Silent Screamer Posted May 8, 2024 Posted May 8, 2024 Out of the blue my Halcro MC-70 amp got hot and went into what I believe was thermal shutdown. I let it cool down and the next day tried to turn it back on. The blue lights on the front went through their sequences flashing but it came back to a flashing red light without starting up. Who is the best person to speak with in the Brisbane / Ipswich area to see about repairs? Does anyone know if this amp has some kind of reset?
Guest Posted May 8, 2024 Posted May 8, 2024 Best speaking to @Magenta in the first case - the owners of Halcro. They might handle repairs in house or recommend someone local to you. 1
brodricj Posted May 8, 2024 Posted May 8, 2024 12 hours ago, Silent Screamer said: Does anyone know if this amp has some kind of reset? And what does the HRAS diagnostic monitoring software say is the problem?
Silent Screamer Posted May 8, 2024 Author Posted May 8, 2024 I have never gotten the CD out of the case. I wasn't sure if it would be of any use now that it is non functioning. Do you know how to use the software / hook it up?
Silent Screamer Posted May 8, 2024 Author Posted May 8, 2024 CD was in my CD drawer. I am hoping the manual is still in the packing box, but that will be a tomorrow job.
brodricj Posted May 8, 2024 Posted May 8, 2024 Both the software and the owners manual is available on-line. 1
Silent Screamer Posted May 8, 2024 Author Posted May 8, 2024 (edited) 1 hour ago, brodricj said: Both the software and the owners manual is available on-line. Not sure if this means anything more to you than it does me... Guessing there is more than one power supply since it has the standby light on, and it is able to generate this message. - System - Provider [ Name] HRAS - EventID 9 [ Qualifiers] 49152 Level 2 Task 0 Keywords 0x80000000000000 - TimeCreated [ SystemTime] 2024-05-08T14:44:27.000000000Z EventRecordID 79148 Channel Application Computer WIN7PRO Security - EventData HRAS Alert [MC70, # A0000269]: POWER SUPPLY FAILURE Message: *S!:M03RA0000269P0V1110A0000000T1111111C1111111D1111111F1111111H01298847 Edited May 8, 2024 by Silent Screamer
brodricj Posted May 8, 2024 Posted May 8, 2024 The HRAS Alert is there as plain as day POWER SUPPLY FAILURE Send it to Lance at Halcro and he'll fit it with a new power supply.
Silent Screamer Posted May 8, 2024 Author Posted May 8, 2024 21 minutes ago, brodricj said: The HRAS Alert is there as plain as day POWER SUPPLY FAILURE Send it to Lance at Halcro and he'll fit it with a new power supply. But which one? If there is still a power led operating, and I can hear a faint clicking noise there must be some power coming from somewhere, I assume there must be an operational power supply for things like the LEDs and the software, and maybe one for the amp itself?
brodricj Posted May 8, 2024 Posted May 8, 2024 Mate, it's stuffed. Nothing you can do to fix it. It needs a new power supply. Pack it up and send it to Adelaide.
Silent Screamer Posted May 9, 2024 Author Posted May 9, 2024 Sent them an email yesterday morning, waiting on reply. 1
Silent Screamer Posted October 26, 2024 Author Posted October 26, 2024 OK so it has been way longer than I anticipated to repair this amplifier with a replacement power supply going in yesterday. Mostly because I got myself into some serious financial poo in the stock market and it wasn't really fair on my wife to then spend money on something for me. Good news is I finally got myself square with the stock market this week and felt OK with parting with the $465 to buy one of the two power supplies required. The front power supply unit was still working but upon close inspection I noticed that one of the resistors was damaged and the main power caps were less than happy. So after I repaired it that only left the rear one to do. I recapped it as well but it still wasn't working, so I admitted defeat and paid for a new one. I would still like to repair the old one as a spare. I can't believe how much I missed listening to music on my system.
