Gainclone not working

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Gianclone not working

I built my first gainclone the other day and it didn't seem happy at all.

I think my error was not grounding the 0V point on the amplifier board (chipamp kit). The cable from the external PSU got really hot and I think the transformer has died (it's not giving anything out on the secondaries).

Am I ok to ground the amp correctly and plug in a new transformer, or is there anything else I should check?

Thanks in advance.
 
This is the colour coding of the transformer connections. I wired them as follows (to the chipamp.com revision 3 rectifier board):

AC1 - orange
AC1 - yellow
AC2 - black
AC2 - red

Is the wiring correct?
 

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Just another Moderator
Joined 2003
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sharpi, that wiring looks correct but the first amp I built with a torroidal, I wired it up as per the colour coding, the only problem being that they put the wrong coloured sleves on two of the wires. End result was that the two secondaries were shorted! (it was a single rectifier setup). There was no mains fuse, and the whole traffo started making a crackling noise and the lights dimmed before I turned it off (only a matter of seconds).

I'm assuming that AC1 and AC1 are actually separate points maybe AC1 and _AC1_ if you have them connected to the same point you have a problem :)

Best to check that you have continuity between yellow/orange, and black/red, if you don't then try between yellow/black or yellow/red, if you get continuity on one of the latter pairs, but not on the first ones, then your insulation colours are probably wrong, though theoretically this should have blown your mains fuse, unless there is a fuse in the transformer itself which blew first.

also check the continuity on your primary winding, if none, then there may be an internal fuse that has blown.

Tony.
 
GAINCLONE WORKING BEAUTIFULLY NOW!!!

Thanks for all the help. I replaced the toroid with a new one and did every check I could think of, and all is great now. The old toroid was open circuit on both secondaries!?! Still not sure exactly what was going on....

This amp is excellent. I had been using a completely rebuilt t-amp with paper in oil coupling caps, beefy SMPS and uprated caps with teflon snubbers. This is a really nice amp - really open and fast (massively better than the stock t-amp). In comparison, the gainclone is bigger sounding, warmer, tighter and more dynamic. This is all there while the transparency of the old amp remains (actually also improved).

The amp is housed in a clear plastic fish-tank type case from Asda/Walmart. I went for an external PSU with a 225VA toroid in a tupperware ice-cream tub. No tricky metal work for me... ;-)
 
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