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Posted: Mon Nov 22, 2010 12:36 pm
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Retro: With all due respect. That's not a study on durability, that's an opinion, albeit a very educated one.

It would be nice to have a consumer reports type document that tracks and documents the number of problems per thousand units sold or something like that.


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Posted: Mon Nov 22, 2010 12:39 pm
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You should go to www.thefenderforum.com and feel the "love" for the HRD series. LOL I have owned well over 30 amps in all the years I've been playing and yes the HRDlx was not only the most unreliable but the most poorly built and designed amp I've ever owned. There are tons of equipment forums that tout the same results as myself. I know musicians who took them back only to get another one to take a dump within a few months. I've seen them DOA too.

I know many, many musicians professional and not that consider the HRDlx a joke. The clean channel on mine sounded fine at lower levels, but really showed it's true colors when you cranked it a little. Justin Holten dedicated a whole site to repairing and modding the HRDlx. Billm does the same thing. It's a big joke. And no, I'm not trying to pick a fight either. I've owned many fine Fender amps as well as many others. It was a name I always trusted to be rock solid and reliable. My 76 Twin went over three decades of serious abuse without a single failure night after night. I also had a 65 Vibrolux Reverb that went strong till some scumbag broke into our van and stole it. It was also over 30 years old when that happened. Any Geezer on this forum could tell you the longevity of the old amps compared to the new stuff. And to top it off, it sounded great right out of the box with usuallu no mods required. :wink:

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Posted: Mon Nov 22, 2010 1:00 pm
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63supro wrote:
You should go to www.thefenderforum.com and feel the "love" for the HRD series. LOL I have owned well over 30 amps in all the years I've been playing and yes the HRDlx was not only the most unreliable but the most poorly built and designed amp I've ever owned. There are tons of equipment forums that tout the same results as myself. I know musicians who took them back only to get another one to take a dump within a few months. I've seen them DOA too.

I know many, many musicians professional and not that consider the HRDlx a joke. The clean channel on mine sounded fine at lower levels, but really showed it's true colors when you cranked it a little. Justin Holten dedicated a whole site to repairing and modding the HRDlx. Billm does the same thing. It's a big joke. And no, I'm not trying to pick a fight either. I've owned many fine Fender amps as well as many others. It was a name I always trusted to be rock solid and reliable. My 76 Twin went over three decades of serious abuse without a single failure night after night. I also had a 65 Vibrolux Reverb that went strong till some scumbag broke into our van and stole it. It was also over 30 years old when that happened. Any Geezer on this forum could tell you the longevity of the old amps compared to the new stuff. And to top it off, it sounded great right out of the box with usuallu no mods required. :wink:


Anecdotal "evidence" is not proof of a problem. Show me some hard data.

Yes, everything old was built better and lasted longer than everything new. Our first clothes drier lasted alomst 20 years without a problem before it died. Our current one gets a service call for a problem on an annual basis. :lol:

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Posted: Mon Nov 22, 2010 1:17 pm
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bluesky636 wrote:
Anecdotal "evidence" is not proof of a problem. Show me some hard data.


The undisputable fact that FMIC has begun to address some of the better-documented problems with these amps with the latest editions is IMO sufficient enough to support the assertions of unreliability and slipshod engineering.

Arjay

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Posted: Mon Nov 22, 2010 1:50 pm
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That's a good point Retroverbial, I wonder just how far the new improvements went towards preventing problems. I do remember seeing a review on the new versions, and they had thicker PC boards, that's got to help some. I would also like to see a schematic of the new version to check differences in the circuit like the new taper pots (exactly which ones) and "tone improvements", but that would be difficult, or near impossible to get. :idea:

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Posted: Mon Nov 22, 2010 2:19 pm
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bluesky636 wrote:
63supro wrote:
You should go to www.thefenderforum.com and feel the "love" for the HRD series. LOL I have owned well over 30 amps in all the years I've been playing and yes the HRDlx was not only the most unreliable but the most poorly built and designed amp I've ever owned. There are tons of equipment forums that tout the same results as myself. I know musicians who took them back only to get another one to take a dump within a few months. I've seen them DOA too.

