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Antique Sound Lab Hurricane Problem

I just picked up a used pair of these and was as happy as a clam, because these sound really fabulous.

Until the amp blew a tube (V3) and that socket is now dead. Has anyone experienced this very upsetting behavior from this amp ? Is this a common problem and does it have an easy fix ? Or is the amp just really temperamental and needs lots of tips to the factory ?

The filament lights up, but there is no blue halo and the tube doesn't get hot. Meter reads "1" for that socket irrespective of what tube I use there.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. I love these amps but can't afford to own an amp that is not reliable.
dimitry
dimitry OP
83 posts
 
What kind of failures are common ? My apparently had a blown resistor and tube. That's not too problematic. Serious failures requireing trips to the dealer are. How do people who own them cope with them ?
dimitry OP
83 posts
 
Well, it was the burnt-out 10 ohm resistor. Clearly a regular occurance in the life of this amp as other sockets had these resistors changed as well. The amps are running fine now...I think. One more question for the fellow sufferers - what bias do you run them at? I don't think I hear a difference between 440 mV and 490 mV. What has been your experience with tube life in these units ? Should one expect longer life at 400 mV than 490 mV ?

Thanks for your comments !
judy426
228 posts
 
>>Clearly a regular occurance in the life of this amp<<
In that case you have a flawed design. Burned out resistors or caps should not be a regular occurrence in any amplifier. All of course IMO
dimitry OP
83 posts
 
==In that case you have a flawed design. Burned out resistors==

Probably. I don't know if it is unusual for high power tube amplifiers to use sacrificial resistors to protect itself against failed tubes, but I certanily never had it happened in other tube amps I owned.

On the other hand it is a simple fix and the rest of the amplifier is intact.

If this doesn't happen too often, than this is not so bad. I suspect the wide bias range allowed owners to set the bias too high, resulting in a tube smoking. In my case, I suspect that I replaced the tubes in the wrong sockets, resulting in inadvertant high bias at that socket.
jeffreybehr's avatar
jeffreybehr
805 posts
 
MANY tubed poweramps consume a resistor when a tube shorts, and I've replaced a few. That's why conrad-johnson and other manufacturers of tubed poweramps place fuses on the high-Voltage rail. You might consider having someone add those to your amps.
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