Phase Linear 700 & 400 series II


There isn’t much not to love about theses amps. Clean accurate linear signal reproduction. Transparent latency output signal. If they do fail they are very easy to repair. We use to joke that it took longer to get off the shelf and take it apart then to get it back working. Usually an output or two a driver and sometimes a pre-driver along with a diode. The units rarely smoked and if they did they still where an easy fix. Biggest repair mistake was substitution of output and driver components then what was original. Can not be mixed up or blow up. Simple series II repair is to stick with Motorola NpN 15024 and PnP 15025 compliments. Use good heat sink compound or good TO-3 wafers. Watch for stressed PCB wires solder joints to the PL-36 driver board. Make those repair by just doing a complete re-solder to all wire connections. Watch for manufacture solder donut holes at capacitors legs. The old wiggle test with a magnified glass worked well. Check for over heated or discolored emitter resistors at on the main heat sink plane. If you have access to a 10 AMP Variac device using an analog meter at the outputs slowly bring up the amp after repairs and watch for excessive fast load draw. The slow power up should be very smooth and minute amp draw on the meter needle. If you have a dummy load rated up to 8Ω @ 400 watts you may bring the amp to the the rated voltage and perform a current sharing test on each bank. Just saying.
ksaldutti
"Rarely smoked?" The electronic repair industry
nicknamed them, "FLAME LINEARS."
BTW: That was not just a personal opinion: ie: (http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/old-phase-linear-equipment.140038/) (http://www.audioheritage.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?25317-Phase-Linear-700)
The Phase Linear 400 may of had some problems but it was one
of the best sounding amps, tube or solid state, in the mid
seventies.