I know many, many musicians professional and not that consider the HRDlx a joke. The clean channel on mine sounded fine at lower levels, but really showed it's true colors when you cranked it a little. Justin Holten dedicated a whole site to repairing and modding the HRDlx. Billm does the same thing. It's a big joke. And no, I'm not trying to pick a fight either. I've owned many fine Fender amps as well as many others. It was a name I always trusted to be rock solid and reliable. My 76 Twin went over three decades of serious abuse without a single failure night after night. I also had a 65 Vibrolux Reverb that went strong till some scumbag broke into our van and stole it. It was also over 30 years old when that happened. Any Geezer on this forum could tell you the longevity of the old amps compared to the new stuff. And to top it off, it sounded great right out of the box with usuallu no mods required. :wink:


Anecdotal "evidence" is not proof of a problem. Show me some hard data.

Yes, everything old was built better and lasted longer than everything new. Our first clothes drier lasted alomst 20 years without a problem before it died. Our current one gets a service call for a problem on an annual basis. :lol:


Yep, and my brand new out of the box HRDlx lasted only 3 months before it started giving me continuous and serious problems. I even had a bad bias trim pot that red plated a set of tubes on me. It would allow the bias to drift intermittently all over the place. Sometimes cold sometimes hot. I could always hear when it did it.

Some of the issues were addressed in the new III series as Arjay said. I too consider that proof. From the volume pots, to the new tube mounts to the new Celestion speaker to replace the farty Eminence. They are trying to get rid of the stock icepick in the forehead tone. They didn't do all that to the 65 reissues. Didn't need to Leo and his boys designed them. he listened to what musicians wants and needs and supplied them with it.

I'll tell you what, when Snowy gets done with his 5e3 Deluxe build, it will be built like a PCB amp should be built, with the tubes mounted to the chassis and a nice thick board for the components. If you want hard data, just search any decent guitar forum or even this one. You'll find lots of problems.

The thing is, I won't defend anything that gives me problems no matter who makes it. I never badmouth anything that I have had no experience with.
Try making a living with one of the HRD amps and you'll see. I always carry a spare amp, tubes and fuses but my HRD was the only amp I had that failed me three times on stage and twice at rehearsals. I usually don't count rehearsals because I don't get embarrassed in front of my musical colleagues.

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Posted: Mon Nov 22, 2010 2:24 pm
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Retroverbial wrote:
bluesky636 wrote:
Anecdotal "evidence" is not proof of a problem. Show me some hard data.


The undisputable fact that FMIC has begun to address some of the better-documented problems with these amps with the latest editions is IMO sufficient enough to support the assertions of unreliability and slipshod engineering.

Arjay


I don't disagree that Fender is fixing problems (a number of those problems were already addressed in the BDRI). Unreliablity? I have found many reviews that claim just the opposite. Slipshod engineering is a little strong in my view. Some people consider anything with a PCB to be "slipshod". :lol:

Oh, well. I think we have beat this one to death. Again. :D I just want to go home and play my guitar. Ya'll have a good day. :D

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Posted: Mon Nov 22, 2010 2:35 pm
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bluesky636 wrote:
...Anecdotal "evidence" is not proof of a problem. Show me some hard data....


I am the same way, I would rather see a breakdown of what kind of problems we are talking about, to be able to objectively compare things. What percentage of problems were solder joint related? What percentage of problems were only bad tubes? How do these numbers compare to all similar amps? What percentage of repairs were two or more trips to the shop for the same amp? And I am more than fully aware of the amount of diligence that goes into a "warranty repair" at many shops. :roll: Most won't spend two hours pulling a board to check the solder joints, when a quick "fix" pays the same money. With the possibility of a return visit, you can just blame the "crappy" amp, right? ;) If I remember my math correctly, at the same failure rate percentage, if 10 times the number of amps are sold, then on average, there would be 10 times the number of failures. Amp A 100 sold, 10 failed, 10 percent failure. Amp B 1000 sold, 100 returned, 10 percent failure. So, amp A is better, because it has way less failures than amp B? Of course I don't have the failure data, but the point is there, way more HRds sold than ANY other Fender amp. :)

