Amplifones - recommended to replace flybacks no matter what?

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Amplifones - recommended to replace flybacks no matter what?

I'll be working on one soon. Doesn't look fried (although a transistor on the board blew up). Wasn't sure if a new flyback is always necessary (like on the G07 and most K7000's) or as needed (as most others). I plan to do the recommended upgrades in the FAQ.

This will be my first Amplifone to work on...
 
Red is dead, is the old motto

I have always replaced them

I'll be working on one soon. Doesn't look fried (although a transistor on the board blew up). Wasn't sure if a new flyback is always necessary (like on the G07 and most K7000's) or as needed (as most others). I plan to do the recommended upgrades in the FAQ.

This will be my first Amplifone to work on...

Which transistor blew up?

This is a cheat sheet for the mods

 
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I don't think the monitor will give you a choice. If its red and still working, it probably will not be for very long.

Now the question I would want to know is how good are the current repro flybacks. Are the original wintrons better? I think there are 2 generations of wintrons. How do they compare.
 
Red is dead, is the old motto

I have always replaced them



Which transistor blew up?

This is a cheat sheet for the mods


Thank you dezbaz! I'm about to rebuild 5 amplifones I have and I was reading the modification but this visual is a GREAT help! Thank you so much!

-Grant
 
Red is dead, is the old motto

I have always replaced them



Which transistor blew up?

This is a cheat sheet for the mods


Red as in the flyback or the board color?

Here's one board:

20130208_094249_zps77b43602.jpg


Here's the other:

20130208_094308_zpsb001551c.jpg


And the blown transistor:

20130208_094347_zps0297ae60.jpg
 
It has a wintron so don't replace it unless it isn't working. If it was red then you would replace it no matter what. I don't care what anyone says, Wintrons are better than the new repro's but the new repros will still work.
Looks like something shorted and caused that transistor to go boom. Might as well order a BU406D too because chances are it's going to be bad.
 
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It has a wintron so don't replace it unless it isn't working. If it was red then you would replace it no matter what. I don't care what anyone says, Wintrons are better than the new repro's but the new repros will still work.
Looks like something shorted and caused that transistor to go boom. Might as well order a BU406D too because chances are it's going to be bad.

agreed...Wintron is what you have on there already and not the original RED fly. keep it on there and work around it. someone has already tried fixing it if it has that Wintron on it!

yes order a couple BU406D also....i blew several before i got it installed right :(
 
And you have to take what that FAQ says with a grain of salt. Like "black is bulletproof". I totally rebuilt a HV board once, and when i say totally rebuilt, i mean i changed out almost every part on the board and it still did not work. I finally got down to the point where it HAD to be the HV transformer, i pulled the wintron, put on a new one and it worked. The FAQ is good if you have never worked on one before, but i can't say I agree with all of it. If you do a good job on the rebuild and are thorough, you should not need that diode mod. Better off spending your time removing and reinstalling the harness and moving the 50 ohm resistors to the heat sink so they don't cook everything.
 
I mainly was going to use the FAQ for the recommended "upgrade" parts. And then if I have any issues afterwards...
 
I have one of the Pentranics and it is bad. I'm planning on using the new repros to replace it. Glad i didn't pay $400 for a Wintron. (Seems to me that is what they were asking at one point)
 
That "transisitor" is labeled "VR" on the board, which means Voltage Regulator. I suspect something went to ground somewhere on your board, or went open.

Be careful. Unless you find what let the smoke out, it's likely to strike again.
 
That "transisitor" is labeled "VR" on the board, which means Voltage Regulator. I suspect something went to ground somewhere on your board, or went open.

Be careful. Unless you find what let the smoke out, it's likely to strike again.

This isn't my first monitor repair. Just my first Amplifone. I'll be going over everything during the rebuild...
 
I got my Star Wars back in 2001 but did not get it working until 2002. That's when I bought my WinTron. It had very few hours on it when it decided to take a crap which I think was around 2008. In 2011 I ordered a new white replacement from Bob Roberts and it's been working great ever sense. So a WinTron can fail. The picture is the WinTron next to my original red is dead.

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