Here’s the NO list. I don’t want to take these on – as there’s little chance to get them working reliably- let alone back to ‘factory gate’ condition expected. I do most 60s-90s Hifi…but have low fix rates on these.
NO PORTABLES inc Ghettoblasters [ worn plastic cassette mechanisms that take too much time – often TWIN decks too]
No Post 2000 [ie Modern] micro systems- many of it Chinese made. [All special chips/boards and software. No support/parts brought to UK. ]
No Home cinema amps- [always need a complete circuit board- & none are available- or affordable. Component level repair occasionally possible..but tricky]
No Old radiograms/ record players/ music centres/ Midi systems. (just so many issues to solve & if not 100% you’ll complain)
No DVD/ Bluray players, VHS videos, Laserdisc, camcorders TV’s , playstations or Car audio)
The following I consider – each on its merits
BIG blown Amps: Yes I can get many going but I’ve always a long list and these can be real nightmares to get going once blown.
BIG Reel-Reels: some have so many faults- Japanese I like.. but European- yuk.. Read this first.
In order to keep some older classic hifi going, we will take on some specific models, like the Sony CDP101, WMD6c etc. I do have new/old spares and can often restore these. Look down the menu to see the specific pages I’ve written on certain items.
I do specialise in Japanese & English Hifi, and fix most of these.. yet there are many more brands, like European companies, that are much less able to be sorted, due to parts/tech non availability and since we never sold these all those years ago- haven’t had years of experience on them
Many other repairers just pick off the easy service work- or only take on the brand they are comfortable with… but as you may already have read, we have a rather special workshop team here that do manage to fix more than 90% of the work we see. Sometimes I will be aware of which I can’t fix and why…and am only too happy to discuss this with you before coming over here with it..
It’s worth me stating therefore what’s not easily fixable nowadays.
But I should also say that many of these I am willing to have a half hour or so (£30 time spend for you ) to give an honest report on what is wrong. (It has always annoyed me how other service depts would quickly take your ~£75 fee and then say ‘sorry it can’t be fixed’) Every item has a story.. of what has likely failed and why and I will get that for you. We may then be at a dead end.. but at least we have tried and there can be ways forward- scrap parts on Ebay etc
So…. It’s a problem for…. lots of European brands.. PHILIPS, NEAL, TANDBERG, B&O, GRUNDIG, Telefunken, Revox etc.
However European/ American brands are less familiar to me… I really have no love of B&O, Studer, BOSE , Philips, Wurlizer etc
I hate pretty much all of these brands.. sorry to say…. they just don’t ‘talk’ to me. Lots of problems to fix, with no help or parts and due to european made capacitors and the like…are just plain unreliable. There are lovers of each of these brands, but not me sorry.. There are specialists out there that will take them on but you need to look hard…
Also..
BOSE. NO I can’t do any of these! They have stopped their own service facility- so no official support. Many have small aluminium SMD capacitors and they are ALL dying now with age… I’ve tried changing many- but you just can’t get them to run reliably again.
SONOS NO You can try sonosrepair.co.uk (I can’t endorse them but…)
CYRUS NO All but the early Cyrus 1&2 are pretty much unfixable
They don’t let technical info out of their building, and don’t have any spares to sort out all the corroding circuit boards on series 3 onwards. (small aluminium capacitors again !) So unless it’s a Cyrus 1 or 2… forget it, there’s literally is no chance of fixing them once corrosion sets in.
Krell, Chord, Electrocompaniet, Classe & other Really massive power amps. EEEK!
Whilst built like tanks, these aren’t meant for mere mortals to fix.. They’re impossible to work on…and do blow up spectacularly as there are huge voltages and currents used….. so beware, I’ll have a look, but probably 50:50 at best to fix. I can do bench-tests and set bias / check them for you. But if it has gone pop… slim chances!
Really fancy Home cinema amps. Rather hit & miss. Yamaha is OK, but Denon, Marantz, Arcam etc, I take each as it comes
While I do have 30yrs experience on home cinema- most end up needing a panel…the big digital panels. So these aren’t normally available after ~5years old. I’m usually able to diagnose for you just where the issue is..and fix some faults- but by no means all. If you can get a panel, they’re upwards of £150 for them.. and need specialist firmware loading and configuring. I can do this on almost any Yamaha…but not on other makes. The manufacturers give up on support after 6 years normally… so we are on own own trying to solve em.
Really Old record players… Hacker, Bush, Alba. I’ll have a go- but the valve ones are less likely to be economic
These need lots of restoring.. you’ve seen ‘The Repair shop’ Yes its like that here… but I can’t spend a whole week of love on just one item! These generally aren’t profitable, just way too time consuming, but if the faults are simple rather than a full restoration- we can usually do them. A few new components and valves and sorting out the mechanism and a new cartridge.. yes.
Portables… tape or CD players. NO to most (other than Sony pro Walkman WMD6C)
Fiddly things with not much chance of being fixed… No spares and they only had a short design life. Other than the Sony walkman pro..most are beyond getting the spares- or me seeing to fit them! So I have now stopped taking these in or trying just once more to get one going.
LCD / LED / Plasma Television repairs. Nope…
no manufacturer sells parts.. so any problem and they’re usually scrap. You might find used parts on Ebay for older ones- but modern ones are either a faulty screen- and you can’t get one, or backlights you can’t replace. That’s why all the TV repair shops have gone now- just no possibility of fixing them!
Car audio. ALL types… its a NO. sorry.
I just don’t have the harnesses and manufacturer specific tools and connections. (Try Head unit repair in Garstang- no affiliation etc, but they seem the nearest)
Modern Chinese made gear (after yr 2000 ) … UNLIKELY
You’d be surprised how many brands use Chinese made gear… Many brands started using Chinese produced panels from around 2000. Subwoofer amplifiers, cheapish Hifi… and some much better stuff. These however all have no tech, no help or parts.. panels or special ICs just aren’t shipped over here. They often have a short life. Sometimes I can find a cure, so worth a quick look maybe.. Manufacturers usually have a few spare boards, but after 5 yrs these are all gone..and with no schematics available or the specially programmed chips, I’m stuck.
JBL, AKG, Sanyo, Panasonic, Harman Kardon – Modern gear needing help -Try Multicare.org.uk in Leeds (can’t endorse but…)
Well the list can go on…. But If I can’t work out why its gone, can’t get any parts now or if it just isn’t worth spending a bit of time (~£30) on, then these may be hopeless jobs to try to fix..
PHILIPS, Grundig, Tandberg. Sorry, but these are all just horrid to work on.
European companies circuit design, the layout inside the unit is so different to the Japanese way, that I find it difficult to quickly read and trace a fault.
Many of their old cassette or reel decks have brittle plastic mechanisms and gears…all spares are obsolete…..and their old belts go gooey like tar and that ends up all over the mechanisms, which takes ages to clean up. Many of the old germanium transistors give trouble, as do their carbon resistors.
NEAL cassette machines. Solid built, but crude.. and no diagrams. Motors tend to go weak.
B&O Bang & Olufsen . It’s a marmite thing…. I hate them…with a passion…so be warned I really don’t want to see these! Based on Philips European designs and with no help from B&O technical, they are a nightmare to fix…. there’s loads out there faulty and they all seem to find their way to me as no-one else can fix them either. Simple issues and gritty controls, or a few capacitors etc.. OK I can do, but weird faults… Sorry.. very unlikely to be able to fix it for you. They were quite well reviered for a while , but now seem to be sliding out of favour thankfully.
MUSICAL FIDELITY A1 , A100. These are unreliable at best. They run as hot as a toaster. Channels blow up. 50:50. I’ll replace transistors and see if it runs.. if it does..it lives… but half of them just blow up again straight away. If so.. then SCRAP. Many stereo amplifiers when they fail can be like this… you repair it after a ‘car crash event’ and cross your fingers when you plug it in..
Creek amplifiers (& other unknown brands of Old English amps) All a bit cottage industry and although some had novel designs, they can be a bit unstable once they’ve got some years on the clock. Generally not particularly well designed and all the old ones…when they go pop…they go unstable and just won’t be reliable again.
TECHNICS Amplifiers (SUX910/920 SUV560… SUA800 /900 & many more) Many of the later (as in 1990s ones) use an amp on a chip module for the whole amplifier output ( look up SVI3205 or RSN600). These modules are all failing now.. most for no real reason and the devices are just not made anymore. You can buy £60 used ones pulled from another unit…but these are life limited due to age. China etc has a load of ‘copy’ crap ones, I’ve tried 2…rubbish, they just blow….so I won’t waste any time and money on these amps once I’ve confirmed the chip is blown. It’s a GAME OVER..
OLD silver cassette decks...
I love them really but they can be a pain. Newer 90’s decks are fine, and we specialise in these, but these silver ones are all 40+years old. Plastic is brittle, rubber tyres mostly unavailable, early logic ICs are starting to fail as are transistor junctions…and old capacitors leak.. so they never fix in an hour, they take time & patience…. and you’ll need to convince me you love & cherish it or I’ll turn it away ! – Expect to have to spend £50-60 or more to get these going due the time they take. Twin tape decks are twice as much work.. so they can’t be done cheap either.
Old radiograms. Dansette record players etc
The valve ones… from the 1950s… are particularly time consuming…Later ones we can get to grips with the dozens of failed components… but the 50s decks are so seized and clunky… the amp/radio circuits are impossible to fault find on being built so cramped together…and the multi clunk click switch blocks are usually so corroded that they won’t clean and switch properly. Cartridges and rotary controls also degrade too. I am now cagey about offering a restoration service on these due to these problems, the time that takes…and the space they take up…sorry.
Thats about it without writing a whole tome about my lifes work… I have gone over 36000 jobs in my career and one day it would be good to lay down all that experience so that whoever follows me can maybe continue this work for another 40 years. For now though, I’m sure to be around for another 10 years, so don’t panic just yet. :)