View Full Version : Doh! Idiot alert!
So, having acquired a nuded DL103, I duly fitted it to my deck and started to play. I checked, double checked and triple checked the alignment (with two different protractors). Fine.
I made sure the arm height was set so the armtube was parallel to the LP surface. No problem.
I set the tracking weight to 2.5 g as my starting point. All good so far.
It didn't exactly sound bad, but something wasn't quite right. I was getting distortion which didn't seem to correspond with heavily modulated passages or any of the normal triggers - just random distortion.
Odd.
So I messed about with tracking weight, arm height and cartridge alignment. Nope, no improvement.
I removed and refitted the Denon, but the problem remained.
Disillusioned, I refitted my old OC9. Guess what? - same random distortion.
Maybe my phono stage is goosed?
Maybe it's the speakers?
Or the amp, perhaps?
No, it was none of the above.
Turned out to be a dodgy solder joint in one of the plugs on the interconnect between the phono stage and the amp.
Took me WEEKS to discover that.
Hence the title of this thread.
What a total numpty I am.
Seriously, I'm beginning to wonder if people like me should be allowed near hifi equipment.
Anyway, it all sounds peachy now, but once again.....DOH!!!
:rolleyes:
Martin
Some intermittant problems with gear take AGES to pin down, let alone fix..
You're no numpty, as I'm sure we've ALL been there at some point.
Ali Tait
06-10-2010, 14:03
Yep,you're not the only one. I spent weeks trying to track down what I thought was an earth loop hum on my system. I eventually dicovered it was the output transformers in the Pre 2,which I had completely forgotten were prone to pi king up hum from magnetic fields and rf. It was so bad as it appears these DPA power amps chuck out a load of rf for some reason. What a complete plank I felt when the penny finally dropped!
Yep, been there with the bad solder joints myself :doh:
They can be very hard to track down :rolleyes:
My story so much worse
When I had the VPI HW19mk4 I was trying new phono stages this guy turned up with a PATHOS phono stage battery operated we could not get any sound, when he went I noticed the cable came l;ose from the arm (its hidden underneath the TT so not obvious to see. DOH..............
Reid Malenfant
06-10-2010, 16:35
Well i can be an idiot to :eyebrows:
I might have mentioned this elsewhere but here goes :eyebrows:
Having managed to burn out the voicecoil on an early Kef B139 & as i was living with a good friend at the time, we set up my speakers in the large living room. As my sub on one speaker was dead i connected it up to his sub (which i built) & promptly forgot that it was wired as a 4ohm load :doh: The amps i was using were ILP HY60 modules which i found were ok into a 4ohm load, but these were bridged :rolleyes: That would have been fine with an 8ohm speaker as each amp would be supplying the equivalent current of a 4ohm load.
The amps were seeing a 2ohm load due to the bridging & 4ohm speaker, as i forgot about this the first time anyone knew anything about it was when a load of wiring literally went up in smoke due to the amps shorting out :mental: There were fuses to but they refused to blow, they'd rather let the cables get hot enough to melt the wire insulation inside of a few seconds :rolleyes:
I ask who is the bigger fool :lolsign: :ner:
flapland
06-10-2010, 17:02
Can't remember anything specific but I have blown a couple of amps and computer bits in my youth. Normally messing about with the lid off and either dropping something or adjusting trim pots without knowing what I was doing. And then... the nasty smell of burnt out transistors etc. Why does that smell linger so long to rub the salt into the wound.
PAul
It's worse than a botty burp after eating a Manchego cheese burrito with a side order of refried beans!
Marco.
flapland
06-10-2010, 17:29
Marco
Is that from personal experience... the burrito not burnt out kit. A night on the Guinness followed by Steak Pudding Chips and Mushy peas has a similar but a less south american effect.
My thing was ripping cantilevers off cartridges I was (Linn) tightening.. A word of advice - get a quantity of 2.5mm bolts as fresh ones should be used each time in an ideal world...
My thing was ripping cantilevers off cartridges I was (Linn) tightening.. A word of advice - get a quantity of 2.5mm bolts as fresh ones should be used each time in an ideal world...
Could never understand the Linn philosophy of 'tighten until something breaks, then slacken by 1/8 of a turn'. I've seen no end of damage caused by the Linn obsession over torquing up fixings. When cracks appear, or the shape of the cartidge body starts to distort, you've gone too far.
If fresh bolts are needed, they have either been stretched or have had their heads burred through over-tightening.
Regards
Too right, Barry. I never over-tighten anything like that - it's utter nonsense.
Finger tightening cartidges, then GENTLY 'nipping them up' with a screwdriver or allen key is all that is required. This also applies to tonearms when being locked in place after VTA adjustment.
Marco.
We have all made the ocassional mistake that can take along time to track down.
In my case, many years ago whilst running an Ortofon SL15E moving coil cartridge I noticed a very low-level hum. So low that nobody apart from me was aware of it. But you know what its like - once you notice a tiny flaw it preys on your mind. I tried moving the transformer module, tried moving the pick-up leads, checked the earthing of the turntable and thoroughly checked the phono plug connections. All to no avail. I eventually found what the problem was when I changed cartridges: I had inadvertently wired up the Ortofon cartridge such that the ground returns were interchanged!
