For those who repair amplifiers/electronics for a living: How/Where did you learn it?

[spooney]

Just wondering where all of the techs that are on this forum learned how to do this kind of work. Working on amplifiers is definitely something I would consider a dream job and maybe someday time and money allowing i'd like to get deeper into it. I'm just curious how some of you got your start.

[c2cthomas]

My 1st training was while I was in military service and was pretty good as it lasted two years. The bad part of that is that it was added on to my service commitment and thus I had a six year obligation. I followed that up with community collage as well as reading books and articles on the subject. Later on my employer provided advanced in house training or paid for training off-site. Instead of going on to pursue a EE I went the management route and worked supervision and Quality Control.

Following the projects presented here is an very good way to work your way through the process of learning electronics and you get the side benefit of have some nice gear around after you complete a project. Start with the less complex projects and work your way up - you'll have lots of support here.

Making a living as an electronics technician is a different situation as it is not a high paying field of employment compared to other trades. There will be (and is) a need in the medical fields for techs and the automotive electronics repair can pay well - but fixing audio gear is not a high dollar pay-off IMO.

[stratus46]

Originally Posted by spooney

Just wondering where all of the techs that are on this forum learned how to do this kind of work. Working on amplifiers is definitely something I would consider a dream job and maybe someday time and money allowing i'd like to get deeper into it. I'm just curious how some of you got your start.

By building DIY kits from magazine articles that didn't all work (the few Heathkits I built _did_ work). Then you figure out why some work and don't work. The you make changes, sometimes worse, more often better. I started out in consumer audio repair and switched over to broadcast engineering. It's pretty good as I've been at it now for 33 years and it's still mostly fun.

[mbates14]

its a dream job to me as well, problem is, where does one find these jobs? im trying to do it on the side, and its hard. few and far between, too cheap to repair worthwhile, all sorts of those problems. pluse people not knowhing what they are doing, and it works on the bench, leaves the shop, comes back all exploaded again saying its my fault.

Thats the problems i have to deal with. So you might want a second look before proceeding this career.

[Perry Babin]

You have to show the owner it works when he picks it up. While he's there and the amp is playing, ask him about the system, who's going to reinstall it and other questions. If he sees it playing normally, no smoke rolling out of it or any other problems, it's virtually impossible for him to blame you.

If you're motivated and are in an area where there is significant business, you can make a lot of money, relative to the time spent actually doing repairs ($35-90/hour depending on the area and the amplifiers you see there).

[dangus]

I suspect there's money to be made fixing LCD monitors. Judging by the 3 that I've fixed, 2/3 of the problems are bad capacitors, and the rest are failed backlighting. Maybe that's not a statistically significant sample, but I'm 3 for 3 on repairing them which is better than my success with CRT things. I'm tempted to place a classified ad and see what happens.

As for how I learned, the key was a particular class in semiconductor electronics as part of a 2-year diploma program that got my head around how transistors worked. The "Electricity 11" correspondence course I did in high school helped establish some basic concepts. Check with your local school system - maybe you can take some course like that for a nominal cost. "The Art Of Electronics" is a good, maybe the best, general electronics textbook.

[1moreamp]

Ill take my hits for putting 30 years inside Silicon Valley. We automated the semi tools before the rest of you had electronics controlling your lives. And with a modern multi-station semi tool costing 10 mill plus, I guess working on car amps, power supplies, LCDs, Plasma Tvs, Rf generators, and custom control systems all the way back to RTL/DTL logic days was my form of knitting after a long day at the shop.
I actually started out playing with Christmas lights, batteries and switches and taking apart TV's back when tubes and color were both still new, I was just 5 years old then.

Then the illness took a hard turn as I aced vocational trade school at 16 under the threat of expulsion for sleeping in the class. I passed a two year course in electronics in three tests and in less then 2 months.

Ah the rest is all old news, boy meets electron, boy falls in love with a sick and nasty habit of night soldering. you guys know this problem its sorta like night putting to golfers...lol lol lol

I think we all started out in wonder, and ended up enslaved by the electron. What did Patton say " God I love it so " but he was talking about war I think

[Glowbug]

And you have the perfect S/N for that

[spooney]

how much do you guys think it would cost to get the necessary equipment to start potentially doing this kind of work on the side.The only solid piece of equipment I have as of now is my o-scope. I really need to upgrade my soldering equipment and power supply. Any brands of equipment you recommend? I know fluke makes an awesome meter and that is probably my next upgrade.

[Perry Babin]

You don't need to buy everything at once. You can purchase it as needed.

The most awesome Fluke meters for this work are the models 10, 11 and 12. I probably have a dozen meters and these are easily my preferred meters.

For a power supply, it's difficult to beat the Pyramid PS52KX (ebay).

For a soldering iron, it's hard to beat the WES51.