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Manley Chinook - chronic issues

I’ve had this Chinook that I purchased from Upscale in September, it has no time on it. I have not enjoyed a single record at this point. I have been plagued by chronic static and popping issues. It is defiantly the Chinook as I have used other sources and a different preamp with no issues. There seems to be a constant crackle pop on all vinyl and now to add insult to injury the Chinook made 4 loud bangs back to back tonight and it really worried me so I shut down the system. These were not dirty vinyl click or pops but loud bangs.

I had narrowed down that one of the tubes on the output channel was bad, and it was replaced. Yet the issues continue and now have progressed with the loud bang. I also have a loud "fuzz" noise coming through the right channel. At this point I swapped the left input channel to the right and the "fuzz" noise flipped to the left channel. More bad tubes?

I can’t deal with this preamp anymore, what was suppose to be a get away has turned into nothing but constant stress.
Bad tubes? Bad board?


lps4eloise
lps4eloise OP
11 posts
 
Thanks for the replies. Didn’t mean to come of complaining just frustrated. I thought I had made progress to find I had not. I talked with Paul from Manley and I've been in communication with both Upscale and Manley, and to be honest VPI and SoundSmith for awhile.  It took a lot to narrow this down and to be quite frank, I don’t have time for it. I wish I did, but I have other demands that can’t be ignored and when I get a chance I work on this little by little, so I seek advice along the way.

Paul was helpful and agreed it needs to go in.
Fingers crossed. Friend is loaning me a PS Audio phono so I will experience a bit of solid state in my chain. Must say though, that Herron seems interesting too.
lewm
12,432 posts
 
"Paul was helpful and agreed it needs to go in."Eureka!  No amount of verbal exchange is going to illuminate the source and the solution for your problem.  You need an experienced tech, preferably one who designed the unit and/or works on them regularly, to figure this out.  Good luck.
phill55's avatar
phill55
138 posts
 
I purchased the same Chinook phono pre-amp from Upscale Audio with 0 problems and around 200 hours use. Defintely take it back to them as they are very good and honorable. If you bought it 2nd hand, I would definitely go back to the seller and ask them to pay for repairs. As for the Herron, great phono pre-amp but lacked in flexibility to load different cartridges. Just my opinion. Good luck and don't fret....once you get this problem fixed you will be listening to hours and hours of pure pleasurable, 3 dimensional and musically accurate music !
zkidd
101 posts
 
Good advice from phill55. No matter the piece, be it solid state or tubed, anything man makes, breaks. No exceptions. I have a neighbor who is a mechanical engineer and damn near a genius, and he calls any with some type of electrical engineering "black magic" and it scares the crap out of him! I do understand your frustration as I had a CJ preamp that died on me twice within six months, both times repaired by CJ to the tune of a lot of money. The second failure was within six months of CJ having done the first repair and they never even offered to help with the cost of the second repair, and they said they only warrantied their repairs for 90 days. Now that made me want to sell the piece, and I did, but that said, it was only after the second failure that I got frustrated. I think Manley is way above board on their business ethics and all so I am willing to bet that once the Chinook is back and running as it can you will be very pleased.
moofoo
286 posts
 
I bought a used Chinook a few years ago from a dealer (not Upscale) and have rolled tubes, used MM and MI carts, different loading and gain settings and never had a problem. I also had an inexpensive resistor fail in a brand new, modified preamp once like zkidd. It caused crackling just like a bad tube and after troubleshooting sent the unit back for a quick repair. After talking with the preamp builder and sending them an audio file of the noise the unit made and detailing my trouble shooting they were extremely appreciative of my effort and repair was very rapid. The was first only occasional. Hang in there. Manley and Upscale are both great companies and very responsive.
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