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Rumble 200 turned out to be eggshell fragile

#43
Lowandfat said:
So far the vote in this thread that the 210 Rumble 500 sounds weak is 2-1, and I am not "lashing out". When I test drove the Rumble 500, having owned both a 12 and a 15 Rumble, it farted out at an embarrassingly low SPL, and had none of the beef or warmth of the other two combos. There are thousands who rave about Hartke Transporter 210s, too, but "use what I use, it's awesome!" is not always the best advice.
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I didn’t know we were voting. I love the Rumble 500c. It is anything but weak.
 
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#49
JakobT said:
All circuit boards are brittle, and if they have connectors soldered directly onto them, this sort of thing can happen. It’s probably true that using onboard connectors is one of the ways Fender manages to hit a certain price point, but all products have weaknesses and vulnerabilities, and it doesn’t mean they’re bad products as such.

Fender probably judged the chance of something hitting that jack in just that way was small enough that it was a worthwhile trade-off to save a few cents by soldering it directly onto the board, and they’d be right. You were just very unlucky. Commiserations, by the way. Hope you get it sorted.
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PaulCISSA said:
Jacking ports soldered on boards always seemed sketchy to me since the practice first started. It makes all kinds of sense from the production perspective and even more so from the “outsourcing” perspective. But you can’t take away the fact that any externally facing port, especially a 1/4” jack, will take more user cycles than most other board-mounted components. Failure rate is guaranteed to be greater. I still believe in vibration/movement isolation.

I’m not surprised the board shattered from the impact, as light as it may have been. PCB’s are thinner, lighter, cheaper and not made from the same materials/resins used just a decade ago. Traces are thinner and durability suffers. Add the road-wear and stuff is gonna break.

Would love to see you do a Frankenstein thread so the collective can stay entertained. Regardless, hope you get it sorted.
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PCBs are not "brittle" or "fragile" if the designer chooses better quality materials. .062" FR-4 material, double sided with plated holes is amazingly robust. Traces do not have to be thin nor do pads have to be small of the designer prioritizes their layout for robustness.

A well designed, well laid out, well constructed PCB based amp is generally more reliable and robust than a hand wired amp, especially when built point to point. Not by a small margin either.
 
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#50
Lowandfat said:
A small PA cab slid into the back of my Rumble 200 and BARELY nicked the extension speaker jack. From 5ft you can't even tell it's been touched. Well, that Rumble 200 is now a paperweight. That tiny blow that didn't even cause any cosmetic damage, cracked the freaking board rendering it totally DOA. My tech said the stuff in there is such low quality mass stamped crap, he is surprised any of them work for more than a few months. I know many have had them last years, and I had no other issues, but I am not making this up. A ding to the extension speaker jack rendered the combo land fill.

Sob story over, my mission begins today. I'm going to reload it with a Kappalite 3015, remove the now-worthless electric guts, and use the bracket from a Genz-Benz Shuttle combo to attach a Shuttle 6.0 to the top, creating the first 33lb 15 combo that is 300w and can handle an 8ohm extension speaker for 600w. I know this will take some cab tuning that is beyond my math skills, but I have a good friend that is going to do the removal for me who will do all that measurin' and cipherin'.

Thoughts?
Suggestions?
Don't do its?
Other speaker suggestions?
Who wants one?
Click to expand...

<A small PA cab slid into the back of my Rumble 200...>

Sorry but I'm going to be frank here. Okay? If I have misinterpreted what happened, hopefully you can apply the basic idea of what I'm going to say to the actual situation. There is no way you could have properly packed your Rumble 200 for transport and had that happen. You subjected your Rumble 200 to extreme abuse, and now you and your tech are blaming the Rumble 200 when something probably not all that "small" slid into it? Your not being realistic, brother. Items gain inertia when moving. It's like they become heavier. Your so called "small PA cab" became a battering ram once it started moving. That's why you must pack your gear properly for cartage. Don't leave space between your components, and make sure they are secure and won't move around. Including while you are loading and unloading. You have to be careful.

It was a freak accident, what happened. The so called "ding" in the extension speaker jack happened because the jack absorbed the full force of what was no doubt a considerable impact. What did you expect? I think the printed circuit board cracked because the extension speaker jack is probably soldered directly to the circuit board, meaning you might as well have struck your circuit board with a very, very large hammer. This manufacturing technique is not at all uncommon, and is used by many manufacturers. It works fine as long as you don't abuse your gear, like you did by not packing it / handling it properly.

Now you know better than to leave space between various components in your pack when transporting your gear, and also, to take care components don't slide into each other in the process of loading and unloading. Packing your gear properly is a skill everybody has to learn. You just learned something the hard way, that's all. Sorry about that. Believe me, I know the feeling! Now you know you have to put some thought into how you pack your gear and how you handle it on stage.

Not that you asked, but if it was me, I would just repair the amp you have. Good luck with your frankenamp, though. Sounds like a fun project if you have money like that to spend on something that may not work as well as what you already have. The same thing is going to happen to the frankenamp, though, if you don't pack it properly for transport and take care of it in use. Just saying. Good luck.

Edit: I originally said that hard wired amps are more reliable than their PCB counterparts, but I deleted that when I saw Agedhorse's comment. It's probably more reliable if the jacks are not soldered directly to the PCB, I would think. Maybe not, though. I'm not a manufacturer.
 
