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Another Red Flag On The Ampeg PF-500.....

#541
Bowe said:
+1

The various posting that keep bringing back the idea that all ECs are due to design flaws are getting tiresome, rev. J is the latest and that was a change to an op-amp (non-critical change, supply problem as I see it) a change to a cap in the PSU (no substantive changes that I can determine as my rev. G has the same value cap in it) and the most critical change of all -> to add fuse clips to the BOM.
Rev. H was a connector change - for the interconnect with the pre-amp, I doubt if any changes in H or J affected the reliability at all.

If you own an Ampeg amp and ask nicely (also agree not to divulge IP and accept responsibility for doing anything stupid inside) you can get for yourself a nice PDF package that has all the parts neatly drawn, plus order today and as an added bonus it comes with ECs and rev levels all detailed for your reviewing pleasure. :ninja: :hiding:

The EC and rev lists are part of the prints anyway so ...
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Posting personal assumptions is of no help. Did the ECO's list the reasons for the change, clear reasons are always spelled out on Engineering Change Orders.
 
#542
B-string said:
Posting personal assumptions is of no help. Did the ECO's list the reasons for the change, clear reasons are always spelled out on Engineering Change Orders.
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I'll have to disagree about what information an engineering change record on a schematic may contain. It has been my experience that the less competent the engineer, the less forthcoming the information regarding the nature of the change may be. I have written ECNs myself, and have always tried to be clear, and concise, but some schematic drawing templates, (AutoCAD, Pro-E) do not lend themselves to verbosity due to space limitations in the title blocks. The real story may only exist in the personal record that an engineer, (hopefully) keeps on any design.
 
#543
Sorry I took "it comes with ECs and rev levels all detailed for your reviewing pleasure." to mean they included the change orders which would not be approved without good reason given. Requesting a product change "cause I say so" will never fly. If he meant the Rev levels are mentioned with reference to the EC/ECO or ECN on the schematics without including those referenced documents then the reasons are left to strictly assumption.
 
#545
I am sure Loud Tech might choose to fire an engineer who posted everything a PF-500 owner would like to know about the change history, but maybe one of the "Mucky-Mucks" could get away with it without repercussions, (and be a hero to Loud Tech loyal customers). If they choose to ignore us, we can choose to ignore them in return. I've got no problem with that. If my P5-500 dies, and I can't fix it myself, I'll throw it in the recycling bin. If that is how it ends, there will be a persistent stink associated with them when it comes time to buy a new amp. I have sent the url of this thread to one of the Loud Tech marketing guys, so I hope they are lurking here. What say you, Loud Tech? We wait with bated breath to hear the truth about the failure analysis of early PF-500s, and design changes that corrected the problems us early owners may encounter. There is a lot of competition out there.
 
#546
P Town said:
I am sure Loud Tech might choose to fire an engineer who posted everything a PF-500 owner would like to know about the change history, but maybe one of the "Mucky-Mucks" could get away with it without repercussions, (and be a hero to Loud Tech loyal customers). If they choose to ignore us, we can choose to ignore them in return. I've got no problem with that. If my P5-500 dies, and I can't fix it myself, I'll throw it in the recycling bin. If that is how it ends, there will be a persistent stink associated with them when it comes time to buy a new amp. I have sent the url of this thread to one of the Loud Tech marketing guys, so I hope they are lurking here. What say you, Loud Tech? We wait with bated breath to hear the truth about the failure analysis of early PF-500s, and design changes that corrected the problems us early owners may encounter. There is a lot of competition out there.
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Wait, when did this happen and where can I read it?
 
#548
jmattbassplaya said:
Wait, when did this happen and where can I read it?
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You can't read it, because it was merely a personal message from me to a representative of the company.

I have been on the "hot seat' with customers myself, and I understand that Loud Tech is reluctant to acknowledge a problem, but their response will show what they are made of. If no response is forthcoming, a lesson for future Loud Tech customers may be learned.
 
#550
B-string said:
Sorry I took "it comes with ECs and rev levels all detailed for your reviewing pleasure." to mean they included the change orders which would not be approved without good reason given. Requesting a product change "cause I say so" will never fly. If he meant the Rev levels are mentioned with reference to the EC/ECO or ECN on the schematics without including those referenced documents then the reasons are left to strictly assumption.
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Oh come on, that post was written entirely within the context of humour, the prints do list the various ECs and components changed but I have never seen an entire ECN/ECO detailed on a print. This is also to address the assertion that a few were trying to make that all of the rev changes were to correct catastrophic design flaws.

Plus it doesn't take a rocket scientist (or an MIT educated EE PhD) to read what changed in a circuit to ascertain changes that lead to catastrophic failure and incremental changes that are minor improvements, help the bottom line or resolve a supply issue, but if changing the connector for the pre-amp interconnect is a resolution for catastrophic failures ...

