Melos SHA Gold - what may be the fix..

I did leave a little info out. I had a BAT VK-31SE and I had some issues, when I called BAT there was a re-set sequence that the ran me through and that fixed my issues. It was a matter of holding two different buttons and shutting it off at the same time.

thank you. I will go through and check fuses and see if
I overlooked any thing of the kind you suggest. Certainly no mention in the owners' manual.

Seems to me I recall reading a post mentioning some kind of photocoupler or a photo related replaceable part that can burn out????

Hi - I too have a Melos SHA Gold with exactly the same problem. In my case, i have tracked it down to a unique PLA chip (near the balance pot), and have thus assumed that it is irreplacable. However....the 2 relays that control the mute are on the pho-teniometer board and are well worth checking, as is the diode and the driver transistor for the relays. Remember, if the tranny is not switching, it is highly probable that the diode is dead too, so replace it at the same time as the transistor.
In my case, I am going to rip out the entire board, replace the volume pot with a decent ALPS one and hard wire whatever I have left. I'll let you have the details when I have done, just in case you end up following my path.

Now things are getting interesting! Thanks for sharing.

The phototentiometer on the Melos was a known problem.