What do you offer in a service?

[bassetrox]

Hi guys

Hope I've posted this in the right place.

For about a year I've been doing repairs alongside my full time R&D job. One of the things I offer is a 'service' and at various times I've taken this to mean various things, including biasing output stage, valve checking, replacing all reservoir caps, replacing bias cap, checking all signal paths, checking for loose or dry connections.

Just wondered what those of you who make money as a tech include in your service. I have a separate service charge - the equivalent of two hours of my normal repair labour time but sometimes end up spending considerably longer.

Thanks in advance for your help.

R.

EDIT:

I guess what I'm saying is that I'm comfortable finding problems and fixing them, but I'm not sure what a reasonable level of preventative action is to give good value for a customer without wasting my time. My gut reaction is an 'if it ain't broke' philosophy - but people like to have their kit looked for peace of mind at even when there's no actual problem - I want to give them good value.

[Bruce / Mission Amps]

Wasting time:
I frequently run well over my 30 mins to 2 hour shop time on average repairs and just consider it nonchargeable time... mostly for my peace though. I hate come backs.
I always give my advice on status and the possibility of a problem at a later date.

[diydidi]

Hi. What I do is see the "service" part of a job, as seperate from the actual repair.
This icludes replacing missing knobs/ screws, checking for dry joints, retensioning tube sockets and cleaning of all controls/ switches. If it is a solid state power amp I will even measure the max RMS into various loads and write it down on a sticky placed on the amp somewhere. Customers love this.
Just my 2cents

[bassetrox]

Thanks Bruce, diydidi,

My standard is to bias the amp, check pots for crackles and clean if needed, check connectors and clean or replace if needed, check for cooked looking screen grid resistors and bulging or leaky caps, clean valve bases and then check all signal paths.

I'll record the power delivery into 4R too, though just into that one load, unlike diydidi.

I guess my main question is whether there is anything that you guys who've been doing this for ages (rather than on and off since 2010 like me...) would replace as a matter of course? Or if there's anything else you guys think I should do as standard?

I'm not really worried about running over 30mins here or there, but I wouldn't want to be doing anything unnecessary like replacing perfectly fine caps either, as I don't think it's in the customer's interests.

Thoughts?

[Bruce / Mission Amps]

I do this to most all amps but especially if I have older amps such as a 60's-70's Fender amps, which are still VERY popular gigging amps here in Denver...
I will almost always replace the bias filter cap with a new one, (bad deal if it fails or allows some ripple or not enough negative voltage...and a cheap security repair), then check all the main filter caps for venting or puked ends, check for AC ripple on the center of the OT, clean ALL the pots, including the bias pot, then relube them, loosen and then re-tighten the input jacks to insure good ground into the brass plate, run a de-burring stick through their contacts, check the idle current of the power tubes and if needed, adjust to a reasonable level and then run a 100mvac signal into all channels to see on my scope what the max clean output power is into a "dummy load" of the correct impedance.
Then plug the speaker load in and see how it sounds.
If the clean output power it isn't within 75%-80% of what it should be, I'll tell my customer to consider a new set of power tubes and if the Hi-V caps are crappy, I tell them I can't really fix the amp to be reliable and or of a "gigable" status unless they replace all the electrolytic caps too.
Again this is part of my peace of mind.... but, it's 100% their fault if they don't do what I recommend and there is no warranty repairs or labor discounts if anything else fails that I did not replace and or if they ignore my recommendations.

[bassetrox]

I will almost always replace the bias filter cap with a new one, (bad deal if it fails or allows some ripple or not enough negative voltage...and a cheap security repair), then check all the main filter caps for venting or puked ends, check for AC ripple on the center of the OT

Thanks for the helpful thoughts Bruce.

R