Hi, I got a Behringer BXL 3000 Ultrabass Combo and would need a circuit diagram! I have no trouble to get diagrams from Peavey, Carvin .... but no way to contact Behriger! Ex-German company, now seems to be swallowed (?) by a Chines one.... and the only contact possibility I can find is via "musictribe", but this platform does not allow me to register (complaining about wrong "country" and wrong "phone number", whatwever I enter there :-( )
Does anyone have an idea how to get in touch with them?
Still selling their products so there has to be a way....
Regards
Michael
Does anyone have an idea how to get in touch with them?
Still selling their products so there has to be a way....
Regards
Michael
Behringer is part of 'Music Group' and has company headquarters in the Philippines (Manila).
The official European branch office is the company Behringer International GmbH in Willich (D).
I obtained this information from Thomann who are the European distributor.
It may be worthwhile contacting Thomann.
Behringer – Thomann UK
The official European branch office is the company Behringer International GmbH in Willich (D).
I obtained this information from Thomann who are the European distributor.
It may be worthwhile contacting Thomann.
Behringer – Thomann UK
According to Enzo, Behringer schematic diagrams are copywrited and not available to anybody but authorized service centers. He used to own such a service center. Any forum publishing Behringer schematics gets a letter from a lawyer.
The reason I buy broken Peavey equipment, and not Behringer. Old crown & QSC schematics are out there, also. In guitar amps, marshall and fender schematics are on the forums.
The reason I buy broken Peavey equipment, and not Behringer. Old crown & QSC schematics are out there, also. In guitar amps, marshall and fender schematics are on the forums.
Hi indianajo, thanks so much for that information, quite important to know!
Of course it is more than ridiculous..... This is 15 year old product, no technical novelty except the Mistubishi subbass processor. And as you say: I never had problems to get Peavey or CARVIN technical documentation with much newer produtcs :-(
And one detailed schematic (BX1200) is available on the web.... it is only the input section, but that is really the most complicated for reverse engineering and should be identical between the BX line of Behringer. The PS section seems quite straight forward 🙂
Thanks for that great piece of information!
Regards from Germany
Michael
Of course it is more than ridiculous..... This is 15 year old product, no technical novelty except the Mistubishi subbass processor. And as you say: I never had problems to get Peavey or CARVIN technical documentation with much newer produtcs :-(
And one detailed schematic (BX1200) is available on the web.... it is only the input section, but that is really the most complicated for reverse engineering and should be identical between the BX line of Behringer. The PS section seems quite straight forward 🙂
Thanks for that great piece of information!
Regards from Germany
Michael
Actually, when I was in it, I dealt right with Behringer for a time, then the folks out in the Seattle area. Now they have moved on a couple times, but I let them go on without me. ANyway, lately I have been hearing of them passing out documents but you had to sort of register yourself with them and promise not to post it online. These sorts of policies have a habit of evolving over time.
Behringer has a history. Long ago they copied mixer schematics and even board layouts directly from some Mackie mixers. I mean EYE-dentical. Mackie sued them and won, almost sued them out of existence. Behr got REAL tight about documentation.
Part of protecting intellectual property is to not make it readily available. ANy engineering team can get a product and trace out the circuits, but in court, making the effort to protect your documents counts for something.
Not all companies feel the same obviously, but they have reasons.
Peavey is tops in making documents available. Fender is very user friendly. But I used to be an Ensoniq warranty center, they did not even let us have schematics. Try calling Line 6 for schematics - service centers only. Call Nady - no nothing for anyone. You want your Nady repaired? Send it to them - no repair centers outside the factory.
The BX1200 is actually quite different from the BXL3000 preamap. Are there similarities? Sure. But not at all using the same circuit throughout the series.
What information do you need?
Behringer has a history. Long ago they copied mixer schematics and even board layouts directly from some Mackie mixers. I mean EYE-dentical. Mackie sued them and won, almost sued them out of existence. Behr got REAL tight about documentation.
Part of protecting intellectual property is to not make it readily available. ANy engineering team can get a product and trace out the circuits, but in court, making the effort to protect your documents counts for something.
