Crackling in right channel, what do I do? Help, please.


Sadly, I am experiencing crackling in the right channel of my system. The crackling happens intermittently and has happened on different sources, including my FM tuner, and from my DAC. It seems like the crackling is not related to the source. 

I have a monster of a system, including a Gryphon Colosseum amplifier, and a pair of Gryphon Cantata speakers. 

My system is described in the link below. How should I go about debugging this problem? Do I dare play the system? Should I buy a cheap amp and swap that in to see if the problem persists? Do I buy a cheap preamp as well? Do I start by swapping the speaker cables to the opposite speaker cables to see if the crackle moves to the other speaker? 

My system has been performing flawlessly for a number of years now. I did have to get cheap part replaced on the amplifier about three or four years ago, and used Soundsmith in Peekskill, NY.

I'm pretty brokenhearted about the possibility of having to get my system repaired. I had total hip replacement surgery two months ago and I can't lift anything. Moving the beast of an amp or the heavy speakers is out of the question. I suppose I could find somebody to help me if it comes to that. 

Sigh. 

Larry
 

 

larrykell

Sometimes, troubleshooting is a pain. I had intermittent bursts of static in one channel. In the process of troubleshooting, I found one bad tube socket (replaced) and a bad XLR plug on an interconnect (got that re-terminated by manufacturer at no cost). I retubed everything -whole lotta tubes, almost none new stock. Still, despite this, and before sending equipment out for repair, I did a cross-channel exchange of the battery packs on my line stage- a fairly sophisticated device. In the process, I saw a bit of "fluff" on the metal contact plate. Dusted that and noise went away.

Moral: It could be something really stupid. I don’t know if there is a tech who could test some basic stuff at your home- like a house call. I almost resorted to that here in a town that’s thin on hi-fi (but lots of tube amp repair people in Austin for tube guitar/organ/other musical instrument amps).

I would also ask Grypon by phone (though you may have to set it up by email first) to tell you where they think the problem might lie if it is indeed the problem. Sometimes, those discussions give you leads to check something else.

Sympathize with you in suffering that "what’s the problem" phase until you suss it out. Some of the logic of troubleshooting is straightforward in terms of switching channels, trying to isolate to a particular component. It’s almost always got an answer, though. If that isn’t your thing maybe, depending on where you are located, somebody qualified could help do the troubleshooting. IT can be a PITA>

Good luck, you’ll find it and fix it.

 

Also, if you have a contact cleaner like DeOxit I would clean all connectors (xlr pins, RCAs, speaker terminals and binding posts).

Good point, there @audphile1. And before applying any contact enhancer, might be worth checking that all connectors are firmly seated. 

Thanks everybody. I’ve seen enough to swap the amp to see what happens. I can’t take any more chances with the monster amplifier. The crackling appears to be happening more frequently now.

I’m not going down the tube road. You guys have convinced me to stay away. 😁

I know the people at Soundsmith will get it fixed. They’re wonderful. 

""I swapped the speaker cables at the amplifier and the crackle moved to the other speaker.""

Run one single attached speaker cable then the other to determine if it is the cable? Maybe you did that as I did not read every post.