AUDIO REPAIRS, RESTORATIONS AND RE-ENGINEERING.

I can repair the following list of equipment......

Solid state Amplifiers and AM/FM receivers.
Tube amplifiers and tube preamps.
Tape decks and cassette decks
Guitar amplifiers
Cable repairs
Old tube radios
New radios
Turntables
Radio-grams
Mixing desks
Electronic Organs
Transformer rewinding
Speakers, including new surrounds and crossovers.

If you are unsure if I may be able to repair your silent or broken equipment, please
email me at info@turneraudio.com.au

I am located in the Canberra suburb of Watson, telephone 02 6241 2760, business hours.

Sorry, but I do not repair VCRs, or TVs.
I do charge to pick up and deliver, but it never costs as much as a plumber charges!

Repair costs & quotations......

I charge a minimum fee of $40 to inspect the inside of a given article to establish why there is a fault.
If you engage me to repair something the minimum fee is included in the total repair bill.

Quotations will not be given for equipment with a market sale value of less than $200.

But if I think the repair bill will exceed $100, and I think you may be reluctant to pay a bill that size,
I will telephone or email you about it.

It is not always possible to provide a fixed price quote before repair work is undertaken because unforeseen and extra problems have a habit of appearing while work on equipment is under way, and there is much variation in the prices or availability of spare parts.
Searching for parts and service manual information can take time, and any costs are included in the repair bill.

If I can establish what is the cause of a problem easily, I usually will give an estimate which allows a customer
to judge whether it is worth having the article repaired.

Typical most common repair bills can be......

Amplifiers, with one silent channel. Problem is fused or burnt parts in an average 15 yr old solid state amp or receiver.
Cost is typically $150 to repair.
Other problems like noisy controls, intermittent or damaged switches can cost $100.

Precaution!!!  Make sure you have connected wires to speaker and amplifier terminals correctly and without any chance of bare wires from red or black terminals ever touching each other which will cause an amp in the box to fail.

Turntables not turning.
Find right sized new belt and replace, $40.
Broken MM stylus.  Order correct replacement stylus and fit and test,  $80 average.
If unavailable because the replacement part is unavailable, a new cartridge plus stylus
would be fitted if possible and cost could be $150 for basic Nagoaka cartridge.
Moving coil cartridges are much more expensive to replace.
Turntable does not start or stop properly, or return arms etc. Sometimes difficult to fix because of the availability of parts, usually less than $100.

Cassette Players.
Tape mechanism does not fast forward, rewind, or play a tape, or tangles up a tape inside the play mechanism..
Sound is noisy and indistinct, and perhaps at the wrong speed.
If all are present, cost for a new set of belts, perhaps replace a motor, and replace the replay/recording head pick up could be $300 for an internal "rebuild".
People should try to buy another second hand but working player if the one they have has developed numerous faults.
Cassette tape, like video tape has become largely extinct, and unless you have a huge collection of valuable cassettes,
it is not worth spending much on cassette player repairs.
Old cassette players may need replacement drive belts, record/replay heads, motors, door parts, pinch rollers but repairs seldom cost more than $150.

Loudspeakers.
The most common problem is disintegrated foam surrounds around the outside of bass or midrange speaker cones
which are unusually the large "round things" on the front panel of a speaker when the fabric cover is removed.
I only use replacement butyl rubber surrounds which will outlast any foam surround. Pairs of stereo speaker surrounds always degrade together
and if only one appears to have disintegrated, the other will be close to failing and I will only replace pairs of surrounds.
Costs for a pair of 200mm speaker surrounds, $220,
250mm surrounds, $240,
300mm surrounds, $270.
(More about speakers below...)

Radios.
I get about 6 AM tube radios per year to fix.
Usually they are a much loved ancient reminder of the past era when life was simple, and you could buy a lot for $2. 
People tend to think their 1955 radio might cost $20 to fix, because that's all they paid on the last service bill in 1966.
Unfortunately, a typical labour time for a silent AM radio with 49 faults will be about 2 days full time to fix properly and
will usually include some modifications to the circuit  to make it work because some parts or tube types are no longer available,
and because the designers in 1950 ensured that the performance included noise and minor problems which would be unacceptable in 2009.
I stock spares of most minor parts and all radio vacuum tubes.  Usually many minor parts need replacement such as capacitors and there will be considerable re-wiring needed. Today's use of compact fluoresent lamps create large amounts of radio frequency interference noise that sounds like loud hums as you tune along the band and often right on your favourite AM radio station. To overcome this problem many old radios need to have a ferrite rod antenna fitted which picks up the wanted station but without the interference noise.

