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Manley Chinook - chronic issues

I’ve had this Chinook that I purchased from Upscale in September, it has no time on it. I have not enjoyed a single record at this point. I have been plagued by chronic static and popping issues. It is defiantly the Chinook as I have used other sources and a different preamp with no issues. There seems to be a constant crackle pop on all vinyl and now to add insult to injury the Chinook made 4 loud bangs back to back tonight and it really worried me so I shut down the system. These were not dirty vinyl click or pops but loud bangs.

I had narrowed down that one of the tubes on the output channel was bad, and it was replaced. Yet the issues continue and now have progressed with the loud bang. I also have a loud "fuzz" noise coming through the right channel. At this point I swapped the left input channel to the right and the "fuzz" noise flipped to the left channel. More bad tubes?

I can’t deal with this preamp anymore, what was suppose to be a get away has turned into nothing but constant stress.
Bad tubes? Bad board?


lps4eloise
tkr
100 posts
 
Check your earthing connections. I had a similar problem with my Manley Steelhead, and the solution was to connect everything really tightly to one single earthing point. 
lewm
13,025 posts
 
tkr, Are you sure your problem was like that described by the OP? Because his problem does not at all sound as simple as a grounding problem really is. What he describes seems most likely due to a bad solder joint or a defective diode or transistor or op amp, somewhere.
tbromgard
814 posts
 
I have a chinook and it’s been trouble free. Your issue sounds like bad tubes to me. Maybe it’s overloading with incorrect settings? But you switched tubes and the distortion switched too. That’s a sure sign of a bad tube. Contact Kevin or buy some new tubes I say. 
markum01
125 posts
 
I would definitely contact Manley Labs . When I owned one of their products they were always very helpful and prompt return calls.
I never had a horror story like you are describing they were just very helpful.
Usually Evana will return a call.
I know it sucks when you have a component that has issues and you feel helpless.
Hope you have happier listening in the near future.
Mark
lps4eloise OP
11 posts
 
Thanks for the replies. Didn’t mean to come of complaining just frustrated. I thought I had made progress to find I had not. I talked with Paul from Manley and I've been in communication with both Upscale and Manley, and to be honest VPI and SoundSmith for awhile.  It took a lot to narrow this down and to be quite frank, I don’t have time for it. I wish I did, but I have other demands that can’t be ignored and when I get a chance I work on this little by little, so I seek advice along the way.

Paul was helpful and agreed it needs to go in.
Fingers crossed. Friend is loaning me a PS Audio phono so I will experience a bit of solid state in my chain. Must say though, that Herron seems interesting too.
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