I have an old Pioneer A300 amp bought 2nd hand.
It made what I can only describe as scratchy noises when turning the volume knob and the on/off power led didn't work.
It's been sitting unused in a box in the garage for years and I'd almost forgotten about it.
Recently had to take my Cambridge Audio AVR in for repair (another story).
So out came the Pioneer.
Pulled the varistor apart and cleaned it up. Cleaned out as much dust and crud as possible and resoldered a bunch of suspect looking joints whilst I was at it.
And replaced the power LED.
All in all pretty simple stuff, but now the amp sounds great.
My only gripe is that I chose a LED with a touch too much brightness!
Cheers
It made what I can only describe as scratchy noises when turning the volume knob and the on/off power led didn't work.
It's been sitting unused in a box in the garage for years and I'd almost forgotten about it.
Recently had to take my Cambridge Audio AVR in for repair (another story).
So out came the Pioneer.
Pulled the varistor apart and cleaned it up. Cleaned out as much dust and crud as possible and resoldered a bunch of suspect looking joints whilst I was at it.
And replaced the power LED.
All in all pretty simple stuff, but now the amp sounds great.
My only gripe is that I chose a LED with a touch too much brightness!
Cheers
I have used Magic Marker, paint, even glued a tiny ball bearing in front of a recessed one! There are times that you can put a resistor in series with one and it will do the job. Remember when Marantz tried to blind us with the blue LEDs?
No matter the color, when I have a way to adjust the brightness, I make them barely visible. So distracting.
Beside repairing 2 weeks ago the HV battery of my wife's 2005 Prius by changing only one cell (15€ vs 3000€ at the Toyota dealer near the corner), I just repaired a Beolab 3 active speaker whose SMPS power supply was burnt. Details here
I repaired a model railway DCC controller.
It was a return that didnt work with his loco.
I programmed in loco address and it wouldnt move.
So turned it off, powered it up then it would move.
So after programming address it needs power turning off and on again.
Then it would accept 8 bit addresses.
I found the fix for that was to send a reset data packet between programming each CV.
Got there in the end.
Customer was adamant it would now work with all 21 pin decoders.
I assured him it would work with the one make he sent me now.
Each make is probably programmed by different software engineers.
It was a return that didnt work with his loco.
I programmed in loco address and it wouldnt move.
So turned it off, powered it up then it would move.
So after programming address it needs power turning off and on again.
Then it would accept 8 bit addresses.
I found the fix for that was to send a reset data packet between programming each CV.
Got there in the end.
Customer was adamant it would now work with all 21 pin decoders.
I assured him it would work with the one make he sent me now.
Each make is probably programmed by different software engineers.
It seems most audio repairs always start when you suddenly remember about things collecting dust in a basement or garage 😉 This one is not a repair per se, just a rediscovery.
Out of boredom (and far away from my setup), I pulled out a pair of about one-meter tall (or approx. 3 feet for the imperial enjoyers) Sony HT floor-standing speakers, equipped with a horn tweeter and (maybe) 6-7 inch woofer, with a bass port at the front.
I fired them up with an amp I have lying around. The left speaker works fine, the right one not so much, as its woofer is taking a day off. The horn tweeter is fine at least.
The reason this happens is because, well, a couple of years back, a bee colony used to live exactly in the right speaker. Yeah. They came to us very suddenly one day and left just as quickly. Everyday we'd see probably hundreds of worker bees going to and fro the front bass reflex port. We had to abandon the entire HT set. The bees seem to be harmless for the most part, until you step on one accidentally...
Since Sony is well known for perfectly user-friendly cheap speaker design, I couldn't access the internals or unscrew the woofer. I had to slip my phone through the port to take pictures with flash enabled. Inside, stretching right up to the woofer's magnet, is a gigantic beehive. It doesn't fill up the whole volume, mainly clinging to the front portion of the speaker. The red and green wire connecting the woofer to the speaker connector at the back is gone or obscured by the hive.
So I'm kinda stumped right now. It looks like too much effort's going to be required to fix it, if at all, assuming the bees haven't used the diaphragm as an interesting hive building material 🙂 I might just re-retire these two to the old corner, and use the other speakers (center, 2 subwoofers and 2 full range speakers) instead.
Have a nice day fellow diy-ers, may your repairs be more successful.
K.
Out of boredom (and far away from my setup), I pulled out a pair of about one-meter tall (or approx. 3 feet for the imperial enjoyers) Sony HT floor-standing speakers, equipped with a horn tweeter and (maybe) 6-7 inch woofer, with a bass port at the front.
I fired them up with an amp I have lying around. The left speaker works fine, the right one not so much, as its woofer is taking a day off. The horn tweeter is fine at least.
The reason this happens is because, well, a couple of years back, a bee colony used to live exactly in the right speaker. Yeah. They came to us very suddenly one day and left just as quickly. Everyday we'd see probably hundreds of worker bees going to and fro the front bass reflex port. We had to abandon the entire HT set. The bees seem to be harmless for the most part, until you step on one accidentally...
Since Sony is well known for perfectly user-friendly cheap speaker design, I couldn't access the internals or unscrew the woofer. I had to slip my phone through the port to take pictures with flash enabled. Inside, stretching right up to the woofer's magnet, is a gigantic beehive. It doesn't fill up the whole volume, mainly clinging to the front portion of the speaker. The red and green wire connecting the woofer to the speaker connector at the back is gone or obscured by the hive.
