tube amp/flutter in speakers?


i have a nice pair of mono blks that are making my woofers flutter. when i adjust the hum bal it gets stronger or softer depending on which way i turn the adj. my interconnects are good. i am using an old pair of ess monitors with the heil driver. the amps are sansui HF V60. rated at 15wpc i belive?. thanks to all who help.
kona
The amp is either oscillating at a very low frequency or passing DC. Both are signs of an amp in need of a thorough inspection and repair / re-alignment. I would advise against running the amps until you can fully diagnose the situation. Continuing to do so could result in major damage to the speaker, amp or possibly both. Sean
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very simple, your amps don't like the speakers and are unstable into the load they present for whatever reason. Either impedence/effeciency of the speakers or design of the amp/input impedence-output sensitivity. This is a guess though as I am not stating this from my own knowledge but from what I have recently read in Listner. Go ahead and correct me anyone if this sounds wrong.
Just a note: For those that think that DC will cause a driver to throw forward and stay in that position, that is not necessarily correct. The DC level could be fluctuating up and down. As such, the driver would move forward, but could appear to "flutter" or move in and out as the amount of DC voltage varied. It would never take a "full stroke" ( positive push forward and then the accompanying negative stroke backwards ) as that would represent an AC signal. DC would only move in one direction but could be moving or fluctuating none the less.

One could actually play music over the top of this, but you would have to present a higher level of AC voltage ( music signal ) to the speaker than the DC level that was leaking into it. The higher AC voltage would actually "muscle" the speaker into moving, but it wouldn't be near as sharp, clean or clear as if there were no DC present. Needless to say, there would be a tremendous amount of heat build-up in the speakers' voice coil and "melt-down" could occur. In severe cases, the driver will literally "flame out". I've seen this happen at rock concerts. The unknowing crowd simply thought that it was "special effects".

Further damage to the amp could also occur, as there is a drastic amount of reflected voltage fed back to the amp in a situation like that. The speaker is resisting movement due to being partially locked in place by the DC so some of the AC music signal is not absorbed and sent back to the amp.

Keep in mind that it is also possible for a driver to "suck in" or move backwards rather than go forwards when DC is present. This would have to do with the polarity of the DC voltage and how it is connected to the speaker. Sean
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Are you sure its not the components upstream from the amp? You can check this effect by simply removing the input connections from the amp, and unplugging all of the gear that is upstream.

I have seen ground loops / ground problems cause this...

If it is the amp -- it seems like a power supply issue -- this may happen due to a bad diode, regulator tube, or capacitor. There are certainly other things it could be - these are the most common ones I have run across...

Good luck -- and follow Sean's advice if you can't quickly figure it out...
Unless it's a rare output transformerless (OTL) design, your amp has an output transformer between the power tubes and the speaker. This transformer will not pass DC unless it is seriously defective, in which case you'd likely have more severe symptoms such as smoke and overheated output tubes.

If it's not coming from an upstream component, then as mentioned above, low frequency oscillation is the likely culprit.

I agree that it's time for a trip to the shop.