What gives with QC/Design?

[Chuck H]

Verellen? Hadn't heard of that one. I'm going to look them up now. Should be a hoot now that I've seen the floating, solder reliant joints all over their build and the slip shod layout of a pre made curcuit kludged with their own. I'll bet they make a big noise about "Orange Drop caps!" in their propaganda.

[J M Fahey]

You bet.
Funny thing is that the fully unshielded 1/2 inch away Class D amp right along the high gain preamp will inject all kinds of ... um .... "interesting" signals into it.
IŽd LOVE to scope that preamp

As a side note, I bet they will win the "Coldest Shop on Earth" prize, since people is shown sitting at a workbench soldering parts while in thick jackets, stacked sweaters and long sleeve flannel shirts, plus woolen caps.
IŽd suggest them to carry a couple soldering irons in their pockets just as extra pocket warmers

[Justin Thomas]

No, they just cryo-treat all their builds for extra specially aligned crystal lattices in the tube and cap micas. And e gotta make sure all the solder atoms align the same way.

Justin

[Chuck H]

Here you go

[nickb]

But hey, seriously, once in a while the boutique big money amps make the cheap stuff actually look desirable. Recent verellen I got in . Quite a load of crap that I would guess cost $2000. Quite disgraceful

[ATTACH=CONFIG]49467[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]49468[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]49469[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]49470[/ATTACH]
outsourced class d power amp with their own rigged preamp

Edit: no idea why the first pic flipped itself upside down. That's the best one

Out of curiosity, what was used for a power supply in that?

[nsubulysses]

NickB, it is an outsourced class D power supply made by a brand called ICE

Fahey, yes it seems extremly unstable and oscillating/chirping. If you turn knobs while playing the signal will cut out and then cut back in again, not in a familiar way where there is a hanging-by-a-thread solder connection or dirty pot or something, it seems like some sort of interference or phase cancellation or something. I suggested I should not work on it to try to "right the ship" and the manufacturer should be forced to face their work again and sort it out.

It's like that story where the carpenter is too lazy so he builds a crappy house then has to live in it.

[nsubulysses]

When you try to play this amp into a dummy load its a big fuzzy sine wave on the screen and then when you get to a certain volume level it starts chirping and cutting in and out.

Is this some sort of problem with class D power supply being played into a dummy load, or is it just because the amp is totally unstable and full of weird noise?

[Justin Thomas]

A class D power supply? Do you mean Class D Power Amp section, or Class D power supply? It sounds like parasitic oscillations to me; I don't think a power "supply" should care what form of load it's plugged into, as its job is to transform voltages and rectify AC into DC.

I'm confused. Is this one of their "hybrid" ones with a tube preamp & SS power amp?

I checked out their website.

Justin

[Enzo]

The ICE boards are a combination of switching power supply and a class D power amp on one board.

At least without further information I see no reason to expect the commercial SMPS/power amp of instability rather than the cobble job preamp mess.

[nsubulysses]

Sorry I mispoke. yes Class D power AMP and the power supply is a switching supply. It has two power amps so it can do 700W each at 4 ohms. Run it stereo 700W per cab or mono bridged up to 1400W at 4 ohms.

[Chuck H]

Sorry I mispoke. yes Class D power AMP and the power supply is a switching supply. It has two power amps so it can do 700W each at 4 ohms. Run it stereo 700W per cab or mono bridged up to 1400W at 4 ohms.

OMG! (to use the parlance of our times)

Having visited the website myself... The other offerings already fly by the seat of their pants. What the hell is THIS monstrosity you have been charged with? It doesn't appear in the companies offerings. It wouldn't surprise me if the designer himself were using service techs to fix/troubleshoot problems in the designs before marketing. This thing sounds like a kludge. I wouldn't touch it.

JM2C

[Justin Thomas]

I'm guessing it's the Meatsmoke Hybrid head.

It's on the website. You not look very hard! :P

Justin

[hylaphone]

Thanks for bringing this up -- I'm flabbergasted by those pictures, especially after hearing buzz about these amps for a few years now.
I've used the 700W ICE module, and it's very thoughtfully designed. Seeing the pics, can't blame you for declining the repair.