Have you ever fried you amp head by mistake?

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Kiteboarder

Kiteboarder

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Have any of you ever fried your output transformer in your amp head due to forgetting to plug a cab to it?

Yesterday I turned on my Mesa Lonestar and let it warm up for about 5minutes. When I came back to it, I switched it ON from stand-by and began to play only to realize I forgot to plug in the cab. I was freaking out! So really, it was only a few seconds but it got me thinking. The amp is fine by the way.

I suppose it's worse if you have the volume cranked.

I spoke with John at Egnater amps once and he told me there's nothing wrong with having the amp on and not connected to a cab, so long as you are not running anything through the input. If it's just sitting there, with no guitar plugged in, it will be fine.
 
Boogies are a little more forgiving of end user boneheadedness... :D
 
I have done that before. :doh: I hate it when that happens, but my amps have been fine.
 
That's the one good thing about combos. They're always plugged in!
 
I haven't, but my drummer has...poor guy finally got his Traynor head fixed for $150 after months and months of it just sitting around broken, 3 days later he's setting up and forgets to plug in the cab. POP goes the weasel, and it needs to be fixed again :doh: Ever since I saw him do that, the first thing I do before I plug an amp in or turn one on is check the speaker cable!!
 
I did that the first night i got my diezel herbert at our show. I was trying to play and was thinking my amp wasnt working and then finally realized it wasnt my guitar or pedals or even volume...IT WAS MY SPEAKER CABLE ! ...unplugged!!!
The herbert was fine though. Soooo glad.
 
Rob Tahan":1qnexkh3 said:
I did that the first night i got my diezel herbert at our show. I was trying to play and was thinking my amp wasnt working and then finally realized it wasnt my guitar or pedals or even volume...IT WAS MY SPEAKER CABLE ! ...unplugged!!!
The herbert was fine though. Soooo glad.
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How long were you trying to make it work?? 1 minute, 5? Plus, at a show I'm sure your volume know would've been set rather high. Mine was set at like 1.
 
Sometimes, with my Egnater Rebel, if I change cabs while my amp is on, I'll switch it to standby and unplug my guitar. I still keep my amp on to keep the tubes on. This, in theory, should be fine.
 
Kiteboarder":1s7yrkef said:
Sometimes, with my Egnater Rebel, if I change cabs while my amp is on, I'll switch it to standby and unplug my guitar. I still keep my amp on to keep the tubes on. This, in theory, should be fine.
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it is
 
I have a friend who plugged a speaker cable from one output of a stereo power amp into the other output...and then ran another speaker cable from speaker to speaker....he was sure everything that needed something plugged into a hole had something in it.

He fired up his rig and we could actually hear the sound coming out of his tubes...very faint and I can't really describe it.

We stared at each other for a while trying to figure out what was up...... twisting knobs and playing a little..still hearing the noise.

It took about 4-5minutes before we turned everything off..traced the cables and realized what the screw up was ...wired it correctly and fired it back up.

Didn't seem to hurt anything at all...he still has the amp and it works fine. That was probably 15 years ago.
 
GITTarzann":1eei9ves said:
I have a friend who plugged a speaker cable from one output of a stereo power amp into the other output...and then ran another speaker cable from speaker to speaker....he was sure everything that needed something plugged into a hole had something in it.

He fired up his rig and we could actually hear the sound coming out of his tubes...very faint and I can't really describe it.

We stared at each other for a while trying to figure out what was up...... twisting knobs and playing a little..still hearing the noise.

It took about 4-5minutes before we turned everything off..traced the cables and realized what the screw up was ...wired it correctly and fired it back up.

Didn't seem to hurt anything at all...he still has the amp and it works fine. That was probably 15 years ago.
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They don't make 'em like they used to! ;)

Wow! That was one major screw up! A couple of more minutes and the tubes would've exploded!
 
It blew us both away the amp wasn't fried when we hooked it up correctly.

What was weird is the sound coming out of the tubes was like the guitar sound coming out...very quiet but you could hear it.
 
once upon a time...before the advent of gear forums, I had a 50 watt jcm900 that I ran without a cab (used the line-out to record) for about 2-3 hours. Nothing happened... LOL! :D

Don't get me wrong, I'm not advising doing this, but it may not be the instaneous OT destruction that people make it out to be.
 
Did that at soundcheck one time with my rack (2:90)...took me around a minute to figure out that the system wasn't plugged into the cabs. :doh: No issues though.
 
Not yet :D ;)

But I have stood totally confused in front of my rig while getting no sound and checking (almost) everything only to realize my guitar isn't plugged in :lol: :LOL:
 
I had a literally brand new mesa 50/50 power amp blow up this way at a practice studio. their equipment was junk and the speaker jack rattled loose, disconnected itself and fell into the cab before i realized what was happening. by the time i did the amp was fried. it still sits in the corner of my room collecting dust after about 8 years. should fix it one day as it has less than 5 hours on it! :cry:
 
moltenmetalburn":3712cvz6 said:
I had a literally brand new mesa 50/50 power amp blow up this way at a practice studio. their equipment was junk and the speaker jack rattled loose, disconnected itself and fell into the cab before i realized what was happening. by the time i did the amp was fried. it still sits in the corner of my room collecting dust after about 8 years. should fix it one day as it has less than 5 hours on it! :cry:
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It shouldn't be too hard to fix right? I mean, it's mainly the power transformer at the end that gets shot? Or is there more?
 
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