I know you sometimes have to choose between good and cheap, but it’s frustrating when you see something where a little better planning and a few bucks in better parts would make these things legendary workhorse amps. Raise the MSRP by like $15 and it would make money across the board.
Easy peasy. Fender sold it for a better profit and you earn your repair bill. More will come. Costumers can choose to not buy it or just make it better. Thanks for showing us viewers the ways of the hot rod.
My old Blues Deluxe was totally destroyed by heat, because of the exact reasons you've mentioned here. I don't understand why Fender does this....I know its all about cost saving and profit, but to me its bad business. I had my Blues Deluxe converted to Fender Vibrolux Reverb (1964 spec I think). Beautifully made all hand wired and quality components...big job though as I'm sure you know. I would never recommend anyone to buy anything from the Hotrod series...
After I started watching your videos that routinely expose the high failure rate of these amps, I didn't take it personally. Instead, I promptly sold my Hot Rod Deluxe and my Blues Jr, as well as my reissue Vox AC15 and Vox AC10. The only thing left around here that's a similar POS when it comes to repair is a Peavey Classic 30. I only paid $100 for the Peavey, so if it fails, oh well.
There are a couple problems with this situation..... 1. The HRDlx sounds VERY Good on the normal channel. They should have stopped Right There, ditched all the horrible high-gain stuff and added digital tremolo in its place. They would have had an awesome amp. 2. These problems have existed for 30 years now. The SAME problems. They have EASY solutions but Fender refuses to fix them. As Lyle says, it shows nothing but Contempt for the customers. 3. It would cost Feeder VERY Little money to fix these disasters and they could even charge another 20 bux to cover it. 4. Fender is Stupid Stupid Stupid
Very interesting, I have a HRD iv in the shop right now for similar buzz and noise, just bought it used from a store here in Canada and they are looking at it. Curious to see if their tech finds the same thing(s) you find on so many amps, or if they just change the tubes and ‘hope’ the problem goes away or I don’t notice it lol. If they do it right, it’s probably going to need caps, maybe the 5-watt parts like this amp, as well as at least 1-2 preamp tubes replaced. Thanks for the insight and info here.
Just opened mine up for buzzing and yea, those same parts seem to have discoloration.. that right filter cap has like red brown color on the front, and those 2 white amp capacitors have discoloration on the board, plus that little black diode to the right of it....
I have a hot rod deluxe 3 and to remove some of the bass put a 70/80 speaker in. Unfortunately this made little difference and played a gig last night with bass totally off and mid at around 9 , but the amp really boomy still. I realise I can change this with a graphic pedal but wondered if this may be indicative of anything else. Was really loud with amp volume up around 5. Thanks
Great info, thanks for your insights! Question...I just picked up one of these the other day for the very fair price of $0.."It works, but sounds bad. Take it if you want." I haven't had a chance to take off the back panel and snoop around yet, but after watching your videos I'm gonna go out on a limb and say this diagnosis applies. So, once the repairs are made is it good to go or does the design cause this problem to reoccur? Thanks again.
I can't believe people say you make things up. That is absolutely ridiculous. Shame on those people, how dare they question your ethics. Ignore them they are nothing but mouth breathers anyway. 👍👍👍
If you don’t believe that there’s inherent problems with these amps, just do a search on RU-vid and see the thousands of “Hot Rod” repair videos. Every single one is a cap job, replacing the input jacks and replacing the 5v switching supply components. No matter the series or how new/old they are, they have the exact same problems.
When I turn my volume up house sort of a-ha if I keep my Addie bedroom volume it sounds great it when I play it loud that it starts to have the rattle or some sort of a hum. What could that be?
I have one of these V2's as well, I've done the Filter cap swap to F&T's, as well as the resistor raising/replacement. Just doesn't seem to have any Bass response. Checked the pot and all is good, any usual suspect I should look for?
Bean counters deciding on parts...😞 What was that movie where an astronaut was asked how he felt about riding a rocket that was put together by the lowest bidder...?🤣😞
I will never understand why people do not take good care of their gear. I guess they do not value it for whatever reason. I have a six year old Mesa MK5/35 that I take very good care of. Mostly because it cost about $2000.00 six years ago. My wife still does not understand why I spent that much on a guitar amp. lol Secondly, do you happen to know how much more it would cost per unit to use a double-sided, plated thru hole board? I would hazard a guess that perhaps only a few more dollars.
Lyle, I've had my HRD for 20 years all stock, no mods. I opened it up and have gone over it several times based on your videos. No leaky caps! Everything else is as you describe. What really has me confused is my speaker cable is connected to the External input on the right. If I plug it into the main speaker jack on the left (when facing the back of the amp) I get low volume. It behaves as if those speaker jacks are reversed. It's odd behavior and I don't get it. What I also don't fully understand is how the pre-amp tube section works when you run an effects pedal (like HX Stomp) into the power amp in. I've always used my amp this way. I get that it bypass the pre-amp section (only the reverb knob works), but what are the pre-amp tubes actually doing? What does a combo tube amp like this physically need when you go through the effects loop?
repeat comment, I thought I was saving my tubes by not playing mine that much, but Im actually saving the caps hahahaha.. what happens if the white square box, next to the blue bias adjuster, moves.. my amp still works good, but I noticed it moves, Im thinking who ever biased the tubes, leaned the screw driver up against it.. do I have to take the green board off to solder it, or can I do a duct tape trick?
Hello. I have a problem with my HRD. the red 6L6 power tubes are getting red and the sound of the amplifier is very humming. I gave it to a technician for repair and he has a problem with this bias. I wonder what is the exact cause of the power tubes turning red. please help. Regards
Crazy world indeed, musicians are like magpies, drawn to the new shiny thing, the marketing guys in these big companies know this all too well. I'd rather listen to experience and a tech than the marketing guy..
Look into “Bartel Amps” tone king now is not what it used to be. If you want true quality for what the original tone king guy aimed for, the Bartel amps or perhaps top tier in quality today
You are def not inventing stuff ! lol. People need to listen. Ive seen soooo many of these amps with the exact problems you mention over and over and over again. I guess people will think theirs is fine until its not ;-)
Nonsense. Fenders from '53-'72 are fantastic amplifiers. And everyone back then pulled from the RCA and Westinghouse etc documentation. As good amp designers still do to this day.
Maybe the Fender company of today doesn’t make great decisions for the consumer. But they still seem to build good guitars, even if the amps suffer from building down to a price. I don’t think Leo would be happy about these Hot Rod series designs that are difficult to service, use some dubious components, and have known issues that are never corrected. But I can’t ask him.
@@PsionicAudio , Not just RCA and Westinghouse, but Western Electric circuits and schematics as well. The main difference, however, was that Western Electric patented as many of their circuit designs as they could, and other companies had to pay a licensing fee in order to use those circuits; whereas RCA and other companies that manufactured tubes would design circuits expressly to print and distribute them for free, circuits that would help them sell more of their tubes.
