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Joined:
January 2007
Posts: 672
Location: New South Wales, Australia | Last weekend whilst playing with a few friends I got a really bad crackle coming through my amp. I fiddled around with the lead and it stopped briefly before starting again.
Tried another couple of leads and the same thing happened so I plugged the guitar into another amp and didn't have any problems. I figured it was the amp and not the guitar which was OK as the amp (Fender G-DEC) is still under warranty.
So I took the amp into my local music shop and the tech guy put it through its paces and it didn't miss a beat. He tried several guitars through it including my 1860 and there wasn't a hint of any crackle.
As a last resort we put a new 9 volt battery in as the one I had was only putting out 5 volts. The guitar seemed fine but now when I plug in it seems to take a few minutes to "warm up".
What I mean is, when I turn the amp on there's no sound. I jiggle the lead a bit and after a little while it's fine -- no crackle.
Does this sound like a pickup problem (loose wire, etc) or could a new battery cause this sort of problem.
I'm playing my first serious gig in a couple of weeks and I want to find out what the problem is before the big night. |
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Joined:
May 2003
Posts: 4389
Location: Capital District, NY, USA Minor Outlying Islands | Sounds like an amp issue.
What kind of amp is it? Tube, analog?
What brand is it?
How old is it?
Did you look inside for lose connections? (I suppose the tech did)
How about dust?
I had some crackling with my solid state yamaha jx-30, and there was dust in the pots. How it got there I don't know, but one way to remove dust is just to twist your knobs back and forth, or get some of that canned duster and spray out the inside of your combo. Could be there was some dust in your input plug?
Inspection and spraying out dust won't hurt it.
Could be with all the plugging and unplugging you dislodged the dirt. |
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Joined:
February 2002
Posts: 1817
Location: Minden, Nebraska | Might be some oxidation in the contacts on the input jack. The poor man's attempt at repair is to take a 1/4" cable plug and rapidly insert, pull it out, and repeatly do this 20-30 times. That often breaks up corrosion. If you have contact cleaner, spray it in the jack before doing this. Best to have the amp off during this process.
Of course this is to no avail if that isn't your problem, but it is a source of intermittent amp crackle. |
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Joined:
May 2003
Posts: 4389
Location: Capital District, NY, USA Minor Outlying Islands | Ooops. I misunderstood. It was the brand new G-Dec?! It didn't dawn on me that a new amp would go bad.
Anyway, dust or corrsion could be the culprit, or maybe a bad plug? Are the plug's connections OK?
Sorry for my confusion. |
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Joined:
August 2005
Posts: 3736
Location: Sunshine State, Australia | Originally posted by ozwatto:
I'm playing my first serious gig in a couple of weeks and I want to find out what the problem is before the big night. Y'gonna tell us more about the upcoming gig, Oz??
...and did you sort out the Snap, Crackle, Pop problem? |
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Joined:
January 2007
Posts: 672
Location: New South Wales, Australia | Muzza, the gig is happening next weekend whilst a lot of our northern hemisphere friends will be enjoying the OFC convention and factory tour.
It's only a party but there's gonna be about 120 people there which is a big crowd for me. I'm used to playing for my two kids and the dog.
Had a bit of a disagreement with the bass player last week and things weren't looking too good but I think it's sorted out now.
I'll let you know how it goes......and yes, the snap crackle pop has disappeared as mysteriously as it first began. |
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Joined:
March 2002
Posts: 14842
Location: NJ | Take the cellophane off of it . . . |
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amp crackle
