Hmm, I have an active RCF speaker in for repair with a faulty SMPS. ART
745A, retail around £1000.

Tried lots of things, the SMPS sparked up on Variac plus inline lightbulb,
but obviously drew lots of current on startup, and thus continually shut
down.

Mosfets removed and good, all secondary diodes removed but still same
problem, seems it is a primary side fault, maybe transformer.


Phoned RCF UK today, and they want £320 odd or so, probably plus 20% tax and
2 lots of shipping, to repair the unit, as it is out of warranty.

This to me sounds like blatant profiteering.

I mean, that SMPS PCB can't cost more than several dollars bought in bulk,
so the £300 plus must surely be a money making exercise for repairing their
own stuff that has broken because it is not good enough not to break in the
first place.

Suffice to say I am not impressed, and would never advise anyone to buy RCF,
even though I have done in the past.




Gareth.

"Gareth Magennis" wrote in message ...

I mean, that SMPS PCB can't cost more than several dollars bought
in bulk, so the £300 plus must surely be a money making exercise
for repairing their own stuff that has broken because it is not good
enough not to break in the first place.

The cost to RCF of a switching power supply for a sound-reinforcement speaker
has to be considerably more than a couple of dollars.

That said... many companies feel that their service departments should be
profit centers (rather than just breaking even), and don't care whether the
customer is happy. From my warped, anti-capitalistic point of view, a business
is entitled to only one profit on a sale.

"Gareth Magennis" wrote in message
...

Hmm, I have an active RCF speaker in for repair with a faulty SMPS. ART
745A, retail around £1000.

Tried lots of things, the SMPS sparked up on Variac plus inline lightbulb,
but obviously drew lots of current on startup, and thus continually shut
down.

Mosfets removed and good, all secondary diodes removed but still same
problem, seems it is a primary side fault, maybe transformer.


Phoned RCF UK today, and they want £320 odd or so, probably plus 20% tax
and 2 lots of shipping, to repair the unit, as it is out of warranty.


Welcome to the world of RCF. We've had so much trouble with schematics and
spares and extortionate repair fees that any that come through the door for
repair now, just get turned around and marched straight back out again ...

Arfa



Gareth.

"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message ...

"Gareth Magennis" wrote in message ...

I mean, that SMPS PCB can't cost more than several dollars bought
in bulk, so the £300 plus must surely be a money making exercise
for repairing their own stuff that has broken because it is not good
enough not to break in the first place.

The cost to RCF of a switching power supply for a sound-reinforcement
speaker
has to be considerably more than a couple of dollars.





Well, I said "several", not "a couple", and kind of exaggerated to make the
point, as one does.....


The point being, they seem unwilling to sell you a new or exchange PCB, but
would rather make the £320 for presumably just replacing the PCB themselves.




Don't know why I am getting so upset, because it is not my speaker, it
belongs to a Church.
Who is just going to have to send it off to RCF themselves now at great
expense.






Cheers,


Gareth.





That said... many companies feel that their service departments should be
profit centers (rather than just breaking even), and don't care whether the
customer is happy. From my warped, anti-capitalistic point of view, a
business
is entitled to only one profit on a sale.

Where are you at geographically ?

If I am not mistaken some countries have laws about things like this but apparently you're not in one of them. Of course the US always has open season on the consumer.

I can understand for example, that parts cost all added up will exceed the value of the unit. Keeping inventory, rent and all that, and a separate box of course, all this costs money.

Last couple places I workd padded the parts. they would crank up the parts price and lower labor, the total is the same butit looks better. However I have worked places that didn't, but sometimes you have to write a bill with $150 labor and $3 parts. Sony factory service does that in the US.

Can you beat that, servicers bitvhing about servic costs. Now I've seen...nope, not going to say it. Every time I do the world outdoes itself.

But really thinling about it, masybe it's not so bad. Know why ? Because a unit like that, if you COULD fix it for anything less than $300, you can always refer the customer to what the factory servicenter would have charged if they balk at the price.

You know for $200 I could tae a regular power transforer, bridge rectifier and some electrolytics and...

wrote in message
...

Where are you at geographically ?

If I am not mistaken some countries have laws about things like this but
apparently you're not in one of them. Of course the US always has open
season on the consumer.

I can understand for example, that parts cost all added up will exceed the
value of the unit. Keeping inventory, rent and all that, and a separate box
of course, all this costs money.

Last couple places I workd padded the parts. they would crank up the parts
price and lower labor, the total is the same butit looks better. However I
have worked places that didn't, but sometimes you have to write a bill with
$150 labor and $3 parts. Sony factory service does that in the US.

Can you beat that, servicers bitvhing about servic costs. Now I've
seen...nope, not going to say it. Every time I do the world outdoes itself.

But really thinling about it, masybe it's not so bad. Know why ? Because a
unit like that, if you COULD fix it for anything less than $300, you can
always refer the customer to what the factory servicenter would have charged
if they balk at the price.



Where are you at geographically ?