So I'm kinda stumped right now. It looks like too much effort's going to be required to fix it, if at all, assuming the bees haven't used the diaphragm as an interesting hive building material 🙂 I might just re-retire these two to the old corner, and use the other speakers (center, 2 subwoofers and 2 full range speakers) instead.
Have a nice day fellow diy-ers, may your repairs be more successful.
K.
Put a moth (napthalene) ball or a few, smell will make them go away.
Or strong smells like raw tobacco, burnt wood ... they get disoriented, and cannot find the hive. Even body spray works.
You can meanwhile wait for advice on opening the speaker cabinets.
Or strong smells like raw tobacco, burnt wood ... they get disoriented, and cannot find the hive. Even body spray works.
You can meanwhile wait for advice on opening the speaker cabinets.
Naresh,
The bees are already gone. It looks like a graveyard at the base of the speaker. Even worse, there're bugs thriving on the decomposing remains...I had to cover it all up last night after inspection for fear that some ungodly thing that might crawl out of there 😕
The bees are already gone. It looks like a graveyard at the base of the speaker. Even worse, there're bugs thriving on the decomposing remains...I had to cover it all up last night after inspection for fear that some ungodly thing that might crawl out of there 😕
Leave it in sunlight, the heat will remove them, they will leave.
Provided the climate in your area is of that type.
Provided the climate in your area is of that type.
The bees are still gone. Getting the rest of the insects out may require some patience. >>>> I imagine that it will be a challenge to get into the cabinet. I had a similar need to get inside a small speaker cabinet once. It was unbelievably difficult, and turned out to be a mistake.
Steam is very highly regarded these days.
I remember going with my mother to see an Aunt 20 miles on the train in early 1960's.
It was almost always a steam loco.
We thought it a treat to get a diesel.
Most of the time because somebody think glue should be anywhere near speakers, except for holding the wood together 🙁
Sorry, I should have said it more clearly. When I said " holding the wood together", I meant making the MDF cabinet. For everything else, they should use normal, visible screws, which didn't happen unfornately in my case.
My tower speakers have some sort of (plastic?) front cover installed, with cutouts for the speakers. There're no screw holes that I can see whatsoever, so I assume it's held there by glue. Yesterday I used a screwdriver to pry it, no dice. Then my genius brain thought somehow a guitar pick would work better. It snapped in half.
My tower speakers have some sort of (plastic?) front cover installed, with cutouts for the speakers. There're no screw holes that I can see whatsoever, so I assume it's held there by glue. Yesterday I used a screwdriver to pry it, no dice. Then my genius brain thought somehow a guitar pick would work better. It snapped in half.
Belling two oven electric cooker which first started playing up in January. Came down to find the clock flashing... maybe a brief mains interruption I thought but then it happened a week or so later, and again, and again. When this happens the lower fan oven will not operate as the clock has to be set for relay to energise and supply the fan oven with power. Top oven and rings all work.
In practice all you have to do is press one of the buttons without actually setting a time.
The problem become more frequent and then it started cutting out while cooking, and when it cut out no less than around 10 times last Friday something had to be done.
A cap was the problem, the board has two electrolytics, a 1000uF 6.3 volt and a 22uF 50 volt together with a 0.68uF 275vac X2 which will be part of a wattless dropper PSU. I suspected the 0.68uF because I noticed the flashing 00:00 was brighter at the start of each flash and then dimmed as if a rail was dropping. Hazy thoughts of the 0.68uF having lost 'goodness' or more likely some capacitance, perhaps from self healing effects (would there be enough current to do that though).
I replaced the two electrolytics but did not have a suitable 0.68uF at the time. It ran for over 24 hours... could it have been just one of the electros... but then it tripped again. Grrr. I got a new 0.68uF 315Vac rated cap (X2) and fitted that and straight away knew it was fixed, the brightness was a little higher and no dimming as it flashed before setting the time.
The original electro's were 'Elite' brand (lol) so should have been good 😉 That other thing on the board is a piezo buzzer.
In practice all you have to do is press one of the buttons without actually setting a time.
The problem become more frequent and then it started cutting out while cooking, and when it cut out no less than around 10 times last Friday something had to be done.
A cap was the problem, the board has two electrolytics, a 1000uF 6.3 volt and a 22uF 50 volt together with a 0.68uF 275vac X2 which will be part of a wattless dropper PSU. I suspected the 0.68uF because I noticed the flashing 00:00 was brighter at the start of each flash and then dimmed as if a rail was dropping. Hazy thoughts of the 0.68uF having lost 'goodness' or more likely some capacitance, perhaps from self healing effects (would there be enough current to do that though).
I replaced the two electrolytics but did not have a suitable 0.68uF at the time. It ran for over 24 hours... could it have been just one of the electros... but then it tripped again. Grrr. I got a new 0.68uF 315Vac rated cap (X2) and fitted that and straight away knew it was fixed, the brightness was a little higher and no dimming as it flashed before setting the time.
The original electro's were 'Elite' brand (lol) so should have been good 😉 That other thing on the board is a piezo buzzer.
Been working on a PC USB scope.
Couldnt for the life of me get it work. Tried replacing SMD A2D and no joy.
Just rubbish on the PC screen.
In the end I adjusted the zero level on the screen and a sine wave rolled on to the screen and the noise went.
Must have been over driving the A2D.
Couldnt for the life of me get it work. Tried replacing SMD A2D and no joy.
Just rubbish on the PC screen.
In the end I adjusted the zero level on the screen and a sine wave rolled on to the screen and the noise went.
Must have been over driving the A2D.
Laugh if you want but changing a headlight on a RAV4 was a little more than I expected.