I think that the guys here who have had problems are simply "twice shy" from their experiences. This reminds me of a song that I was just listening to; The band "Bangkok Rooster", the two singers/guitar-players were trading verses back and forth like this: Paul- "My gal is red hot", Mark- "Your gal ain't diddly squat". Well, my gal (HRDlx) IS red hot, I'm gonna go play it right now and the sound of it will make me forget all the mean things that people say about it. :lol:

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Posted: Mon Nov 22, 2010 2:39 pm
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I really don't have a dog in this fight, Bill. Not anymore.

My sole motivation re Fender amps in general and the HR's specifically is to hopefully ensure that every player who buys a FMIC product has a pleasant-and-positive experience with it, whether an amp, guitar, or accessory. And while some may regard me as a troublesome ranconteur, I'll accept that moniker if my protestations result in a better piece of gear for those who choose to buy it.

Yeah......I got a set of pickups to install this afternoon.

Peace!

Arjay

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Posted: Mon Nov 22, 2010 3:46 pm
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Retroverbial wrote:
My sole motivation re Fender amps in general and the HR's specifically is to hopefully ensure that every player who buys a FMIC product has a pleasant-and-positive experience with it, whether an amp, guitar, or accessory.


An excellent motivation and one I fully support. 8)

Retroverbial wrote:
And while some may regard me as a troublesome ranconteur, I'll accept that moniker if my protestations result in a better piece of gear for those who choose to buy it.


Troublesome? Nah. More like outspoken, but then so am I. :lol:


Retroverbial wrote:
Peace!

Arjay


Back at ya. :D

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Posted: Mon Nov 22, 2010 5:08 pm
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Threads like these make me notice how lucky i am to have a Good Old reliable Twin. That and a Mesa Boogie.

Not bragging, im just grateful.

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Posted: Mon Nov 22, 2010 7:22 pm
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Big The Cat wrote:
Threads like these make me notice how lucky i am to have a Good Old reliable Twin. That and a Mesa Boogie.

Not bragging, im just grateful.


It's not bragging, it's being a smart consumer. I bought a HRDlx because I don't really gig as much as I used to. I thought it would be fine. It wasn't. Now I'm thinking about playing a lot more. I'm glad I dumped that hemorrhoid with 40 watts and a 12" speaker. I never looked back.

My amp tech doesn't like warranty work because he claims it doesn't pay as much as he likes to earn. He doesn't want a second visit under warranty. The only upside is he may get a new customer out of it. I'll tell you what if I had to reprint 10% of every photograph I sold, the reputation for making sloppy prints alone would put me out of business.

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Posted: Tue Nov 23, 2010 1:55 am
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you hear more about hot rod deluxe problems simply because there is more of them out there.
i agree though that this amp should be treated with much care if you gigging with it.
on the other hand IMO it sounds much better than lots of the tube amps at it's price point.
if you are gigging constantly with a tube amp don't be surprised if there will be problems.


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Posted: Tue Nov 23, 2010 2:10 am
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babatube wrote:
if you are gigging constantly with a tube amp don't be surprised if there will be problems.


BULLSHIT!

I've played over 2100 professional gigs in my career, all but a handful with amps designed by Leo Fender.

Not once have they ever left me "high and dry" when it counted.

Arjay

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Posted: Tue Nov 23, 2010 2:33 am
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I've played over 2100 professional gigs in my career, all but a handful with amps designed by Leo Fender.

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I agree, if you talk about point to point amp, " modern low cost printed circuits are very often poor quality, same for caps and resistor

I have friends giging with old tubes Marshall ( point to point and hih quality printed circuits board) made in '70 or Hi watts and Soud City. They are tough night after night.


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