Two day's work means 16 hours, and if I was a plumber or cheap mechanic, that would bring me $1,120 at $70 per hour.

Who wants to pay that much to fix an old AM radio, usually so they can listen to ABC Radio National which is the only station worth listening to?
I've never known anyone offering the "plumber's fee" for the work, so don't complain when I charge only $300, including replacement parts
and a new antenna. In many radios I have to replace the mains cable because the existing cable is downright deadly, and its a wonder half the family has not been electrocuted.

FM radios are mainly all solid state and don't suffer from interferences and cannot be re-wired. But most of the circuit chips are
available for anything made since 1975. FM reception is often the most reliable sound source, but occasionally I get a lemon that resists all attempts to make it work properly, and they can be difficult to diagnose because of the circuit complexity.
 

Warranty.
All repairs are warranted for 3mths at least.

But suppose I'd just repaired dad's favorite 1980 amplifier and speakers.
Suppose dad allows an end of school year party where the fine young people present  try to find out how just how loud dad's
old hi-fi system can go with full bass boost.
After 20 minutes some smoke pours out of the speakers and amplifier, and there's a nasty smell, and the sound of crackles,
then dead silence. And suppose I'd repaired the amp 2 weeks previously. I would not fix the system a second time for free!

And if I fix something and the fix does not last 3mths, and it is not an owner's fault that the item has failed,
and the item cannot be fixed, then I refund the repair cost.
Unfortunately, a small % of items fall into the category of having a fault such as some intermittent
noise or sound failure whose cause cannot be traced economically.

I am very reluctant to try to fix CD players for which there is no support such as easily available parts,
so if you spent $70 at Bing Lee on a CD or multi disc player made in China, I won't touch it. Buy another new one.

After amplifiers and receivers, CD players are the second most unreliable audio component.

Modern electronic items are now always extremely complex, and many items from the 1960s
to about 1985 are much easier to repair than more recently made equipment.

Time for repairs.

Most solid state repairs can be done within 10 working days, but sometimes the time can stretch out to a month
because a workshop manual has to be obtained, and perhaps several orders for parts placed as faults are discovered and fixed.
And some parts suppliers are hopeless to deal with and very slow to answer inquiries on parts availability.

Tube amp repairs can take longer.

I have often got a back log of projects where I am making new amplifiers which takes an enormous number of labour hours.
So I have to interrupt the crafting part of my business to carry out a repair, so some delays can be expected.

I know our Government politicians lament the shortage of skilled people in Australia.

But I lament that nobody offers me the wages of politicians, and not even wages of a plumber, and somehow they get this idea that home base businesses
are some kind of glorified hobby where the skilled electronics tradesman happily works for 1978 wage rates.
There would be more skilled people to perform all the fixes if the wages attracted more people to the job.

So please be be *very* patient, I know I earn far less than you!
 

RESTORATIONS and RE-ENGINEERING IS MORE THAN JUST REPAIRING.

Usually there is a far longer time scale for restoration simply because I have to have a queue system for larger projects which is the only fair way
to arrange the work flow. Over the last 6 years I have always felt I have too much to get through in each week.
I have asked God for 100 more hours a week. God is extremely "time challenged", and he has not answered my godmails....   

Some clients want their equipment fully restored to its original functioning condition without any unsightly changes to the appearance
and this work can be more expensive than providing just a repair of the equipment to make it functional but nothing else.

This means that with an given amplifier or pair speakers, there may be a need to replace parts which
may threaten the the future reliability of the item, so the repair has to include preventative work to ensure a happy future.
So when I repair an old 1960  tube amp, I don't just repair it by replacing one little part and I may have to rewire the whole
amp to get the performance of the unit to meet 2008 expectations of performance and reliability.
The repair job then becomes one of re-engineering since it may require me to re-design the circuit.
I am well skilled at designing amps and radios to give excellent performance but it does take a lot of time.

I will always also try to fit modern safe mains wiring and a fuse so that your ancient equipment won't give you a shock,
electrocute your cat or burn down your house. Much equipment comes to me in terribly unsafe condition.

Radiograms needing re-furbishment of their cabinets can be expensive but I know tradesmen here that can do nice french polishing.

Old radios, and radiograms are a small part of my work, but much care is taken to ensure such old items benefit from restoration for future generations to enjoy.

I often take a long time to get around to fixing a radio brought to me because there is always a backlog of better paying work I have to do so the bills get paid.