Now to reverse the story, rev. D "add snubbers" to the output MOSFETs and rev. E "add FET buffers" aka drivers into the PA stage are IMHO substantive changes that could address actual or potential reliability issues. Please note that rev. E was issued in Feb. 2012.

I will say that there have been other changes that would be qualitative improvements that could have an impact on the muting issue but probably not on the catastrophic failure issue in the intervening rev levels, but that is an educated 'assumption.'

But I digress...
 
#551
P Town said:
I am sure Loud Tech might choose to fire an engineer who posted everything a PF-500 owner would like to know about the change history, but maybe one of the "Mucky-Mucks" could get away with it without repercussions, (and be a hero to Loud Tech loyal customers). If they choose to ignore us, we can choose to ignore them in return. I've got no problem with that. If my P5-500 dies, and I can't fix it myself, I'll throw it in the recycling bin. If that is how it ends, there will be a persistent stink associated with them when it comes time to buy a new amp. I have sent the url of this thread to one of the Loud Tech marketing guys, so I hope they are lurking here. What say you, Loud Tech? We wait with bated breath to hear the truth about the failure analysis of early PF-500s, and design changes that corrected the problems us early owners may encounter. There is a lot of competition out there.
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So you say your PF500 is working fine? Yes, I agree...time for the pitchforks and torches.
 
#555
Jimmy. My problem with Loud is that they would not answer questions regarding the changes made to the design that came after the schematic I have. My purpose was to see if there might be a simple update that I could do to bring my amp up to a later revision. I don't use my PF500 much, and when I do, it is mostly as a headphone amp. If one of the failures these amps are known to be prone to only happens while under significant load, and there is a known cause, and a known fix, I would like to have the information required to prevent it before it happens. Otherwise, I will always be worried that some day, my amp will break at the least convenient time. If Loud would tell owners what they have found to fail, and what design changes were implemented to prevent the failures, we could decide if we wanted to try to prevent a problem, or be ready with a replacement part on hand.

I'm not working right now, but in my last job, part of my duties involved performing warranty analysis on industrial equipment we built. We had customers who, (wisely) requested a failure analysis, and we would report what we found, and if possible say what we would do to prevent a recurrence of the failure. When a part that we purchased failed under warranty, we sometimes requested a failure analysis from the supplier. If a supplier would not, or could not provide a failure analysis, we would take that into account, and on occasion, we did decide to drop a supplier because they would not provide the information we requested. I had one manufacturer of a high tech motor controller tell me that our persistent request for a failure analysis forced them to find a design flaw, and improve the product.

I love my Ampeg, (and Mackie) gear, but I hate having something that I can't depend on. If there is something I can do to improve reliability, and they know about it, they should tell me about it. I'm a paying customer, who has bought a couple new Loud products in the last six months. Humor me.
 
#557
Roland GR 88 said:
Simple question.....as an Ampeg endorsing artist, how seriously can we take your comments regarding a product you're paid to advertise ?
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I'm paid to advertise it? Gee, where are all the checks?

And you can take them as seriously or non-seriously as you want. I really couldn't care one way or the other. People on here who know me know that I'm honest.
 
#558
Fair enough, but are you saying then that you purchase your gear at full pop and endorse it too ? Not trying to be an ass here but I thought endorsements fell into a "I'll scratch yours you scratch mine" kind of deal. Set me straight if I'm off base here please.
 
#559
Yeah, I get a discount. Now. Been an endorser for two years but I've used Ampeg amps since 1978. And they asked me. I didn't and still don't go around begging for endorsements. This notion of people with endorsements playing stuff they don't like just because they get a discount is ridiculous. Life's way too short to play crap gear just because of a discount.
 
#560
My 2nd Ampeg PF500 head, after a warranty exchange done in September of 2011, and matched with the original PF210HE cab I bought, is still kicking just fine. My first head had an issue with a non-working clip light in the preamp section, and the power amp section had an issue of not coming to volume until the preamp gain was around 1 to 2 o'clock, and the master volume was at 2 o'clock or more. By that, I mean a mid 80's Peavey Basic 40 single 12 combo could bury my first PF500 head volume wise, if the Peavey was dialed to noon on both the pre and master gain sections, in comparison to my first PF500 being set at noon on both of it's amp stages. My warranty exchanged second PF500 is working just fine at both small and big gigs either as an 8 ohm combo, or running at 4 ohms with my St. Louis Music era SVT15E as an extension cab, which does match well with no phasing issues. In fact, I used that rig on a large stage with a tap from the XLR into the more than adequate p.a. system provided for Omaha's Septemberfest back on labor day weekend Saturday, a nasty hot day, and the head held up just fine and sounded great, and I had more than enough stage volume to say the least, with no failures to report so far. I hope my good fortune continues, and my second try at the PF500 is a happy relationship for a good number of years to come.
 

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