Not all companies feel the same obviously, but they have reasons.
Peavey is tops in making documents available. Fender is very user friendly. But I used to be an Ensoniq warranty center, they did not even let us have schematics. Try calling Line 6 for schematics - service centers only. Call Nady - no nothing for anyone. You want your Nady repaired? Send it to them - no repair centers outside the factory.
The BX1200 is actually quite different from the BXL3000 preamap. Are there similarities? Sure. But not at all using the same circuit throughout the series.
What information do you need?
Another thumbs up for Peavey. The steel guitar crowd knows this manufacturer VERY well, as they have gone out of their way time and time again to provide schematics and information. And their repair charges, should you need to send a unit in, are among the fairest in the industry. I only WISH other gear providers were as cooperative!! Roland/Boss is another one who won't give out schematics, even on units that are WAY beyond last production.
I don't agree with your view. If a company wants to keep its info tight, then its allowed to.
If you want to buy an old product, and not do your homework as to whether a service manual or schematic is available, then assess your decision to buy as ridiculous and sell it off as for parts only (and morally tell the new owner that you couldn't find a schematic for repair).
We all get caught out with faulty equipment that we deem impractical to repair without a schematic. I typically put the equipment aside, and do a google search in another 5 years - sometimes a new thread goes through a repair or teardown. I came across a faulty Picotest 6.5 digit multimeter, and it took quite a few hours to repair some of the internal damage, but a few functions are still bad, and I doubt any schematics will come out for quite some time. At least with a lot of audio gear, its often easy to identify the first and last IC's or relays that process the signal, and faultfinding them probably covers more than 50% of failures.
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Nobody said that what they are doing is ILLEGAL---it's just DAMN ANNOYING, and will certainly figure into my next purchase (or NOT) of their gear. I find it absolutely absurd that a thief like Behringer would then deny access to their information!
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Who said anything about legality?
The topic of whether Behringer stole others tech is not the core topic of this thread, nor what I was commenting on.
The topic of whether Behringer stole others tech is not the core topic of this thread, nor what I was commenting on.
Of course they may do it. It is still ridiculous.
I have been living in a countru for several years where I did a lot of benchmarking myself and I can tell you that the cost of a complete re-engineering of the Berhinger (or any other) set of PCBs will take mostly 6 weeks and you will get not only the schematics but finished PCBs which might differ in the PCB color itself, nothing else. Even if it contains "write-only" microcontrollers. ..... so if anyone would really like to get your date, he will.
An if not..... anyway it is not rocket science and if you will sell in big series, developping good equipment is affordable without stealing designs.
Not providing information for users indeed is an argument for not buying a brand....
If you get a chance, Google for and watch the Feb 2015 episode of "Undercover Boss" that featured Peavey.
During that show it became evident that there were are serious problems at Peavey, starting right at the top of the management structure. The show accidentally revealed a lying and dishonest Peavey top management that did not want to address the serious problems they had, and ignored the feedback they were getting from customers and retailers about poor product reliability and quality control.
Worse, it was revealed that manufacturing and repair facilities were badly out of date and incredibly inefficient, and worse yet, there was a management culture of lying to, mistreating, and taking advantage of Peavey employees.
I will never buy another Peavey product. The people who run that place now do not deserve to be rewarded with my money.
It's been five years since 2015, is it possible that all is sweetness and light at Peavey now? I have no idea, but I suspect pigs will fly first. The old saying "Leopards cannot change their spots" comes to mind; adult people with no sense of honesty or fair play are extremely unlikely to suddenly develop a working conscience. Unless Hartley Peavey retired, and the company fired all its top management and hired new people to replace them, things are unlikely to be any better there in 2020.
-Gnobuddy
Hi,
I really do not ask for a "nice management and repair facilities".
I repair on my own.
And was surprised even in Corona times I could manage to get the technical documents for my TOUR 115 TNT and a good conversation running from Germany.
This is what I need.
Of course quiality is an issue, but all companies face the same thing!
So from Service Point of View right now I am fan of Peavey and CARVIN!
That is what I need. Every user is diferent, but we should avoid to make the brand decision a religion ;-)
Thanks for sharing your opinion!