If I am not mistaken some countries have laws about things like this but
apparently you're not in one of them. Of course the US always has open
season on the consumer.

I can understand for example, that parts cost all added up will exceed the
value of the unit. Keeping inventory, rent and all that, and a separate box
of course, all this costs money.

Last couple places I workd padded the parts. they would crank up the parts
price and lower labor, the total is the same butit looks better. However I
have worked places that didn't, but sometimes you have to write a bill with
$150 labor and $3 parts. Sony factory service does that in the US.

Can you beat that, servicers bitvhing about servic costs. Now I've
seen...nope, not going to say it. Every time I do the world outdoes itself.

But really thinling about it, masybe it's not so bad. Know why ? Because a
unit like that, if you COULD fix it for anything less than $300, you can
always refer the customer to what the factory servicenter would have charged
if they balk at the price.







Erm, trying to sort out what you are trying to say here, but mostly it seems
to be verbal Diarrhoea as usual.

Please re-read the post.

It is clear I am in the UK.
We are not talking $300, we are talking £320 plus 20% tax plus 2 x shipping,
which is approximately 625 of your North American Dollars, plus 2 x North
American Shipping costs.

And we are also talking about the cost of replacing an SMPS PCB.

Or at least I am, you appear to be mostly talking ****e.




Blimey.

"Phoned RCF UK today..."

That says you called them on the phone. It does not indicate where you are or where they are.

I try not to ASSume things.

William Sommerwerck wrote:



That said... many companies feel that their service departments should be
profit centers (rather than just breaking even), and don't care whether the
customer is happy.

** Most service centres operated by import agents spend their time doing repairs for free under warranty - they would be very lucky indeed if the out of warranty work that came along were profitable enough to cover that loss.

If RCF UK are very smart, they may have negotiated free supply of sufficient spare PCBs, woofers and horn drivers to cover both warranty and out of warranty work. Pretty much the only way to end up with a profit.

Anecdote:

One of my customers used a fair number of replacement cones for 15 inch JBL sound reinforcement speakers. The only supplier was the local agency for JBL - Jands Electronics.

When he asked (perfectly legally) for the 27.5% sales tax component of the price to be removed, this caused a big problem for Jands.

They offered him a 10% discount instead.

You see, Jands had not actually paid anything for the cones ( so paid no sales tax) and sold them on at around half the price of a new speaker.


..... Phil








..... Phil

"Phil Allison" wrote in message
...

William Sommerwerck wrote:



That said... many companies feel that their service departments should be
profit centers (rather than just breaking even), and don't care whether
the
customer is happy.

** Most service centres operated by import agents spend their time doing
repairs for free under warranty - they would be very lucky indeed if the
out of warranty work that came along were profitable enough to cover that
loss.

If RCF UK are very smart, they may have negotiated free supply of sufficient
spare PCBs, woofers and horn drivers to cover both warranty and out of
warranty work. Pretty much the only way to end up with a profit.

Anecdote:

One of my customers used a fair number of replacement cones for 15 inch JBL
sound reinforcement speakers. The only supplier was the local agency for
BL - Jands Electronics.

When he asked (perfectly legally) for the 27.5% sales tax component of the
price to be removed, this caused a big problem for Jands.

They offered him a 10% discount instead.

You see, Jands had not actually paid anything for the cones ( so paid no
sales tax) and sold them on at around half the price of a new speaker.


..... Phil





OK, that's interesting.

If it's the case that RCF UK is not actually part of RCF, but some kind of
UK "franchise" company trying to make a buck from servicing RCF, then I
might take back some of my initial uninformed disgust.



Cheers,


Gareth.

"Well, to be fair, he quoted prices in ï¿oe, not $"

I got that from context. The pound (money) sign doesn't show up for me. It just shows up as a square on my screen.

What's more, even at $320 I would make one hell of an effort to fix it some other way, at $625 I would do damnear anything.

I would find a way to test that transformer clean out of circuit, like with a generator or something. Transformers do no go bad all that often. He pulled the diodes off the secondary, but there are little caps, and some of them are right across a winding so an ohmmeter won't tell you if they're shorted. You should be able to put a 100 kHz square wave to the primary off a generator with like 600 ohms output and have it not short it out.

If it IS shorted, I doubt they wound the thing themselves, and that has something to do with location. In some countries, parts are extremely hard to come by. All servicers operate like a car boneyard. Like Poland for example, I was told is like that, or at least was when the person I know lived there.

However in the civilizd world you can get some parts. That transformer might be off the shelf. OK, I know it is hard to find them but $625 !!!

But, next time I'll just keep my fucing mouth shut.

But, next time I'll just keep my fucing mouth shut.



Good call.

"Gareth Magennis 3:24 PM (1 hour ago)


Other recipients:
Good call.

But, next time I'll just keep my fucing mouth

Good call.
Show trimmed content"

You're just as much of a smartass as I am.

But yes, it can rest in peace now.

wrote in message
...

