Peavey VTM 60...Lost Heaters?

[Just Mike]

This amp was sitting in somebody's garage for years. I replaced the 6l6 output tubes, cleaned the pots and fired it up. The high gain channel didn't work. Well, it was real weak and sounded really bad. So I snooped around and found that the plate resistor on V1a was open. I replaced the filter caps and the 100K 1w plate resistor, in fact I replaced 6 of them. I plugged it in and turned on the power switch and no tube glow on any of the tubes. When I pull the tubes and turn it on, I have 6.3VAC where I should. Any Ideas?
Thanks in advance.

[The Dude]

If you found an open plate resistor, it probably opened for a reason- i.e. a shorted tube. Try pulling that tube out and see what happens. Also, you told us what the filament voltage is with no tubes installed- with the tubes installed, what happens to your filament voltage?

[Gtr_tech]

The ribbon cables on these and several other PV amps have been a subject of discussion here every so often. Resolder the header connectors at both sides and make sure there are no burned sections on the cable ends. Replace the contacts if they are damaged.

Really, the way to bulletproof these is to eliminate the cables altogether and hardwire them. Remove the headers and solder wires from one board to the other. You'll not have heater problems after that.

[Just Mike]

The ribbon cables on these and several other PV amps have been a subject of discussion here every so often. Resolder the header connectors at both sides and make sure there are no burned sections on the cable ends. Replace the contacts if they are damaged.

Really, the way to bulletproof these is to eliminate the cables altogether and hardwire them. Remove the headers and solder wires from one board to the other. You'll not have heater problems after that.

We have a winner!
Although it wasn't the ribbon cable from the PSU board to the pre board, it was actually the Molex connector to the 6.3v winding on the xfmr.

Dude- My bad on the original post...I just measured the AC voltage right off of the xfmr. But you got me to thinking-it's just the heater voltage, not much to the circuit. So i checked the continuity between the heater fuse and the other side of the heater winding and got nada...had to be the connector.

Thanks for the quick responses!

This amp sounds pretty darned good. I'm now going to put in a buffered fx loop (a kit that I bought from Iron Works a while back) and if it works as I hope, I'm bringing this rock monster to the gig tomorrow night.