Michael
I have seen it a couple times.
I have had a few conversations with Hartley dating back to a phone call from him in about 2008 regarding an article I published in an electronics magazine, and a few more times since then. I met him at a ham radio show 3 or 4 years ago where we discussed several things about the tubes, amps, and music manufacturing scene in general. I believe that he is a decent man who got sucked into the ugly reality of offshore manufacturing....a bit too late. It's my opinion that the "Undercover Boss" show did reveal several problems at Peavey, but not the total "big picture."
At the time of my first call Peavey employed 2200 people in the US, and made all of their own stuff. They did everything in house from amp design and manufacturing to speaker cabinet building. As CNC and other new manufacturing processes came into existence, the assembly line people were given the opportunity to learn them. Up until then Peavey had never laid a single person off in the company's history. How many American companies could make this statement? Certainly not where I worked, where there were multiple layoffs each year.
The problems started when offshore manufacturing got a stronghold in the music manufacturing business. The other big players were quick to get their products made in these low cost places, and Peavey wound up at a serious cost disadvantage, with the other players having a 2 or 3 year head start in the offshore manufacturing game. This created a "house of cards" which came down pretty quick and hard, almost taking the whole company with it. Entire facilities had to be shut down just to keep the company alive. The "Undercover Boss" episode was filmed during this time.
As with any company, I'm sure that there was a lot of "weasel moves" in middle management to ensure that one "internal kingdom" survives at the expense of another, that Hartley may or may not have been aware of. I have seen this happen in BIG ways at Motorola. Did one big boss's grudge with another big boss result in 353 people losing their jobs on a single day just to settle a grudge? Yes it did, fortunately I had worked my way out of that group before it was wiped out.
The "stuff" that was revealed on "Undercover Boss" at Peavey was nothing compared to what went on at other larger companies. I survived for 41 years at Motorola, mostly by moving around to get out of places where this culture flourished, and doing the stuff that others didn't want to do. At Mot, over 100,000 people lost their jobs in a 10 year period. This was in a company that INVENTED the technology we use today every day. Shady company politics and "weasel management" is everywhere. This is magnified big time when a company must move its manufacturing and other vital functions offshore in order to survive.
Peavey Responds to Controversial Episode of CBS's "Undercover Boss":
Peavey Electronics was featured on the Feb. 15 episode of CBS' "Undercover Boss," a hidden camera realty show that disguises top executives as regular workers to see how their companies really work.
The episode featuring Peavey took a controversial turn when it was revealed that one of the Peavey employees featured on the show was let go and another demoted a few months after filming when the company shut down the part of the plant they worked in to outsource jobs overseas.
Courtland Gray, COO of Peavey, and the executive who went "undercover" during the show, issued the following statement regarding the episode:
"Peavey is a leading provider of music and sound equipment around the world. No other company in our industry ever invested as much in U.S. manufacturing as Peavey. While our competitors took their products to China far earlier in the process at the first hint of higher profitability, Peavey strove to sustain manufacturing in the U.S. for as long as possible. Over the last several years, we performed numerous lean manufacturing processes to become more efficient and to continue manufacturing in the U.S. Closing part of our Plant 3 manufacturing facility was a business decision that we made to remain competitive in the global marketplace. We sincerely regret the hardship the partial closure of the factory caused some of our long-standing, valued employees and their families.
"After the initial shooting, Michael was given an hourly raise to the level of the job offer he referred to. Michael remains employed at Peavey; he was not laid off. Thresa's husband remains employed with Peavey; he was not laid off. We fulfilled the rewards to the employees appearing on the show. Due to the extensive process involved with renewing a work visa, Aj's visa renewal is under review with Immigration. Hopefully the government will approve it, and he can attend the Joe Satriani music camp as promised. We feel the show and network did not portray these issues accurately.
"Peavey continues to manufacture Composite Acoustics guitars, various speaker enclosures and custom products in Meridian, Mississippi. I would also add that our most advanced technology products (MediaMatrix) will remain in the United States.
