the guitar cable shifted, and volume returned. What happened was that my cable was old, and as I played for a while and the amp heated up, the connection between the cable and the amp also heated up, which then affected the connection. I replaced my old cable with a new cable, and it has worked perfectly ever since. It can't hurt to check the cable.
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A few years back, I bought a new Blues Deluxe 'Reissue' from Sweetwater. Am I glad I did!
The amp cut out on me during a gig and didn't work again...until I got home. Grrrrrrrrrrrr!
Next time it cut out, I called Sweetwater, and they immediately sent a return authorization for a replacement.
The next amp worked perfectly.
I upgraded the tubes and it sounded better. Next I wanted to upgrade the speaker. I dropped a Weber AlNico in it and it sounded glorious! But what a royal pain in the A$$ to take that cheap chassis apart!! Then the amp started acting up again. Turns out it was the cheap input jack. I had a local amp tech fix it.
After that I had it. I left the speaker in the amp and sold it.
No more cheap pcb crap amps for me. The concept of the Blues Deluxe Reissue is great. The execution of the internal components and chassis build is where Fender does things on the cheap. Fortunately they offer a 5 year warranty...IF you buy new. But it still is pain for a working musician...or at home hobbyist to deal with repairs.
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Amend!! I feel the same way. Who needs this hassle. You get suck in on the features and performance and price point at first. Then bam, you get kicked in the nuts for it.
I bought a 1966 Princeton non-reverb for a few hundred bucks more than the reissue Princeton '65 . Worth every dollar.
Originally Posted by Gitfiddler
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A lot of times this is either a cold solder, a broken pcb trace or a bad signal cap.
With a keen eye you can fix the first thing yourself. The others will have to be serviced by a qualified tech.
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Back to the OP. He did take it to a qualified Fender amp tech, and the guy said nothing was wrong with it. So his story goes on. I live were the amp tech is from and recommended another amp tech from the area. IMHO part of the issue is that the "old school" amp tech have little interest in chasing down board issues.
Originally Posted by Michiel
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Makes you think, doesn't it? Originally Posted by Wildcat
Most tech probably aren't lookong forward to sorting out this kind of problem. Too much bother and often deemed cost-ineffective.
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Interesting. I replaced my Blues Deluxe with a '68 Princeton non-reverb. Great minds... Originally Posted by Wildcat
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I turned my Blues Deluxe into a Tweed AB763 amp with an extra 12ax7 in the preamp (since it was already there). I cut a cap out of the reverb circuit and removed a little cap just in front of the PI with unknown function but somehow limiting the 'snappiness'. And I added a bias-pot. It sounds sooo much better now! Ok, it's still a PCB amp of course, but I replaced the crappy input jacks and reinforced the PCB/ replaced some traces with wires. Never had any problems since and it sounds like a boutique vintage amp now! (Well.... too me it does.)
A vintage Princeton (Reverb) is on my wish list, but I know for most of my gigs I need the 2x6L6 power at least.Last edited by Little Jay; 11-19-2016 at 07:12 AM.
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Hi again guys,
I saw that this thread is active again so I wanted to post back a clear things up. I did get my amp back up and running (although it took multiple trips back and forth from the tech over the course of 3 months to do so). The 5 year fender warranty covered the cost of labor and parts for the fix. The pair of ceramic resistors that come stock on the amp were acting up when they got hot enough. Here's a picture of my board and the replaced parts to show exactly where the problem was. The blue resistors I'm pointing to are the replacements. Hopefully this will help someone out in the future.
Also, my reverb tank seems to be cutting in and out now so if you have any suggestions as to why that is happening, I'm happy to hear them.
P.S. - my apologies for the rude comment about Manella Guitars. They are widely respected in the area for quality work and it's not their fault they couldn't replicate the problem with my amp. I usually send my students there if they need guitar work and the instruments always come back great.
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If your reverb is cutting in and out, make sure that your 12AY7 tube (and all of the tubes) are seated properly in their respective sockets. Also, make sure that all reverb RCA connectors are likewise fully inserted.
Anything other than those DIY adjustments should be handled under warranty.
Good luck and I hope you get to enjoy the amp very soon.
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The reverb is solid state in the Blues Deluxe! The amp has a second 16v power supply circuit that drives the reverb and the channel switching circuit. The two big white 5W resistors (470k or 330k, depending on the year) are at the heart of that circuit. They can get hot and cause solder connections around them to crack - or can fail themselves- causing all kind of unpredictable events like random channel switching, volume loss, cutting out or stop playing completely. Probably causing the reverb to cut in and out too. Originally Posted by Gitfiddler
EDIT Oops, I should read first, your resistors are already replaced. Seems they knew what they were doing!
Then I would suspect the reverb tray itself or the the RCA connectors indeed.Last edited by Little Jay; 11-21-2016 at 05:52 PM.
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