how long should it take for a amp repair

[nagnuggets]

alright guys i am new here and dont know if this is the right spot but i had to get my peavey ultra plus amp repaired back in march 28 2011, and i still havent gotten it.. and it is 4-28-2011.. i have called him once a week to check on hte status and he doesnt tell me anything that he should have it done the next week.. this has gone on for 3 weeks now.. okay he is the only guy in hte shop and has alot of amps by hte looks of it.. so is this normal??? to take this long.. and should he call me to let me know the status of the amp??? this is the first time i have used him and ever take a amp to a tech.. if someone could lmk what i should say or do if this isnt normal.. thanks

[Cliff Schecht]

Some shops take a while, especially one-man shops or really busy bigger guys. I do consignment work for a local one man shop and his turn around times on guitars, depending on priority, is 1-3 weeks usually. For amps it's about the same if he's working on them if not longer when parts need to be ordered or it's a big repair.

When I work on amps independently it usually takes me about half a day from the time I pick up the amp to the time I drop it off again, and usually only about 30 minutes to do the actual repairs. But most shops probably don't have the amount of parts that actual amp builders have so I'm betting that a lot of people on here are as quick (or nearly so ).

[selloutrr]

It's probably fine. But his communication skills are poor.

the break down...

It took him a week or so to get it on the bench, maybe it was late in the day and took until the next morning to trouble shoot.

The part he needed wasn't in stock. Shipping on the part was more then the item and he didn't want to over change you the customer or absorb the $ shipping. so he waited for a few more amps to need parts so he could hit a price break or the free shipping mark (usually $99) making it a win for all of the customers.

It can take 7-10 days ground shipping depending on where he is located

*RECAP*

your amp set for a 7-10 days before it got to the bench
Your amp set for a week or so as other amps completed a parts order
7-10 days waiting for parts.

~ 3 weeks / month

Where he failed was his customer service. I personally call my clients and at least inform / give a progress report at least once a week or as they have requested. a 30 second phone call goes a long way to customer satisfaction. I also offer them the option to have the part express shipped or as a special order though most when you break down that the part saves $$$ if they are patient they are more then understanding.

I stock about $5K in parts on hand and still can't have every piece for every amp. it's not that he's a bad tech, you were probably just at the front of the line hopefully you'll be the first to get fixed.

Next time you talk to him be friendly and positive, don't whine or bitch. maybe hint at having a gig in coming week and that you are really looking forward to using your amp.

hope it helps.

[Cliff Schecht]

Eek I've never even thought about the value of my parts, many of them were free or bought in bulk at different periods. Come to think of it my renters insurance might not have me covered so well..

[nagnuggets]

you know that is all i want him to do is call and say something.. ive had to call him everytime.. and only 3 times in one month and 2 days.. and when i call im very polite and ask if he has figure out the prob.. i jsut fell like he has more important projects to get done first and doesnt care, if you want the truth.. his shop is litteraly 5 min from my house so that is awesome.. and i dont think its even a hard fix. all i did was changing preamp tubes around in different slots to see if i could get a different tone and the last time i changed them and turned on my amp no sound was coming out.. but you could still here my dirty pots when turning the knobs.. and also v1 and 4 preamp tubes would get warm and 2 and 3 were not.. or one vice verses.. i klnow nothing about amps so i couldnt think to were to start looking at.. but thanks guys for the comments....

[Cliff Schecht]

Yeah it's probably an easy fix if you know what you are doing. As much as I love old tube amps, PTP/turret/eyelet construction is a different art than PCB amps and in most ways easier to work on (usually with less parts too). With modern amps the first thing I do is google around to see if others have had a similar problem. If so then I start there, if not I pull up a schematic and study the area where there is a problem. Once you learn what typically fails in modern amps you start at those points and move on from there. It's usually just one or two parts in a small section that have failed and I as a tech usually pray to god that I don't have to remove an entire PCB to make the fix (usually I don't, but I charge extra if I do!).