"We continue to provide jobs to more than 300 hardworking people in this community. Thanks to our amazing employees and customers we have been in business 50 years, and we will continue selling innovative and reliable products well into the future. Thank you for your understanding and support."
Peavey Electronics was featured on the Feb. 15 episode of CBS' "Undercover Boss," a hidden camera realty show that disguises top executives as regular workers to see how their companies really work.
The episode featuring Peavey took a controversial turn when it was revealed that one of the Peavey employees featured on the show was let go and another demoted a few months after filming when the company shut down the part of the plant they worked in to outsource jobs overseas.
Courtland Gray, COO of Peavey, and the executive who went "undercover" during the show, issued the following statement regarding the episode:
"Peavey is a leading provider of music and sound equipment around the world. No other company in our industry ever invested as much in U.S. manufacturing as Peavey. While our competitors took their products to China far earlier in the process at the first hint of higher profitability, Peavey strove to sustain manufacturing in the U.S. for as long as possible. Over the last several years, we performed numerous lean manufacturing processes to become more efficient and to continue manufacturing in the U.S. Closing part of our Plant 3 manufacturing facility was a business decision that we made to remain competitive in the global marketplace. We sincerely regret the hardship the partial closure of the factory caused some of our long-standing, valued employees and their families.
"After the initial shooting, Michael was given an hourly raise to the level of the job offer he referred to. Michael remains employed at Peavey; he was not laid off. Thresa's husband remains employed with Peavey; he was not laid off. We fulfilled the rewards to the employees appearing on the show. Due to the extensive process involved with renewing a work visa, Aj's visa renewal is under review with Immigration. Hopefully the government will approve it, and he can attend the Joe Satriani music camp as promised. We feel the show and network did not portray these issues accurately.
"Peavey continues to manufacture Composite Acoustics guitars, various speaker enclosures and custom products in Meridian, Mississippi. I would also add that our most advanced technology products (MediaMatrix) will remain in the United States.
"We continue to provide jobs to more than 300 hardworking people in this community. Thanks to our amazing employees and customers we have been in business 50 years, and we will continue selling innovative and reliable products well into the future. Thank you for your understanding and support."
Well, try as I might, I couldn't find anywhere to view this episode of "Undercover Boss" unless I was willing to sign up for a subscription of some sort. So I found this description of the event:
Sunday’s episode [of “Undercover Boss”] …..sent the featured company — Peavey Electronics — scrambling into damage control mode on Monday. In an ominous sign, CBS issued a statement before the episode aired indicating that something had gone horribly wrong after filming.
“Most of the stories we’re lucky enough to tell on the series are inspirational, and many times conclude with the boss offering life-changing rewards for the hardworking frontline employees,” executive producer Stephen Lambert wrote. “Sometimes stories don’t end so perfectly, and we present those to the audience as well.”
It all started when Peavey Electronics, an audio equipment manufacturer based in Meridian, Miss., sent its chief operating officer, Courtland Gray, to check out how things were going in the company. While it thrived in the music industry boom of the 1970s and 80s, business has struggled in recent years. The executives stressed that they didn’t want to outsource jobs overseas, but had to make some changes to operations — so Gray put on a wig and colored contacts and set out to investigate undercover as an employee named Kyle.
During his tour, Gray stopped in “Plant 3” to chat with Thresa, a circuit board technician who worked at the company for 24 years. She filled “Kyle” in on all the cutbacks at Peavey over the years: Shifts cut to four days a week. Rising health insurance costs. Vacation chopped from three weeks to two weeks. Tuition reimbursement ended. Another employee, Michael, had a similar story. He was no longer making enough money to support his family, so he had found a much higher-paying job and given his two weeks’ notice that day.
So, during the grand finale of the episode, “Kyle” revealed himself as Courtland Gray. As inspirational music played, he gave Thresa $5,000 to pay off her student loans; $10,000 to continue her education; and allowed her and her husband (also a Peavey employee) an extra week of vacation. As for Michael, Gray offered him $10,000 to pay off his loans, as well as $5,000 to start a college fund for his kids. About that other high-paying job? Gray asked if they could “work together” to find a way to keep him at the company. Michael happily agreed. “I’m just glad you’re not going to fire me when I get back,” Thresa said, clearly relieved after learning she was there for a reality show. “There was no light at the end of the tunnel before, now there is,” Michael said tearfully.