Anyway tonight I also had a 'Doh! - Idiot' moment. So busy was I in preparing tonight's meal, I forgot to open a bottle of wine to breath, nor had I any white wine chilling in the fridge. No time to do anything about it, so I opened a bottle of beer instead, and very good it was too.
Regards
We have all made the ocassional mistake that can take along time to track down.
In my case, many years ago whilst running an Ortofon SL15E moving coil cartridge I noticed a very low-level hum. So low that nobody apart from me was aware of it. But you know what its like - once you notice a tiny flaw it preys on your mind. I tried moving the transformer module, tried moving the pick-up leads, checked the erthing of the turntable and thoroughly checked the phono plug connections. All to no avail. I eventually found what the problem was when I changed cartridges: I had inadvertently wired up the Ortofon cartridge such that the ground returns were interchanged!
Anyway tonight I also had a 'Doh! - Idiot' moment. So busy was I in preparing tonight's meal, I forgot to open a bottle of wine to breath, nor had I any white wine chilling in the fridge. No time to do anything about it, so I opened a bottle of beer instead, and very good it was too.
Regards
I have to say that many years of red wine quaffing have left me unconvinced of the benefit of allowing the wine to breath before drinking. I reckon temperature is far more important. In any case, I would sooner drink a 'suffocated' bottle of cab sauv than a glass of water.
But then again, I know nowt about owt, so carry on.....
:)
Martin
Ali Tait
06-10-2010, 20:24
I have read that letting wine breathe is a fallacy.
I have to say that many years of red wine quaffing have left me unconvinced of the benefit of allowing the wine to breath before drinking. I reckon temperature is far more important. In any case, I would sooner drink a 'suffocated' bottle of cab sauv than a glass of water.
But then again, I know nowt about owt, so carry on.....
:)
Martin
Temperature is important: reds mustn't be drunk too cold or the flavour is killed, nor should whites be drunk too warm or they will taste 'flat' or 'suffocated' as you aptly put it. However allowing a wine to breath does make a difference - the wine 'opens out', otherwise you don't taste the full depth that the wine can offer. To demonstrate this, next time you open a bottle of wine, pour a little into a glass and have a good sniff and see what you can smell. Now swirl the wine in the glass and smell again. You should find that small quanity of wine has 'opened out' and you will smell and taste a lot more.
Even the cheapest bottles benefit from being allowed to breath: it allows the flavours to 'open up' as described. Cheap reds may need decanting - not to remove sediment, but to provided a larger surface area for it to breath. Just pour it into a pitcher; that too helps with the aeration.
Regards
Reid Malenfant
06-10-2010, 20:31
Even the cheapest bottles benefit from being allowed to breath: it allows the flavours to 'open up' as described. Cheap reds may need decanting - not to remove sediment, but to provided a larger surface area for it to breath. Just pour it into a pitcher; that too helps with the aeration.
Regards
Indeed, just like you should let a roast "rest" after it has been cooked ;)
Not that it got a lot of exercise in the oven :eyebrows:
The Grand Wazoo
06-10-2010, 22:42
The effects of breathing wine are easy to demonstrate as Barry says, but I'm rather less in agreement with the conventions about the temperature of red wine.
I much prefer red to be cool or cold. I've often thought that the rule about serving it at room temperature was invented when the average room temperature was much lower than it is nowadays.
The effects of breathing wine are easy to demonstrate as Barry says, but I'm rather less in agreement with the conventions about the temperature of red wine.
I much prefer red to be cool or cold. I've often thought that the rule about serving it at room temperature was invented when the average room temperature was much lower than it is nowadays.
You're not the only person I've met Chris who likes to drink chilled red wine. I find that red wine has to be at least at room temperature (18 - 20 degC), otherwise to me it's largely tasteless, or at least not as full or flavoursome as it should be.
However each to their own.
Regards
The Grand Wazoo
06-10-2010, 23:49
However each to their own.
That's the way I see it too. The last time I told anyone that, I was called a Trog!
Glad you lot can afford to experiment - regularly it seems - tut, tut...;)
Going back to embarrassing cock-ups, this one's a bit subtle. Many years ago, Sennheiser released a test record which had been recorded using a Neumann dummy-head microphone. The recording consisted of a bloke walking around a room talking, and doing various noisy things, incuding opening a window, allowing in sounds from outside such as traffic and church bells, and I have to say the effect when wearing open-backed headphones was astonishingly real. Even after listening to it a number of times, I often found myself taking the headphones off to check if what I was hearing was real or recorded. We used this to huge effect, and would regularly get looks of blank astonishment from customers with a sale pretty much guaranteed. Except for one customer. There I am, ranting on about the astonishing realism he's just experienced on the headphones, and he's looking at me like they haven't all been locked up yet. Finally he gives me a fixed grin and sidles out of the shop, leaving me puzzled as to why the unfailing magic didn't work. Then I look at the amp that the phones are connected to.
With the mono button pressed in....
Powered by vBulletin® Version 4.2.3 Copyright © 2024 vBulletin Solutions, Inc. All rights reserved.