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"New" toy....


Lex Kempo

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Well, the girlfriends' aunt was looking through her old stuff and suddenly my eye caught a box that said "Harman/Kardon". I asked her what she was doin with that one and she said "Oh, we dont use that one anymore, you can have it if you like!"

I took it and RAN like a Bandit :P

Its a HK 940i ... circa early 80's i think ... so far i havent tried it out very much ... i know the FM radio works because i hooked it up to my RS 25's ... Sounds ok!

So far i have found one minor ( yet somewhat major) problem ... for some reason one of the channels have "static" in it ... when i adjust the volume level ... i can hear static from the left channel ... which sucks ( i tried it on both speaker "systems" A & B ...still static)

My question is .... ... has anyone ever had this particular Amp? And honestly ... is it any good? Is it worth the trouble to having it brought in to a local hi-fi repair shop and probably spend ~ 60$ CAN to have it look at?

Is the quality of this "vintage" equipement worth it?

Any help and insight would be appreciated....

Thanks

PAt A.K.A. Lex

(FYI ... i live in Montreal, Quebec)

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I'll bet it's dirty switches, nothing spray cleaner won't cure. It's probably not worth looking into, junk, used up old crap, why would you bother with old junk? Send it to me, I'll get rid of it for you.Tell you what, meet me in Plattsburgh, I'll save you shipping? NO, really, a can of contact cleaner will probably make it go away, and put a smile on your face.

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Pat,

You can get it at any hardware store.Just ask for electrcal contact cleaner.I believe you can remove the cover and spray it in the volume control while rotateing the knob from the outside.Look for a product with a spray tube included(looks like a straw) to have more control of the application.

Greg

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Well, the girlfriends' aunt was looking through her old stuff and suddenly my eye caught a box that said "Harman/Kardon". I asked her what she was doin with that one and she said "Oh, we dont use that one anymore, you can have it if you like!"

I took it and RAN like a Bandit :P

Its a HK 940i ... circa early 80's i think ... so far i havent tried it out very much ... i know the FM radio works because i hooked it up to my RS 25's ... Sounds ok!

So far i have found one minor ( yet somewhat major) problem ... for some reason one of the channels have "static" in it ... when i adjust the volume level ... i can hear static from the left channel ... which sucks ( i tried it on both speaker "systems" A & B ...still static)

My question is .... ... has anyone ever had this particular Amp? And honestly ... is it any good? Is it worth the trouble to having it brought in to a local hi-fi repair shop and probably spend ~ 60$ CAN to have it look at?

Is the quality of this "vintage" equipement worth it?

Any help and insight would be appreciated....

Thanks

PAt A.K.A. Lex

(FYI ... i live in Montreal, Quebec)

I agree with what you have been advised so far, however, I try to take a more simple approach to these things at first (cause I'm simple minded), kind of like making sure the mower has gas in it before you take it to the shop.

First, I would try switching the wires on the back of the speakers, in other words, take the wires hooked to the left and hook them to the right, and the wires going to the left and hook them to the right. If the noise moves to the right channel then you know for sure it is in your new toy. If it does not switch then you know it is your wires, speakers.

Then I would use the can of air and blow the heck out of it, of course it goes without saying that you want to do this with the unit UNPLUGGED .

The contact cleaner can help, but usually the noise from dirty contacts is only there when you are moving the contact, that is when you turn the volume up or down you will hear noise and scratching but it goes away for the most part after you have finished moving the part. I would get DeOxit, which you can purchase at Radio Shack and other locations. I have not seen it at Home Depot but I may not have looked hard enough. Caig is the manufacturer and it is the cleaner the pros use. It is more money but it is formulated to not cause you more problems in the future due to lubricant build up, etc. I am not sure how your Toy is configured but it is very easy to use, you simply spray it into the control while you are moving it. Unless you know what you are doing I would not reccomend spraying it while the unit is plugged in. Some units you can get access to the control by removing the knob. After you remove the volume knob for example there is a larger hole that the shaft of the control/pot sticks through and you can some times get the spray tip to it. Other units have a nut that covers the hole up and you have to remove the outside case/top to get to them. If you have to go this route first spray the vol pot while moving the know back and forth. Power that up and see what happens. If it fixes it you are in great shape, if not, go to the tone controls, and do those one at a time. The reason you want to do them one at a time is that if the spray significantly improves the sound you can isolate where you might have a future problem. Then finish spraying and working all of the other knobs. You do not want to be spraying the contact cleaner on the moving parts of the radio tuner itself. Just the volume and tone controls. You can also clean the rca jacks on the back, speaker terminations on the back with DeOxit.

That is the limits of expertise, there are several on this forum who can take you way beyond this, but this is a good start.

Travis

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Well....I bought some electrical cleaner and dared to open the Stereo ...

The thing was PRISTINE inside ... NO DUST at all ... i even gave it a few shots here and there and there was no dust to be seen. So i removed the volume knob, sprayed the rear binding posts, spared the part that the knob seemed to hide and exactly on the other side of that on the inside of the amp .... Man was i scared cuz i didnt wanna "F" anything up ...

So i put the cover back on....screwed a screw in ... and plugged it in ... WORKS *whew* Plugged some speakers in and ..........WOW... the "static" noise when i raise or lower the volume appears to have dissapeared by about 95% ... Its not perfect but WAY acceptable now ...

THANK YOU ALL for your Advice!

***********************

NEW QUESTION

**********************

I cannot seem to fit "normal" banana plugs into the binding posts as i can do with my Denon 1505 ...i find it kinda wierd ... are there different types of banana plugs?

Is there a special interconnect available that hooks up well with binding post, other than banana plugs ? because they dont seem to fit on mine... ive tried and pushed but theres no give ...im sure if they're supposed to fit they'd go right in ...

Thanks ahead of time

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Im afraid there are no screw connectors (except for the FM and AM radio) ... only binding posts and RCA jacks .... so it might not be a twin power model. (I also looked inside today and didint seem to notice two power supplies, my father had a 430 Twin Power)

But bare wire is always an option, being a novice i though that proper connectors made a better connection and therefore better sound...

To live and learn!

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