So that only spells impending doom, right? Cut to a message on screen: “FOUR MONTHS LATER,” in fall 2014. Sure enough, things are in shambles. Peavey Electronics indeed closed down Plant 3 to outsource jobs. Employees including Thresa and Michael were all given 60-days’ notice. Thresa’s husband kept his job, but it was unclear how long that would last. At the last minute, Michael was offered another job in Peavey; though he was seething that he turned down his other, higher-paying job in order to stay a company that wanted to lay him off anyway.
“I feel like I was done wrong,” Thresa said.
“I’m a little bitter,” Michael added.
While social media erupted with criticism, Peavey posted a long statement on its Facebook page (“Unfortunately, there was no other choice we could make in order to stay competitive in the global marketplace.”)
After hundreds more critical comments, Gray wrote a letter and posted it on the company’s Web site, reiterating how sorry he was. But he also blamed CBS for its editing of the episode. He added that they gave Michael a raise on par with the job he turned down, and Thresa’s husband was indeed still employed at the company. Plus, another employee featured, Ajay, was indeed in the process of getting his visa, as Gray had promised him.
“We feel the show and network did not portray these issues accurately,” Gray wrote.
Is he surprised? Of course, a producer is going to edit and present the storyline for maximum drama. When producers caught up with Thresa, she made a point of saying Gray wasn’t even present when an HR manager came to tell everyone that Plant 3 was shutting down. But no matter what happened, obviously, that’s not how a company wants to be shown on national television. The episode points to the dangers of going on a show like “Undercover Boss.” While it’s tempting to boost your company’s profile by appearing on a popular reality show, you never know what’s going to happen that can make the whole effort backfire……this season especially should serve as a warning with reality TV, you never know which way things are going to go — and there will always be producers always ready and willing to point out the flaws.
Sunday’s episode [of “Undercover Boss”] …..sent the featured company — Peavey Electronics — scrambling into damage control mode on Monday. In an ominous sign, CBS issued a statement before the episode aired indicating that something had gone horribly wrong after filming.
“Most of the stories we’re lucky enough to tell on the series are inspirational, and many times conclude with the boss offering life-changing rewards for the hardworking frontline employees,” executive producer Stephen Lambert wrote. “Sometimes stories don’t end so perfectly, and we present those to the audience as well.”
It all started when Peavey Electronics, an audio equipment manufacturer based in Meridian, Miss., sent its chief operating officer, Courtland Gray, to check out how things were going in the company. While it thrived in the music industry boom of the 1970s and 80s, business has struggled in recent years. The executives stressed that they didn’t want to outsource jobs overseas, but had to make some changes to operations — so Gray put on a wig and colored contacts and set out to investigate undercover as an employee named Kyle.
During his tour, Gray stopped in “Plant 3” to chat with Thresa, a circuit board technician who worked at the company for 24 years. She filled “Kyle” in on all the cutbacks at Peavey over the years: Shifts cut to four days a week. Rising health insurance costs. Vacation chopped from three weeks to two weeks. Tuition reimbursement ended. Another employee, Michael, had a similar story. He was no longer making enough money to support his family, so he had found a much higher-paying job and given his two weeks’ notice that day.
So, during the grand finale of the episode, “Kyle” revealed himself as Courtland Gray. As inspirational music played, he gave Thresa $5,000 to pay off her student loans; $10,000 to continue her education; and allowed her and her husband (also a Peavey employee) an extra week of vacation. As for Michael, Gray offered him $10,000 to pay off his loans, as well as $5,000 to start a college fund for his kids. About that other high-paying job? Gray asked if they could “work together” to find a way to keep him at the company. Michael happily agreed. “I’m just glad you’re not going to fire me when I get back,” Thresa said, clearly relieved after learning she was there for a reality show. “There was no light at the end of the tunnel before, now there is,” Michael said tearfully.
