problems with CJ's Premier 140 ? anyone


There's a Cj 140 offered @ audiogon at atttractive price & I'm thinking about it.
I did read numerous post about this amp having problems with tubes blowing up & bias resistors going out of whack. Anyone here with this particular amp having problems with these symptons ?

Whats the real score on this amp ? I heard its being discontinued. So short of a production. Makes me wonder.

Perhaps someone here can shed some light on this matter.

Thanks for inputs & much appreciated!
128x128mid40sguy

Showing 2 responses by jtimothya

Both posters in the referenced threads are overseas from US one in Ireland, one in Philippines , so likely 240v which means some different parts from NA - don't know if that makes a difference. Lew Johnson responding to the one fellow seems significant. CJ does sell alot of amps - anyone who does will have some problem cases. Of course asking around as you're doing cannot hurt.

I see eight 140 owners in AA Inmate Systems. Perhaps you could e-mail some of them for their experience? People whose gear works fine tend not to post msgs. to that effect, so you may not find threads that will prove a negative, ie. not unreliable. Is the used 140 still under warranty? Maybe the seller can share the serial # and you can check with CJ if it was every under repair. Cheers!
Absolutely zero problems. I've been using a Premier 140 since November of 2003. Every day it proves reliable and sounds great. The 140 is more neutral, faster, and refined than the Premier 12s that it succeeded, yet it remains unmistakenly a CJ. In contrast, it is not as slow, warm, or blurry as the Premier 8 or 12 - those still being great amps. The 140 represents a wonderful combination of control, finesse, and mid-to-lower bottom-end authority.

For the past decade CJ had a 70 watt amp and a 120-140 watt amp or monos in their Premier lineup. There was no comparable smaller amp to the 140. I think they wanted to get back in sync and went ahead with the LP70S and LP140M gear. Same push-pull architecture they've been using for a long while, but as Fjn04 notes, with Teflon caps - those do add to the price. And I also agree with him that your choice should consider your systems preamp and speakers. That said, a used 140 should hold its value quite well.

And fwiw, it may be discontinued, but today it is still listed among current models on the CJ web site. Can you please post a link to the "numerous post" you mention?

Good luck with your amplifier search.