Can you get good sound bridging 2 Classe CA-200s


I have had on-going issues with my Classe CA-200 amplifier's mosfet fuses blowing out driving my Thiel CS2.3s. The sound is excellent, however, after 40 to 60 minutes the amplifier gets hot and the fuses blow. (I do play music loud). One reasonably economical solution would be to find another used CA-200 and bridge the amplifers to double the power. Will this work? Will the sound be as good? Has anyone tried this. Thanks!
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Showing 4 responses by gbart

I agree with the above. It is probably a good idea to get the amp checked out. It should not be blowing mosfet fuses repeatedly like that. Is the amp adequately ventilated ? Is your CA-200 a rear or side heatsink version ? I have a CA-300 (biased to factory recommended setting by yours truly) and it never gets hot driving my PSB Stratus Gold i's, which drop to around 2.7 ohms in the midbass.

A CA-300 would give you a little more headroom at about 50% of the cost of a second CA-200. Similarly, you could sell the CA-200 and get a CA-400 for roughly the same as a pair of CA-200s.
As stated above, for many years I have been running Classé with speakers that drop below 3 ohms, also have quite severe phase angle, and never had a failure.
Since I service my own amps, I've had quite a bit of back and forth with Classé tech support. I am reminded in an old e-mail message from them I have archived, that "in response to reports by some owners that amps were running too hot", they lowered the recommended bias setting for the CA-series amps. It is probably best to contact the factory to discuss the amp issues.
*You can get a technician to check the bias for you. Its not difficult to do but if you're not careful, a slip of a test probe can cause expensive damage. If you need the service manual, send me a PM and I will reply with a copy.

*IMO, the AC supply should not be causing the issues you're experiencing.

*"DC coupled" means having no capacitors in the signal path. A DC coupled preamp or amp will pass/amplify DC. This can be a problem if for example a source component or preamp has high DC offset. The amp will amplify that DC and pass it to your speakers, which can damage them if the DC level is high enough. Many/most modern amps have DC protection circuitry that will open an output relay in the event of severe DC offset. IMO, high DC offset should not be blowing your mosfet fuses. The CA-200 has protection circuitry for that purpose.