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#53
buldog5151bass said:
Rumbles are good sounding amps at a low price. There will be trade-offs. But this is one more reason I prefer a separate head over a combo.
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I owned a Rumble 100 for a few years. It was a great amp for band rehearsals and playing around the house. I had no issues with it. But.... Would I take it on the road? Probably not. It was so light. It just didn’t feel solid at all.
 
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#54
Never had any issues with my Rumble 500 combo nor did it ever seem boxy or have bad tone. A fellow musician got "Gold" coverage on his gear after a fatal gear mishap and never had to use it as it wards off all "final destination" forces that trash gear.
 
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#55
Nevada Pete said:
<A small PA cab slid into the back of my Rumble 200...>

Sorry but I'm going to be frank here. Okay? If I have misinterpreted what happened, hopefully you can apply the basic idea of what I'm going to say to the actual situation. There is no way you could have properly packed your Rumble 200 for transport and had that happen. You subjected your Rumble 200 to extreme abuse, and now you and your tech are blaming the Rumble 200 when something probably not all that "small" slid into it? Your not being realistic, brother. Items gain inertia when moving. It's like they become heavier. Your so called "small PA cab" became a battering ram once it started moving. That's why you must pack your gear properly for cartage. Don't leave space between your components, and make sure they are secure and won't move around. Including while you are loading and unloading. You have to be careful.

It was a freak accident, what happened. The so called "ding" in the extension speaker jack happened because the jack absorbed the full force of what was no doubt a considerable impact. What did you expect? I think the printed circuit board cracked because the extension speaker jack is probably soldered directly to the circuit board, meaning you might as well have struck your circuit board with a very, very large hammer. This manufacturing technique is not at all uncommon, and is used by many manufacturers. It works fine as long as you don't abuse your gear, like you did by not packing it / handling it properly.

Now you know better than to leave space between various components in your pack when transporting your gear, and also, to take care components don't slide into each other in the process of loading and unloading. Packing your gear properly is a skill everybody has to learn. You just learned something the hard way, that's all. Sorry about that. Believe me, I know the feeling! Now you know you have to put some thought into how you pack your gear and how you handle it on stage.

Not that you asked, but if it was me, I would just repair the amp you have. Good luck with your frankenamp, though. Sounds like a fun project if you have money like that to spend on something that may not work as well as what you already have. The same thing is going to happen to the frankenamp, though, if you don't pack it properly for transport and take care of it in use. Just saying. Good luck.

Edit: I originally said that hard wired amps are more reliable than their PCB counterparts, but I deleted that when I saw Agedhorse's comment. It's probably more reliable if the jacks are not soldered directly to the PCB, I would think. Maybe not, though. I'm not a manufacturer.
Click to expand...


I am not even going to bother to read that, because you obviously haven't even bothered to read the thread. Lighten up Francis.
 
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#56
And...we have reached the point in the thread where people commenting haven't even read it. "Here! Let me talk down to you about points that have already been addressed, and act like things you've said aren't true, because I am ever so smart." Yes, some things shifted in the back of the band van causing the damage. It's not a prom dress, and I have no plans to leave it home to protect it. It took a VERY minor glancing blow and turned into landfill. How it happened is moot, but thanks for the judgement. Fixing the amp would cost far more than it's worth. The egos on this board never cease to amaze, witness the screed supplied above.
 
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#57
Lowandfat said:
A small PA cab slid into the back of my Rumble 200 and BARELY nicked the extension speaker jack. From 5ft you can't even tell it's been touched. Well, that Rumble 200 is now a paperweight. That tiny blow that didn't even cause any cosmetic damage, cracked the freaking board rendering it totally DOA. My tech said the stuff in there is such low quality mass stamped crap, he is surprised any of them work for more than a few months. I know many have had them last years, and I had no other issues, but I am not making this up. A ding to the extension speaker jack rendered the combo land fill.

Sob story over, my mission begins today. I'm going to reload it with a Kappalite 3015, remove the now-worthless electric guts, and use the bracket from a Genz-Benz Shuttle combo to attach a Shuttle 6.0 to the top, creating the first 33lb 15 combo that is 300w and can handle an 8ohm extension speaker for 600w. I know this will take some cab tuning that is beyond my math skills, but I have a good friend that is going to do the removal for me who will do all that measurin' and cipherin'.

Thoughts?
Suggestions?
Don't do its?
Other speaker suggestions?
Who wants one?
Click to expand...


Rumbles have a pretty good rep.

You had a freak accident.

Admittedly, having the jack mounted to the board and not the chassis caused this.

Talkbass members could probably give you a ton of freak accidents that had both lessons and a partial fix to keep from occurring.

I only use right angle jacks on amps to keep wires from comingbout straight and having its own weight pulling on the jack and solder connections, but that is me.

Sucks, by the way, what happened.
 
#59
rashrader said:
It wasn't a transport accident.... Did you read the thread?
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Did you?

From the OP, "Yes, some things shifted in the back of the band van causing the damage."

"A small PA cab slid into the back of my Rumble 200"
"a second cab of similar size/weight grazed one single jack on the back of it."
"an 18lb micro monitor literally grazed the external nut"

I'm not sure how this is NOT a transport accident. ;)
 
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#60
Some settling of contents occurred during shipping, lol. No one posting at this point has read the thread. They read the OP, and head for the end to tell me my well regarded tech doesnt' know his business, and I shouldn't bash Fender for the freak occurrence I called a freak occurrence, and also I should fix it anyway. To them I say, thanks for playing.
 
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