Bryston 4B gets HOT. Should I leave it on?

A) Bryston's are not high bias amps and therefore will not benefit as much as other amps that experience wide temperature swings between normal operation or being turned off.

B) Your amp is defective if it is running as you described it. While i hope that it does not "terminate itself" on you ( it's already broken according to what you stated ), i'm sure that it could sound better and pull a LOT less power than what it currently is.

Good luck... Sean
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I've owned 4B's over 23 years, they depend upon lots of unrestricted air movement for cooling, put one in a closed in area and it will get too hot to touch! they produce a lot of power, and summer, heavy use, restricted air all can and do add to the heat. However that said, if it is getting as hot as you describe, and its got lots off available air [I always put mine on at least 2 inch tall 2 inch wide 12 inch long blocks running front to back, always placed with nothing above or below] I have had this occure more than once, if its the same thing you have a slight service problem. the remedy is easily preformed by any qualified tech. it is a simple adjusment of bias, usually one side gets hotter than the other, bingo. However whatever the problem, do yourself a favor, take care of it asap, I have twice had post warranty repairs to 4B's the bills were in Can.$110.00 and $130.00 I have a Bryston preamp and 8 Bryston amps in my system, and I'm damn glad I do.
p.s. a favorite way to place a 4B is alone on top of a milk crate, the kind that used to make good record holders, that proclaim property of so-and-so dairy, non-dairy ones are available from wall-mart type retailers, painted black, and with lots of the sides cut out, the 4B fits like it was made to, and placed behind a speaker. after all the less speaker wire the better. [i use almost none even though crossed over 5 ways, using 8 amps] Lastly, this set up has actually cured me of a never ending desire to upgrade that had lasted over 25 years, since the first day of 2003 over 7½ months, and still absolutely satisfied.

vetteman: What are you doing, mono-blocking with one amp feeding the treble ( or something similar ) ? Sean
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I didn't think anyone was interested. I'll try to make sense; I have 6 mono amps and 2 stereo amps total. Each side has ½ the above [3 mono and 1 stereo] this gives 5 ways times two channels* [*commonly called- stereo, right and left] i call the 5 ways sub-woofer, woofer, lower mid, upper mid, and tweeter they are amplified by way of [all amps are Bryston] sub-woofer- 7B NRB, woofer- 7B ST, lower-mid- either side of a 3B ST, upper-mid- the other side of a 3B ST, tweeter- PP120 [Power Pac 120] all is wired with nearly no speaker wire, and has large gage wire from the amps output directly to the terminals of each individual driver, with the amps either mounted to the back of the speakers cabnet [3B ST, PP120] or placed on modified milk crates a few inches from the back of the cabnet.
also mounted directly to the backs of the main cabnet [consists of all but sub-woofer] are mono 5 way electronic active crossovers [including time adjustment]
all interconnects are balanced, two are long [from pre-amp to crossovers] all the rest are 2 - 3 feet except the crossover to subs [cause the subs are permanently installed attic mounted twin 18 inch drivers per side, infinite baffle] and of course the subs amps are also in the attic. I hope that answers your question completly and without much unasked for extra filler.

after rereading this thread i realized that i need to add this bit; I had used 4B amps for over 23 years, but within the last year have switched to 7B and 3B and PP120 [witch is ½ of a 3B]