Studer A820 24 track....... Help please

[Geert Heyrman]

Hello,

Last week my studer A820 24 track finally arrived from Australia (after two months of subtle seafreight :? . It plays and records well and the sound is really breathtaking. I was actually surprised it took shipping that well. Everybody raves about the automatic alignment feature and indeed I think it's really nice. Except I have jet to experience that joy. Here is the problem I have:

I had to make very few adjustments but when I entered the data for one channel for example reproduce level everything is OK but when I want to store the changes I made, the recorder display states "store unable mode". I thought it had something to do with the restriction on program mode but by loosening a little screw on the frontplate of the main recorderunit that problem went away (some king of foolproof option so only the wright person can make changes..., but I still can't store an allignment change. I still get the same message. I'm getting a little frustrated after spitting out the manual for two consecutive days during the weekend so any help here would be really appreciated. As I'm planning to have the heads relapped.... If I'm not able to align....... I'm in deep shit.

I'll also start recapping soon. Best I use the Wima caps I suppose. Anyone with valuable information to that regard? Or other things I should watch out for? Approximately 35 caps to exchange for the lot of cards used in one channel..... so that makes 840 caps :shock: Plus powersupply and caps in the electronics bay. The misses will have a lonely August for sure. :twisted:

Anyway I hope someone can help me out here as I would like to have this baby up and running in oktober.

Kind regards,

Geert

 

[pucho812]

here is a link to studer and it has manuals for the a-820 MK 1 and MK II.
My first questin is if you like the sound so much why do you wish to recap it. Are the caps old or something? Recapping will change the sound of said recorder. Anyway bound to find the info you need in one of the manuals here.

ftp://ftp.studer.ch/Public/Products/


you know without looking at the manual probably needs a new batttery much like on lexicon reverbs and such one can store parameters but once the battery dies one cannot store any user changes into the internal ram. Might be a similar issue...

 

[Geert Heyrman]

Hi Puncho,

Thx for the reply. I noticed there is a battery in the ledmeterunit. I might change that and see what happens. Stupid of me that I didn't think of that before. With regard to recapping. The machiene is from 1991. that means 15 years old. I read on several boards that one should recap after 15 years. Also deu to the developed alignment possibilities, it automaticaly corrects any negative changes in the cirquitery. I have heard you only know when its impossible to further align. So I thought a recap would give this recorder a fresch start. With regard to the sound I do really like it. I got 15 tapes with the deal and when I play them back on my studer mixing desk I was really amazed. But hey you know .... boys and their toys.

If other people think their might be other reasons for my problem please do reply.

Kind regards,

Geert

 

[Samuel Groner]

I read on several boards that one should recap after 15 years.

Electrolytics perhaps but why film (you were talking about Wimas)?

Samuel

 

[Geert Heyrman]

Hi Samuel.

Thx for the reply. I thought I had to do that because I read it somewhere, wo I thought I had to recap it. How long do filmcaps take?

cheers,

Geert

 

[pucho812]

[quote author="Geert Heyrman"]Hi Puncho,

Thx for the reply. I noticed there is a battery in the ledmeterunit.

Geert[/quote]

which one? do you mean the meter bridge atop the unit or on a control card under the transport but not all the way down to the I/O cards?

 

[Svart]

film caps rarely go bad with age. Since lyitcs have a liquid in them they tend to dry out over the years which is why you need to recap over time, unless of course they are bad but that's usually another problem.

 

[Geert Heyrman]

Hi Puncho. At this time I only found one in the meterbridg. The card says 1.820.783-02 MP-Unit VU-Panel. The battery is a lithium 1/2 AA 3,6 volts SL-150 type of battery. Are there other batteries I have to change?

Cheers,

Geert

 

[Geert Heyrman]

Svart,

I bet my girlfriend likes that explanation a lot. If there is no need to recap then maybe better that I spare the effort. Thx for the advise.

Cheers,

Geert

 

[pucho812]

hmmm I do not have an a820 manual on hnad so I am taking a guess. I will FTP the manual tonight and go over it... It seems weird to me from a design point to have it at the meter bridge as one would think it would be closer to the necessary circuit. but then again they could ahve placed it their for easy access. I would wait. FTP the manual from studer the link above as they have the tech manual... let me get back to you...