RE-ENGINEERING AMPLIFIERS

I have clients who bring me ancient old amplifiers which are in a very poor condition. Sometimes they are "collectors' items"
which are supposed to have some kind of value. One recent case is where a guy brings me a pair of Quad-II amps and its control unit and a tube AM and
FM tuner all made in about 1955, so four separate components and the tubes are all smashed, missing, or worn out and need replacing and all
the internal small parts such as resistors, capacitors all have reached their end-of-life so a full re-wire is required with modifications to make the
items perform well for the next 50 years. But something like this may take me 3 weeks to finally get right and cost $1,500, or 1.5 times average weekly earnings in Australia at present. The original cost in 1955 may have been 15 weeks pay because Quad equipment was an expensive brand that was purchased mainly by doctors, lawyers, rich graziers, and anyone else who got high wages while most people struggled to buy something awful from Pye, AWA, Kreisler etc.
But when I have finished, the Quad system will be able to be used with normal modern speakers and have better sound than available in 1955.
The terminals will suit modern cabling, and safety is much improved, and the system will be reliable, and have active protection against output tube failure
and thus meet modern expectations of performance.

Hence some ancient Leak, Quad, or Dynaco amps etc are able to be fully stripped down and rebuilt to a new circuit using all modern minor parts such as resistors, capacitors, diodes, potentiometers, switches, wiring, contacts, sockets and cables and replacing all the vacuum tubes if needed.

Generally, if the basic items like output transformers and power transformers are in good condition then these can all be retained or mounted on new chassis, and a unique amp is thus created.

For those technically minded interested in images and schematics of work I have done on old amps, see the pages on re-engineering.

It is possible to have existing fused transformers re-wound, but preferably not by me.
It  is often far too difficult to extract the core material originally used and copy the old transformer exactly. And then you may only have something prone to failure again so it is better to work out what voltages and currents are required and wind a new transformer that is slightly bigger and better but only if nobody has something in stock which will do the job.  Recently I had a guy with a fused OPT in a Jolda 502 and I was able to use Hammond Engineering output transformers available from http://www.evatco.com.au based in Queensland. The Hammond type 1650P OPT worked better than the original Chinese output transformers
and were easy to fit. OPT in both channels were replaced at a cost of about $400 total.  I opened up the Chinese made OPT and saw why the very shoddy work was destined to fail and then cause a couple of tubes to also fail. Hammond are wound in a better manner.

In December 2008 I have obtained a large number of power and output transformers to suit a wide range of applications.
I probably have something in stock to suit anything in a tube amp.

And some designs like those used on old Leak amps are not worth copying, since Leak quality was so poor and the Hammond solution
would be very favorable or else use something from my stocks. But if there isn't room to fit an off the shelf replacement item, then a custom wound new
transformer may be the only answer.
If I wind custom output transformers, or import replacements from Sowter or Lundahll, the quality of the amp and the sound will then equal the highest available, for after all, even the best quality and most expensive high end tube gear is simply some tubes combined with a nice OPT, and other parts, and it is possible to re-engineer an old amp up to the same standard. 

With solid state equipment, only marginal improvements can be made and there are restrictions on any changes
due to the use of printed circuit boards within. But it is amazing that so many ancient solid state amps can be brought back to life.
For really serious restoration, all the electrolytic coupling capacitors should all be replaced with modern types which function
with less leakage and distortion than the original types. This is especially true of low voltage rated electrolytic caps used in preamps, and early power amps.
In the case of power amps, I often replace poorly rated power transistors with modern types of better voltage and current ratings and better frequency response.
RE-ENGINEERING SPEAKERS

Occasionally I have customers whose ancient loudspeakers have declined past middle age and lost their ability to sing very well.

I have test equipment that can accurately measure the frequency response in any speaker and detect their shortcomings due to old age, use by teenagers, or because of absurdly optimistic lying cheating designers before they even left the factory. Many old speakers that were very cheap in 1960 are not worth trying to up-grade but many from the 1970s and 80s can be given a second life. I have had to re-engineer several pairs of AR speakers which may have been extraordinarily expensive in 1975 and which have well constructed cabinets but now need a total re-build.

I plot graphs for the speakers response at 4 different microphone positions and average the levels expressed in voltage dB to gain what is a fairly good indicator of the actual acoustic output from a speaker in the normal listening position sitting in a chair at 3.5 metres from the speakers. I have a slightly better than average listening room and if I get any speaker to measure as well at my room it will sound excellent in anyone else's living room.
The 4 mic positions are usually at 3.5M +/- 0.5M from a speaker and nearly on axis and between 0.7M and 1.2M above floor level.
The response will vary with each of the 4 mic positions because even with a randomly varying 'pink noise' test signal with varying frequency and phase shift and level there is still some effect from room resonances and reflections. Resonances in all domestic rooms will prevent making accurate graphs of responses using pure sine wave tones of constant level, phase and frequency. Such tones rarely occur in music. The bass will be tight foundation for the music as the speakers allow, and treble will have the right amount of presence and not too bright or harsh and not too little and dull.

