Quickie + PJCCS - lost bass

[danielehn]

Hi,

I've had my quickie for a while now and it's great.

However after not using it for a longer period it seems to have lost the low frequency bass.

Everything else is fine. The feeling is that of having a home cinema receiver where you can select at which frequency the sub-woofer is
to take over.

I tried connecting my subwoofer to the outputs of the quickie just to see if it would perform deeper bass, but it also seemed not producing low frequency bass.
I also tried another power amplifier that used to sound a bit overblown and used to produce to much bass. This power amp were also not producing the deep
bass that I used to love so much.

Is there something that might have broken inside my quickie that could account for this ?

Any help is much appreciated

 

[galyons]

Since sat for awhile, did you put in fresh batteries?

Cheers,
Geary

 

[danielehn]

Hi, Yes, bought new ones. Can hear a little bit of difference when the D-Cells are completely new but it's not what it used to be.

What is the normal voltage lvl at which the D-Cells needs to be replaced ?

(When mine hits 1.35 I can clearly notice that the sound quality have deteriorated)

 

[Paul Joppa]

The broadest specification I've seen says the tube wants at least 1.0 volts. I think the tube designers expect it to work down to 1.125v.

As the batteries run down, it becomes more important that the D-cell orientation is correct - for version 1.0, see the sticky about the error in the manual. This is fixed in the current Quickie version.

 

[danielehn]

I'll give that a try after buying a few new batteries

Tried with the old ones but they sound awful at 1.35V with loss of clarity and punch.

Is all of the quickie 1.0 manuals (CD's) incorrect ?

 

[Paul Birkeland]

Is all of the quickie 1.0 manuals (CD's) incorrect ?

The old Quickie 1.0 does need to have the D-cells flipped.  The Quickie 1.1 does not.  Rather than redo the 1.0 manual with revised wiring, we made other changes to the kit and addressed that issue with the 1.1 revision.

 

[danielehn]

I'll check if I flipped the holders before. I don't remember.

The sound however is more or less exactly the same no matter how the batteries are placed.
(Lacking bass)

 

[danielehn]

Have tested with different sources and when connecting a volume pot and a CD player directly to the power amplifier the sound is much more aggressive and there are more bass. Have also noticed that the sound stage is to wide and lacks focus using the quickie. Since this started after having it in storage for a while I wonder if some thing has come loose and it's not producing the voltage it's supposed to.

 

[Zimmer64]

Is there enough juice in the 9v battaries left as well?

 

[danielehn]

I've probably gone thru 3 sets of fresh batteries since I started troubleshooting.

Don't really think it's battery related any more.

It's like voices aren't distinctly in the middle of the room, but smeared out a bit as well..

 

[Paul Birkeland]

I wonder if some thing has come loose and it's not producing the voltage it's supposed to.

A voltage check would be a good starting point for diagnosis.

 

[danielehn]

Voltages are about 34v & 1,6v( pjccs manual measurement points ). think that isn't far off ? since the 9v batteries are at 34v and the D cells are about 1.4v.

Tested with a tone generator and an 80hz tone sounds like a ticking sound . (clipping)

Higher frequencies sounds better.

 

[Paul Birkeland]

Voltages are about 34v & 1,6v( pjccs manual measurement points ).

For which points?  34V is OK for IA/IB, for for OA/OB or tube pins 4/6, that's a tremendous problem.

 

[danielehn]

IA,IB = 34v
Tube Pin 6 = 1,6v

 

[danielehn]

I took a 100k pot and connected it to a couple of rca connectors (no quickie involved just for testing). When running this way with my power amplifier and CD player. Even at the lowest level for the pot I got a super high volume. And if I would have tried to raise the volume I would have blown my speakers. Is this normal?

 

[Paul Birkeland]

What voltages do you get at OA and OB?

 

[danielehn]

Will do a complete voltage check tomorrow and post the result. Forgot to shut it off earlier today and the batteries are getting a bit drained.(Recharging the 9v batteries now)

I really appreciate all the help.

 

[danielehn]

Hi,

Here is the voltages for my quickie.
================================
A1, 3,2V
A2 26,1V
A3, 0V
A4, 26,1V
A5 1,9V
A6 26,1V
A7 3,2V

B1 3,2V
B2 28,6V
B3 0V
B4 28,6V
B5 1,9V
B6 28,6V
B7 3,2V

T1 0V
T2 1,9V
T3 0V
T4 1,9V
T5 0V
T6 18,7V
T7 28,4V
T8 0V
T9 9,5V
T10 0V

PJCCS
================================
IA 38V
IB 38V
OA 26V
OB 29V

Resistance
================================
Terminal 1-5 , Just as described in the quickie manual
Terminal 6-10 , No connection at all

 

[Paul Birkeland]

Your voltages do look good. 

It's possible that there's a flaky solder joint giving you all this trouble as well, I've had a bad solder joint allow for proper voltages but awful sound on more than one occasion.

-PB

 

[Paul Joppa]

Since the tube voltages are OK, the problem is likely to be before or after the tube.