Kaynin Posted October 26, 2024 Posted October 26, 2024 These are wonderful amps, and great to see still locally supported. I had one as NOS and a module blew. Magenta sent out a new one, but it took a tweeter in one speaker so that cost me a few hundred. My current mono (not Halcro) had a tube blow and took out some components. 6 months and $1750 later it's back home. Just hoping it makes you feel a little better... lol
Silent Screamer Posted October 27, 2024 Author Posted October 27, 2024 (edited) 2 hours ago, Kaynin said: These are wonderful amps, and great to see still locally supported. I had one as NOS and a module blew. Magenta sent out a new one, but it took a tweeter in one speaker so that cost me a few hundred. My current mono (not Halcro) had a tube blow and took out some components. 6 months and $1750 later it's back home. Just hoping it makes you feel a little better... lol Considering I have probably had 10 years of faultless service out of it I don't begrudge having to spend some money on it. I just would have preferred to fix it myself, sure the money is a part of it, but part of it is being able to do it myself. It could have been worse I could have needed to replace both of them, so I am semi happy that I could bring one of them back into a serviceable condition myself. Changing the resistor was quite tricky, as the resistor was difficult to get out. The holes were quite tight, and not much wiggle room for soldering back in. And considering what I know about electronics could be written on the back of a postage stamp, I say one out of two is not a bad repair rate. Edited October 27, 2024 by Silent Screamer 1
Kaynin Posted October 27, 2024 Posted October 27, 2024 10 minutes ago, Silent Screamer said: Considering I have probably had 10 years of faultless service out of it I don't begrudge having to spend some money on it. I just would have preferred to fix it myself, sure the money is a part of it, but part of it is being able to do it myself. It could have been worse I could have needed to replace both of them, so I am semi happy that I could bring one of them back into a serviceable condition myself. Changing the resistor was quite tricky, as the resistor was difficult to get out. The holes were quite tight, and not much wiggle room for soldering back in. And considering what I know about electronics could be written on the back of a postage stamp, I say one out of two is not a bad repair rate. Yep, great to see you having a go. I don't have the courage! 1
Silent Screamer Posted October 27, 2024 Author Posted October 27, 2024 1 minute ago, Kaynin said: Yep, great to see you having a go. I don't have the courage! The only reason I even give it a go was because probably two years ago my fridge blew up during a series of electrical brown outs, and I decided to see if there was something I could do. It was going to cost me a minimum of $450 (going off the manufacturers prices for PSU and service call minimum) to have someone come out and fit a new power supply, so I figured why not take a look. Was easy enough to get out and I looked for anything that was black and charred. Everything looked fine, but I did notice that one of the caps looked bulged on the end, and I had seen people say this happens when they die. So I went down to Jaycar, and spent something like $4 and bought two new caps. Change them over and like magic my fridge was up and running again. So it seemed only logical to see if I could do the same for the amp. Magenta told me how to check for DC voltage, and the front one was still working but there was obvious damage to a resistor and the caps didn't look happy, so its going to cost me $440 per module why not have a crack? Unfortunately there is something in the rear one that is a bigger problem than power caps, so it needs someone who actually knows what they are doing take a look. But I am back up an running so it is not a huge rush to fix. 2
Disauda Posted March 8 Posted March 8 Hi everyone Looks like I have the same thing going on with my Halcro MC20! It started to not fire up and now flashes red on the power light (no lights on the channels). Funny burnt smell coming from the unit. I also feel like I would be keen to give it a shot at repairing, I have a small amount of experience at electronics and associated repairs. My concern is that we had a brown out happen about a week ago and this is when the issue started, I am also concerned that the power grid can be as low as 216v and as high as 252v and still be considered "within spec". The amp states that's it requires 240v. I really don't want to repair this thing and then have it happen again... Any advice on this would be appreciated.
brodricj Posted March 8 Posted March 8 What's going on in the Halcro universe? My MC70 has just gone down with +12V & +72V A/B power supply failure.
Hi-Fi Whipped Posted March 9 Posted March 9 On 8/3/2025 at 2:13 PM, Disauda said: Hi everyone Looks like I have the same thing going on with my Halcro MC20! It started to not fire up and now flashes red on the power light (no lights on the channels). Funny burnt smell coming from the unit. I also feel like I would be keen to give it a shot at repairing, I have a small amount of experience at electronics and associated repairs. My concern is that we had a brown out happen about a week ago and this is when the issue started, I am also concerned that the power grid can be as low as 216v and as high as 252v and still be considered "within spec". The amp states that's it requires 240v. I really don't want to repair this thing and then have it happen again... Any advice on this would be appreciated. Guess it depends on how much you value the amp. If not a lot have a crack at fixing it, If it’s a keeper maybe get in touch with the manufacturer to arrange the nearest service agent to look at the fix and give the amp a service at the same time, then you’ll have a near new amp when it’s returned, ready for years of service.
Disauda Posted March 11 Posted March 11 On 09/03/2025 at 8:07 PM, Hi-Fi Whipped said: Guess it depends on how much you value the amp. If not a lot have a crack at fixing it, If it’s a keeper maybe get in touch with the manufacturer to arrange the nearest service agent to look at the fix and give the amp a service at the same time, then you’ll have a near new amp when it’s returned, ready for years of service. Thanks for the reply, I had a chat with Mick from Magenta today. He was certain it is a power supply failure. based on the flashing light sequence. He also said the power supply is multi volt (can be used in other countries) so poor voltage at my home will not have been the culprit.. He suggested boxing it up and sending it to Adelaide for a inspection.. He didn't have current pricing for the hardware, but he suggested $400-500 would be the cost for the repair. For that sort of money I think I will send it to the experts.. 3
Disauda Posted March 11 Posted March 11 On 08/03/2025 at 10:55 PM, brodricj said: What's going on in the Halcro universe? My MC70 has just gone down with +12V & +72V A/B power supply failure. Maybe have a chat with Mike from magenta, if you haven't already.. He was very helpful!
brodricj Posted March 11 Posted March 11 2 hours ago, Disauda said: Maybe have a chat with Mike from magenta, if you haven't already.. Other things can cause the observed fault. In my case the control card might be incorrectly detecting a non-existent fault.
brodricj Posted March 12 Posted March 12 I found the fault with my MC70. The +12V (red wire) solder joint attaching the power supply to the back plane was broken. Without +12V the +72V circuit will not be powered. This explains why there was +5V but not +12 and +72A/B. Easy fix. 1
brodricj Posted March 12 Posted March 12 My MC70 has been repaired. Total cost = zero. It was an effort in time to get it out of the rack and open it up. And a bit tricky to get the lid aligned with the holes in the chassis to button it up again. The key point here for MC owners is to use the HRAS diagnostic software tool. In this case HRAS said my +5V supply was good but the +12 and +72 A/B were not. This is an odd indication. With this fault all LYRUS modules will shut down. On inspection a broken +12V wire was found and this was entirely consistent with the HRAS diagnostics. Without the +12V supply you won't have the +72V, but you will have the 5V. 1
Recommended Posts