In layman's terms, pink noise is a test signal that when played through speakers moderately loudly sounds just like standing beside a nice big waterfall.
Sound energy in this signal contains all audio frequencies changing randomly in terms or level and phase and frequency between 20Hz and 20kHz.

For many old loudspeakers, variations of +/- 20% of capacitor or inductor values used in the crossover filters can cause serious peaks or troughs in the response measured in my graphs, and such measurements prove often that no care was ever taken to make the response flat in the factory.
Such problems are identified and addressed in the testing process.
Old speakers can sing better than when purchased, especially if the speakers were considered very good quality when purchased and if the enclosure quality is good enough to warrant the technical upgrade. Old enclosure boxes may need re-gluing, new gaskets, new screws and additional bracing and damping materials to render them less prone to resonances and buzzes which always spoil the sound. Some enclosures benefit from my process of fitting an internal extra panel layer of fibre board glued with a pliable and sound absorbent adhesive and in addition to added internal cross braces. Such box repairs are cheaper than building new enclosures.

Cone surrounds on old bass or midrange drive units may be needed.
I replace old deteriorated foam or other materials with mostly butyl rubber surrounds but sometimes I use specially treated and hand formed cotton cloth or fine leather doped with a silicone compound to give the speaker the correct firmness and compliance.

Where the driver unit has a damaged voice coil, ( that party was too loud! ), then it is usually more effective to replace the driver with a factory replacement if available. This is seldom possible with speaker that is over 20 years old so a Peerless replacement can be fitted and most often be better quality from
something made 20 years ago. With substitute drive units there is always a cost of altering the crossover filters to suit the substitute speaker's different electronic/acoustic properties.

Tweeters, ( high frequency units ),  sometimes suffer open circuited voice coils from use at high levels with teenagers involved. Its never worth repairing old tweeters and they are best replaced with a new pair. If a hard dome on a tweeter has been pushed in by inquisitive little fingers, the tiny fragile voice coil may be damaged beyond repair. But if the dome is the soft fabric type, it may possibly be pulled outwards and the speaker still functions OK.
The use of ferro fluid inside the coil gap and better modern cone or dome materials has greatly improved tweeters over samples from the past. I use Peerless tweeter replacements and I alter crossovers to suit.

Crossover networks in older speakers are of appalling design and component quality.These networks may need total re-design and rebuilding with new components. For example, a customer brought me a pair of large Acoustic Research AR9 speakers with the 4 bass speaker foam surrounds all quite perished, and with tweeters burnt out, so I fitted new Peerless tweeters, replaced all the surrounds with rubber types, and then re-wired the complex and poorly conceived crossovers to make these speakers less likely to damage amplifiers when turned up loud even briefly. Careful tailoring of the crossovers gave a much flatter response and the owner was delighted that the repair converted what was useless junk into what would have cost him much more than the repair if he'd bought new speakers.
The reformed AR9 gave very impressive performance from very low frequencies to 20kHz, and there was no need for a sub-woofer.

Replacement tweeters are from $150 per pair including my labour.

I use replacement drivers purchased from WES components. See the range of speaker drivers and prices at  http://www.wescomponents.com.au
WES stock a large range of the Peerless speaker drivers made in Denmark, and Scanspeak and Vifa.
The Peerless range from Denmark include types which will sound better than 90% of any drivers used in speakers made 20 years ago. The WES price is reasonable, but fitting new drivers into existing boxes requires that I adjust or re-build the crossover frequency filters, and perhaps adjust the size of the hole in the box for the new driver.
So fitting new drivers is usually much more expensive than just replacing the surrounds on old drivers and not having to change the filter crossover.
I do not do panel repairs on electrostatic loudspeakers. Most ESL needing repairs are Quad ESL 57,and after about 40 years these speakers develop numerous faults. I recommend Mr John Hall of Melbourne, phone number 03 97726293. He can fix these but the cost is high because of the technical difficulty of the repair.

For a final test of speakers, I use special test signals prepared by Mozart, Beethoven, Bach, Sibelius, Miles Davis, KDLang,Cassandra Wilson, Terence Blanchard, James Carter, James Morrison,  Bob Marley, Ry Cooder, Buena Vista Social Club, Pink Floyd, etc, etc, etc, or something from a few of your favorite CDs.

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