With your amp it sounds like you might have killed something doing all of the tube swapping. I recently fixed a Pro Series Twin that went dead in the shop when the tubes were pulled to be tested. The amp was only in for a non-working tremolo but somehow a JFET died when swapping tubes (with the amp off of course). The fixes in the amp were swapping a single 150k resistor in the tremolo circuit and clipping out the JFET, which was one of those unnecessary things that Fender throws in their amps for whatever reason anyways. An oscilloscope led me to believe that after the second tube there was signal but after the JFET there was none and after studying the schematic, I saw that the FET was just doing a simple muting during channel switching. Funny enough I couldn't get the amp to pop during channel switching with the FET cut out of the circuit..

[Andy Le Blanc]

I try like hell to turn over repairs asap

sometime you do have to wait

a good many take 5 min, with the rest of the bench fee going to diss-assembly
and then re-assembly

but unless there's a compelling reason the fellow has communicated to you
or you know the shop is swamped by volume...

hes a smuck... forget about it... find a different smuck

[d95err]

How long did the guy say it would take when you left the amp for repair?

If the shop is just 5 minutes from your house, why not just go there and talk to him? Face to face conversations solve things a lot quicker than phone calls.

[nagnuggets]

How long did the guy say it would take when you left the amp for repair?

If the shop is just 5 minutes from your house, why not just go there and talk to him? Face to face conversations solve things a lot quicker than phone calls.

well he is the only guy in my area that works on amp.. within 2hrs.. so i dont want to bug him and piss him off.. then he will either take forever like hes doing or find a million things wrong with it.. thats what i am afraid of.. i am going there today, and talk to him.. to see whats going on.. becasue i feel this is not good business. what he is doing.. no communication what so ever.. taking over a month to fix something that is prob a 1 hr top fix.. you know when i would call he had a excuse everytime.. first was i will get on the bench thursday or friday.. this was week one.. then i called him back the following friday, well i got it on the bench sort of check it out and i need to look alittle deeper into it, call him back the following week on thursday, well i have been out sick ALL WEEK and jsut havent had the chance.. he said it would be done this week.. well i waited until friday of the following week like he said it would be done.. ive called his answer machine yesterday and he hasnt returned my call yet.. so i will be visiting his shop here in a couple of hours to see whats up... what would you guys say to him..???? becasue i dont want to piss him off but i also want me amp, and i really dont want to pay full price becasue of his lack of communication skills.. so

[Zippy]

How long did the guy say it would take when you left the amp for repair?

If the shop is just 5 minutes from your house, why not just go there and talk to him? Face to face conversations solve things a lot quicker than phone calls.

well he is the only guy in my area that works on amp.. within 2hrs..

Let's see... 8 hours for two round trips vs 1+ month in the shop...

What matters? Go see the guy and see if you feel like he's going to finish the amp. If he has opened it, determined the failure, and ordered parts, you can go home happy. If he hasn't started it, take it somewhere else.

[nagnuggets]

Well we to the shop today and he did have it opened. But he told me he was still trying to figure out what is wring with it!!!! And that it would come to him and would be done earlier part of the week..."so it has taken him over 4 weeks to figure out nothing.. So I told him he had until Wednesday I'm taking it either way.. I think that is bull crap and no matter what it shouldn't take that long.. I don't care if he's the only one there.. And I always have to call him or go up.. There.. I bought a peavey 6505 today for a great deal.. So I can have something to play.. And my ultra plus will be my back up... It's sad that I had to spend more cash just to have an amp.. I will prob just sell the ultra if I need to.. But I just got scAred when he said that he didn't know what was wrong with it..and m afraid he's going to say I can't fix it.. So I bought a new one!! Lol

[selloutrr]

Bummer.

It should be an easy fix. I'm sure most of us if the amp was in front of us could go thru and diagnose / repair the amp in 30 min.

If he's having this much difficulty one of two things may have happened.

1.) it's a bad solder contact and he's being lazy and doesn't want to take out the PCB to fix it.

2.) he put in a new "better spec'd part" and another component in the chain failed. Peavey amps are built with parts that are often best replaced with OEM parts.

Where are you located?

sorry you're having a difficult time.

[David Root]

This guy is a BS artist. Find someone else.

[nagnuggets]

I live in Ashland ky, I meed to find someone and ship it to them.. At this point I just want it fix.. And yes he's full of crap

[Jana]

It would be interesting to hear his side of the story.