amp I bought 3 days ago not powering on - electrical engineer advice wanted

@goodlistening64 

Thank you!

I understand some of it. It's very educational! 

1) when I unhook the speakers, it ALWAYS turns on

2) I opened it, no leakage, or visible damage. 

First I would like to make progress with this before I think about another amp but thank you!

@ervikingo 

I don't think I am the unluckiest. I like to try a fair amount of new (used) amps so it's part of the game that I will buy old (once pricey) equipment with some parts nearing the end of their life. Is this a good strategy? Probably not the best. Also "pricey" for me is over a $1000 so that explains the other half, buying from limited funds will lead to bad decisions and "just hoping". The third half is that I am not good with keeping things in perfect shape although I do the best I can with audio. 

@zarf

 exactly, I am not complaining.  It's unfortunate to have to deal with broken equipment but still, I am happy to have enjoyed so many different gear and learned a lot. 

If it doesn't start when speakers are hooked up because it goes into protection mode, but does start when there are no speakers hooked up, try hooking up one speaker to try it to nail it down to see which L or R channel is bad. 

Then, if you find one channel to be "good", switch to the other channels speaker wire to see if it may just be the speaker wire, or the wire is touching something in the path, or you have mistakenly reversed red/black. 

It is also possible one of your speakers is damaged, which could cause the protection mode, so don't forget to rule that out at some point. 

At this point I’d try an exorcist or a local shaman.