So that only spells impending doom, right? Cut to a message on screen: “FOUR MONTHS LATER,” in fall 2014. Sure enough, things are in shambles. Peavey Electronics indeed closed down Plant 3 to outsource jobs. Employees including Thresa and Michael were all given 60-days’ notice. Thresa’s husband kept his job, but it was unclear how long that would last. At the last minute, Michael was offered another job in Peavey; though he was seething that he turned down his other, higher-paying job in order to stay a company that wanted to lay him off anyway.
“I feel like I was done wrong,” Thresa said.
“I’m a little bitter,” Michael added.
While social media erupted with criticism, Peavey posted a long statement on its Facebook page (“Unfortunately, there was no other choice we could make in order to stay competitive in the global marketplace.”)
After hundreds more critical comments, Gray wrote a letter and posted it on the company’s Web site, reiterating how sorry he was. But he also blamed CBS for its editing of the episode. He added that they gave Michael a raise on par with the job he turned down, and Thresa’s husband was indeed still employed at the company. Plus, another employee featured, Ajay, was indeed in the process of getting his visa, as Gray had promised him.
“We feel the show and network did not portray these issues accurately,” Gray wrote.
Is he surprised? Of course, a producer is going to edit and present the storyline for maximum drama. When producers caught up with Thresa, she made a point of saying Gray wasn’t even present when an HR manager came to tell everyone that Plant 3 was shutting down. But no matter what happened, obviously, that’s not how a company wants to be shown on national television. The episode points to the dangers of going on a show like “Undercover Boss.” While it’s tempting to boost your company’s profile by appearing on a popular reality show, you never know what’s going to happen that can make the whole effort backfire……this season especially should serve as a warning with reality TV, you never know which way things are going to go — and there will always be producers always ready and willing to point out the flaws.
In all fairness, it doesn't appear to me that Peavey is doing anything that its competitors aren't already doing or have been for some time. I think they held out for as long as possible from sending their manufacturing to China (like everyone else). But, I guess the Leo-Fender-Bashing-Committee now has added Hartley Peavey to its ****-list of industry mavens to malign.
REgardless of what one thinks of Hartley, the customer service at Peavey is top of the heap in my mind. Not only will they fetch up 50 year old schematics for you, they even stock parts WAY longer than anyone else. And when TI stopped making the TL604 IC that PV and others used by the ton in the 1980s, many companies threw up their hands and said "Oh well..." Not Peavey, they engineered up a small board with a couple ICs on it to perform the function of the 604, and gave it long legs so it could be soldered into a board in place of the old IC.
As irritating as it may be not to get documents, it might serve to keep in mind that guys fixing them on their own is a TINY TINY portion of their customer base.
If you don't want to do business with Behr - or Peavey - so be it. I refuse to do business with Chic-Fil-A or HobbyLobby for basically political reasons - Their HR policies mainly.
As irritating as it may be not to get documents, it might serve to keep in mind that guys fixing them on their own is a TINY TINY portion of their customer base.
If you don't want to do business with Behr - or Peavey - so be it. I refuse to do business with Chic-Fil-A or HobbyLobby for basically political reasons - Their HR policies mainly.
Peavey gave me a schematic for a nineties MMA-875T PA amp last year not available on any of the usual sources. Thank you. Peavey tried as hard as anybody to maintain US production as far as I can tell, but US electronics manufacturing can't be competitive below the $$$$$ boutique snake oil product market. There is a US made class A 40 w mono amp out there for $$$$, no thanks. My music room is hot enough with class AB.
When I encountered a venue PC playing youtube tracks that had no analog earphone output, only USB, I bought a Peavey PV8-USB mixer made in ***** to mix audio into the Allen organ sound system. As USB is a recent development, there will be no US made source of such a product. Now I don't have to listen to the projector fan rattling into the microphone the lady was using to amplify sound before.
When I encountered a venue PC playing youtube tracks that had no analog earphone output, only USB, I bought a Peavey PV8-USB mixer made in ***** to mix audio into the Allen organ sound system. As USB is a recent development, there will be no US made source of such a product. Now I don't have to listen to the projector fan rattling into the microphone the lady was using to amplify sound before.
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