Thursday, January 21, 2016

Important Tips About Guitar Amplifier Repair

By Richard Martin


Guitar amplifiers boost the quality of the sound produced by musical instruments during performances. They make it possible for audience to hear clearly the tones being produced by the instrument. Considering that they are strained by external factors such as dust and unfavorable weather conditions, they should be maintained regularly by an expert. This person should have an in depth knowledge and experience with the musical instruments. Highlighted below are some advices on guitar amplifier repair tasks that will help sustain the lifespan of this crucial instrument.

Check the filter caps occasionally and determine whether they are working as expected. In the event that they are not in the best condition, replace them with new ones. When not replaced in time, they may cause the music equipment to break down during work. This can bring confusion and disharmony with the other instruments comprising of the band. The big caps are ones that get faulty frequently. Be checking on them frequently and replace them when necessary to avoid failure.

Tube sockets must be tightened all the time. As you continually use the amplifier, the tube sockets loosen up over some time and start causing your amplifier to produce hissing and sizzling sounds. To curb this, you can either hire a technician to tighten them or do it for yourself by keenly using screwdrivers. Kindly take care because there is high voltage present which can make you encounter electric shock inadvertently.

Ensure that any scratchy pot on the amp is impeccably clean all the time. A lot of dust, cobwebs and insect carcasses are attracted to this part, which in the long run may cause faultiness of the amplifier. You must clean all the holes of potentiometers from inside the chassis and rotate them to clean up their trackssince replacing the pot with a new one is extremely expensive, you need to ensure that you have taken care of this part.

Make sure that all the bolts, screws and nuts are well tightened on the back panel, power transformers and mounts on the chassis. Failure to carry out this task occasionally, the amplifier will not be able to produce the required tone instead it makes noise with huge vibrations. This exercise can be achieved simply by using a toolkit.

Resistors will wear out and some other times fail in older amplifiers. Therefore, there is a need to replace them occasionally. When they are not replaced the amplifier will start producing sizzling and hissing sounds. One particular resistor that requires to be replaced more often is the 100k ohms comp resistor in the preamp stages of vintage fender amps.

At the power stage, you have very large and resilient resistors. You need to check them regularly and replace them if it is necessary. This is because at this stage, there is very high voltage and power present which normally messes up with the resistors. The task of replacing the faulty resistors must be carried out by experienced technician to ensure that they are done correctly with the appropriate ratings to avoid short circuiting the whole amplifier.

Capacitors on the tone circuit and coupling should also be checked occasionally. This is because they can become faulty in the event of power surge. This exercise must be carried out by qualified technician to prevent further damage.




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