"Gareth Magennis 3:24 PM (1 hour ago)


Other recipients:
Good call.

But, next time I'll just keep my fucing mouth

Good call.
Show trimmed content"

You're just as much of a smartass as I am.

But yes, it can rest in peace now.





Good call.

"Ever tried fixing an RCF switcher without the benefit of a schematic ? No
...? "

For that kind of money I will dogdamn ****ing try like hell. Seriously. And most of what I have fixed in the last decadeor two has been without a print.

Granted, reverse engineering takes ALOT longer these day, but six hundred bucks. Six hundred bucks. I mean, are they encapsulated or something ?

"That's make, not extort ... "

I tink we all agree on that. sand I think that is why the market for old vintage high end equipment is alive.

"And the posting address is ntlworld, which is a UK ISP ... "

I do not see any of that here. I can't even see your email address or anyone else's. SOMETIMES when I reply it shows up in the quoted text, but most of the time not. It will not give me any information.

It is probably because of Google, and them not wanting to be accused of fomenting spam for Usenet users becasue it would look bad.

On 19/09/2014 00:46, Gareth Magennis wrote:

Hmm, I have an active RCF speaker in for repair with a faulty SMPS.
ART 745A, retail around £1000.

Tried lots of things, the SMPS sparked up on Variac plus inline
lightbulb, but obviously drew lots of current on startup, and thus
continually shut down.

Mosfets removed and good, all secondary diodes removed but still same
problem, seems it is a primary side fault, maybe transformer.


Phoned RCF UK today, and they want £320 odd or so, probably plus 20% tax
and 2 lots of shipping, to repair the unit, as it is out of warranty.

This to me sounds like blatant profiteering.

I mean, that SMPS PCB can't cost more than several dollars bought in
bulk, so the £300 plus must surely be a money making exercise for
repairing their own stuff that has broken because it is not good enough
not to break in the first place.

Suffice to say I am not impressed, and would never advise anyone to buy
RCF, even though I have done in the past.




Gareth.

The only RCF I looked at and repaired was
RCF Flexa PS6320 modular amp system, ps of 2006
So 300 squid, that'll do nicely, for changing a
2.2uF SMD aluminium electrolytic that smoothed the sense voltage, was
bad ESR,
of the first SMPS ,for the low power control electronics,which must be
operational before transfering to the main power SMPS. At least they use
standard off-the-shelf components without grinding off idents.

wrote in message
...

"Ever tried fixing an RCF switcher without the benefit of a schematic ? No
...? "

For that kind of money I will dogdamn ****ing try like hell. Seriously. And
most of what I have fixed in the last decadeor two has been without a print.

Granted, reverse engineering takes ALOT longer these day, but six hundred
bucks. Six hundred bucks. I mean, are they encapsulated or something ?

"That's make, not extort ... "

I tink we all agree on that. sand I think that is why the market for old
vintage high end equipment is alive.

"And the posting address is ntlworld, which is a UK ISP ... "

I do not see any of that here. I can't even see your email address or anyone
else's. SOMETIMES when I reply it shows up in the quoted text, but most of
the time not. It will not give me any information.

It is probably because of Google, and them not wanting to be accused of
fomenting spam for Usenet users becasue it would look bad.





The clue was he

Phoned RCF UK today, and they want £320 odd or so, probably plus 20% tax and
2 lots of shipping, to repair the unit, as it is out of warranty.



Gareth.

"Gareth Magennis" wrote in message
...


wrote in message
...

"Ever tried fixing an RCF switcher without the benefit of a schematic ? No
...? "

For that kind of money I will dogdamn ****ing try like hell. Seriously.
And most of what I have fixed in the last decadeor two has been without a
print.

Granted, reverse engineering takes ALOT longer these day, but six hundred
bucks. Six hundred bucks. I mean, are they encapsulated or something ?


I fix switchers in this sort of equipment, and other areas pretty much on a
daily basis, and mostly without schematics. Gareth does too. The RCF
switchers are some of the most *******-engineered, obscure design and
un-repairable ones that i have ever come across ...


"That's make, not extort ... "

I tink we all agree on that. sand I think that is why the market for old
vintage high end equipment is alive.

"And the posting address is ntlworld, which is a UK ISP ... "

I do not see any of that here. I can't even see your email address or
anyone else's. SOMETIMES when I reply it shows up in the quoted text, but
most of the time not. It will not give me any information.

It is probably because of Google, and them not wanting to be accused of
fomenting spam for Usenet users becasue it would look bad.


Ah. So you're not accessing the group via a dedicated news client ? All the
proper ones that I've ever used, display the poster's details in the
displayed header. Interestingly, my news client is showing this reply of
yours as having come from Gareth, which of course, it hasn't. Presumably,
this is a foible of Goggle providing the front-end user interface ??

Arfa






The clue was he

Phoned RCF UK today, and they want £320 odd or so, probably plus 20% tax
and
2 lots of shipping, to repair the unit, as it is out of warranty.



Gareth.