 

[Geert Heyrman]

Wow Puncho,

That would be realy nice. By the way, the correct name of the PCB is "MP-UNIT VU PANEL MCH 1.820.783.25" I see that one IC has been changed as part of a needed software upgrade. I will keep my hands off the studer for now and wait what you'll find out.

Today I also asked JRF for the record and reprohead. They asked 2150 USD for one head. they had a good argument, that it had to be custom made, but the fact that their flux heads only have an average lifespan of 3 to 4000 hours seems a little low. Especially if you compare them to the studer 318 heads. Am I misinterpreting the data here? If I track and mix like 30 hours for one band....that means I would have to charge each band 40 euro extra for using the studer to end up brake-even just for the heads. Although I read some nice things about the JRF heads I was wondering wether someone can direct me to a recording head manufacturer that manufacturs like more robust heads.

Regards,

Geert

 

[Michael Tibes]

I just quickly browsed this thread, but do you know that there is a secret switch you have to unlock in order to save certain parameters? There is a little hole beside the opening on the front right hand side as well as on the meterbridge if I remember right (It's been a while since I handled one of these babys). It takes an 'Imbus' (don't know the english word for that) screwdriver and the screw inside the machine unlocks the saving options.
Nevertheless it's a good idea to replace the batteries. But I would expect all data to be gone afterwards, so be prepared with alignment tapes and perhaps a manual to redo the settings. It looks like the manual should be on the Studer server. If your machine has the tape interface option, you could save the settings to tape (or better a computer nowadays) using that. It's a card that fits into the front where the tape transport cards sit.
Congretulations to your buy, this is really a great machine. If you make it to put it into a 'nearly new' condotion, it should perhaps serve you a lifetime afterwards since it might not get used as much as it was designed for in the old days.

Michael

 

[Geert Heyrman]

Hi,

Yes I was aware of that option in the studer A820. But it didn't enable me to store allignmentchanges. At the moment I have located two batteries in the studer A820 witch I'm going to replace soon.

I do really love this machiene a lot. I'm currently looking to buy some sparemachienes for parts. Had a deal for 7500 USD for two but I.... negotiated a little to hard.

Anyway I'll get back to you people after I replaced the batteries.

Regards,

Geert

 

[SSLtech]

There should be FIVE (5) basically identical microprocessor cards on the A820: One in the remote, one in the meterbridge, one for the autocal, one for the transport and a fifth one... em... -I forget.

Anyhow, check them all. If you're replacing one battery, replace ANY that use battery backup, since the gases that they emit after a few years are corrosive and can EAT the traces off of circuit boards.

Keith

 

[Geert Heyrman]

Hi Keith,

Thx for the reply. I'll have to go looking for the other batteries :grin:
Many thx

Geert

 

[ioaudio]

[quote author="Geert Heyrman"]Wow Puncho,[/quote]

poor pucho, always the same...

 

[Tillmann]

[quote author="Svart"]film caps rarely go bad with age. Since lyitcs have a liquid in them they tend to dry out over the years which is why you need to recap over time, unless of course they are bad but that's usually another problem.[/quote]

For redundancy's sake, I just want to echo this point. Don't bother recapping anything other than the lytics, and I would really have some good listens to the machine before even recapping them at this point. My two questions are:

1. Did the machine have heavy hours on it already?

2. How long has it sat inactive?

If the answer to question one is not many and the answer to question two is not too long, then I would not even bother changing the electrolytics unless you're hearing problems. That's just me though, however I am generally a strong proponent of recapping. Maybe others have something else to say on recapping the lytics on such a machine?

T

 

[Geert Heyrman]

Hi

The machiene has really low hours and the heads have practically no wear. To my knowledge this machiene has not been used in the last 8 years and prior to that was only used for transferring. Tapedeckmachanics are in perfect condition and the sound seems to be perfect on all channels. So I will not recap.

Regards,

Geert

 

[pucho812]

[quote author="ioaudio"][quote author="Geert Heyrman"]Wow Puncho,[/quote]

poor pucho, always the same...[/quote]

yeah kicked around like a dirty mutt

 

[Walrus]

In my experience of the A820 24 track, it is the cards directly underneath the head block that may need recapping. Especially if the machine has had Dolby SR cards in and got very hot.
The cards in the pull out draws never had a problem with capacitors in the 14 years they were used.
Had to replace all the Dolby switching relays on the audio mother boards though..... :wink: