2. amps-preamps
  3. 140029-80294

Does anyone care to ask an amplifier designer a technical question? My door is open.

I closed the cable and fuse thread because the trolls were making a mess of things. I hope they dont find me here.

I design Tube and Solid State power amps and preamps for Music Reference. I have a degree in Electrical Engineering, have trained my ears keenly to hear frequency response differences, distortion and pretty good at guessing SPL. Ive spent 40 years doing that as a tech, store owner, and designer.
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Perhaps someone would like to ask a question about how one designs a successfull amplifier? What determines damping factor and what damping factor does besides damping the woofer. There is an entirely different, I feel better way to look at damping and call it Regulation , which is 1/damping.

I like to tell true stories of my experience with others in this industry.

I have started a school which you can visit at http://berkeleyhifischool.com/ There you can see some of my presentations.

On YouTube go to the Music Reference channel to see how to design and build your own tube linestage. The series has over 200,000 views. You have to hit the video tab to see all.

I am not here to advertise for MR. Soon I will be making and posting more videos on YouTube. I don’t make any money off the videos, I just want to share knowledge and I hope others will share knowledge. Asking a good question is actually a display of your knowledge because you know enough to formulate a decent question.

Starting in January I plan to make these videos and post them on the HiFi school site and hosted on a new YouTube channel belonging to the school.


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atmasphere's avatar
atmasphere
11,901 posts
 
No damage, and from what I can surmise, due to luck- one of your connections was apparently loose, otherwise neither speaker would have played. Essentially on the non-playing side, it sounds like the output of the amp was shorted. Fortunately you caught it and sorted it out, so no damage to the amp.

This is assuming that the biwire connection on the loudspeaker employs a common connection between the woofer and HF section.


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daveyf's avatar
daveyf
2,894 posts
 
Thanks. The speakers are bi-wirable at the input, so I am assuming that without a connection at the terminal, which I have removed, that there is no common connection between the woofer and the tweeter. ( it’s a two way). Nonetheless, the right speaker did play, just not the left? I also have a REL sub hooked up to the amp, it is left, right and ground at the amp, as both the amp and the REL are balanced designs. I guess I got lucky and didn’t blow one channel at the amp...or worse that and both speakers! 

atmasphere's avatar
atmasphere
11,901 posts
 
I've found over the years that its not wise to make too many assumptions. If you have a Digital Voltmeter, check the continuity between the woofer and HF sections (with nothing connected to it) and see if they really are completely isolated.
daveyf's avatar
daveyf
2,894 posts
 
Ok, what would be the difference if they are isolated vs not isolated...would this have changed the way the amp behaved...or I guess the right side speaker? 
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