I love my Crates I have a GFX212-GX212-CR212(old marked SLM made in STLouis)-GX20M(just fixed up sounds AWESOME)
However the GX20M is the only one still working right.
I hope to fix them with some help from these forums.

I would say play the amp and see for yourself how it sounds.

My friend has a Crate G160 it has a single 12 EVM spkr and is absolutely incredible sounding.I like it better than my GX series amps.
You should be able to find a decent used 100watt Crate combo for 100$ or so.

EDIT:Crap I feel so stupid right now :duh
I think Teemuk is right and I think I found the problem as I was getting ready to take pics for
him.
I will let you know as soon as I find the camera,I think the others with the same problems proly did the same thing...The simplest oversight ever...


Thanks again for the input and sticking with me through this guys.
And Teemuk while I hold your opinoin in the HIGHEST regard same as RG and the like.
I am 90% certain that this chip will NOT work with the application circuit from the data sheet.
Please, no disrespect intended I very much appreciate your time helping me with this.
After days googling I found a company called Conrad offers kits with these chips and forums from europe are full of people having the same issues as me.
One guy reported his IC exploded after a days use and was propelled through his enclosure on to the floor where it burnt a hole in his rug his heat sink was twice the size of my Pentium3 sink and was pure copper-not to say he had it wired right he went off the data sheet.BUT STILL EXPLODED?
Its kinda hard to mess up a layout that only involves 3caps-I have succesfully built TrainWreck -Marshall clones  which is much more difficult and layout sensitive than this chip amp.
BUT I am not an engineer just a monkey who can read schematics...And copy others.

YES I have a DC offset issue,BUT why IDK
I will post a schematic of my preamp so you can explain what I am doing wrong.
I fried a second chip sort of,I overloaded the input with my guitar and a single FET now the DC offset makes the chip unusable I have one more left.
Apparently this chip needs a very low input my guitar is enough to drive it.
My best luck so far was with a single 22uf cap on one side of the spkr and a 56n from input to ground this only had two issues,
The Volume was like a tone control (first order filter) so that 90% volume offered the best tone.
The other issue was it still oscillated at low-no volume.
I fixed this by moving the volume pot behind the buffer after my tone control.
This produced a lower output but no oscillation and no tone change with the use of the volume pot.
It was actually pretty decent at this point just not a 10-12 watt output,so I continued.

Every stage of my pre-amp is decoupled with 100-330n caps.And I used a .47uf input cap to the PA.
I also tried my Multi FX staight in through a 1m volume and a FET buffer it has both line-and low level output,even the low level output was overloading it at 3/4 volume.
I am going to go with another chip but would like to learn why I had so much difficulty with DC offset and oscillation.
I also learned its better to have a chip that uses external components for feedback and gain control ,decoupling and the like.

What about using two wall warts to make a bipolar supply like 2X9V 1amp or 2X12V 1amp supplies.?
I was even thinking along the lines of 16AA nihm cells for a +/-12V supply would that have enough current to run the lm3886 to 15-20watts?

Also I have a 42VCT 80VA toroidal for my lm3886 amp just wondering could I use two of these transformers to make a 84VCT 160VA supply for two 3886 chips bridged together?

Sorry I know that's 3 questions But I really appreciate the help before I start messing with these chips.

OK thanks for that I believe it is oscillating "wildly"
Update I have tried so much its about 50% there,
I increased the heat sink even more- used one off a pentium3 That helped alot,let me realize the spkr had to be decoupled.
The data sheet is wrong I used a 220uf on each side of the spkr this got it going,NO HEAT :tu:
But still oscillating at low and high vloume and not much sound,sounds awful still :trouble.
Tried the 6800pf from input to ground this helped the oscillation at low volume.
Messed around with adding Bourchers cells changing the cap values going to the spkr.
Changing the value of the 6800pf cap,no improvement.
Added a 56K resistor from input to ground fried the first chip,WHY?

Finally just used one cap on the spkr- big volume increase so different values I try.
Anything smaller than 22uf it oscillates at low or no volume.
Anything larger and I start loosing volume but still oscillating at higher volume.
At this point with the 6800pf cap and the 22uf on one side of the spkr it sounds like a decent 3-5 watts it actually gets a nice distortion by uping the gain on my clean channel.
The dirty channel oscillates at all but the lowest gain needed to get the signal through the two clipping diodes in the feedback loop of the 5532 chip.
So where its normally louder its now the quieter of the two and its easier just to use the clean channel with a pedal.
So if I can just get rid of the oscillation at higher volumes this amp will be ready to put in an enclosure.
ANY SUGGESTIONS PLEASE?
I tried running it off an 18V 1.5amp power supply with no improvement over the 8 AA nihm cells.
Should signal ground be separated from power ground with a cap or resistor?
Do I need some kind of RC network between the SPKR leads?

OK I know the lm3886 likes a bipolar supply around 50VCT.
But I am having trouble with another chip amp that was supposed to use 12V 2A supply for 12watts could I run the Lm3886 on that and just get reduced output say around 15watts would be great at .01 %THD
I know it works on a straight DC supply as well, just wondering if 12V 2A is enough (isnt that roughly 20VA?) and what the output power would be around?
I got the chips cheap enough to experiment with too BTW so I dont mind not getting its full potential.

Nice job is it finished yet?
I like the schematic to recording deal, makes it easy for someone like me to repeat.

OK I triple checked everything Googled for hours,and even found a German forum where they were having the same problem(but I dont read German)so I dont know how they fixed it.
Only the guys amp was heating up super fast (like mine)and the solution involved pins 2 and 5 and the ground being tied to the power? Isnt that just a short?
I was able to translate one page and He smoked several chips ordered 4 more still having the same problem,
He stated it was either bad chips or data sheet error?
Then(on the next page which I couldnt get to translate)he solved the problem very simply,
And said it roared to life and embellished the thread with beer drinking smily's

So I used a much larger heat sink with fins ,now it takes about two minutes to heat up  :loco
I have sound and at one volume its actually pretty good.About halfway its decent tone.
I am using a 50K pot instead of the 100k I had before.
With the volume turned down it makes a horrible hum sorta noise and with the volume up its a terrible screech.

Does this info help? I can tell this amp will be quite loud if I ever getting running right.

On the TV schematics I found they have a 6800pf going from the input to ground what does this do?
Also one schematic had both sides of the RL tied to ground with .1 caps again why?
And shouldnt the spkr have caps on both the +and- terminals since its floating?
Sorry if these seem like silly questions but I am trying to understand this chip and circuit,and really want to get this working.

Hi thanks for the replys.
I have the caps on the wire to pin 7 I have it wired exactly like the data sheet.
The only difference between mine and Munkeys' diagram is I have only one signal + going to pins 1 and 9 and have pins 5 and 2 going to ground.
His "corrected" schematic shows the + signal going to both pins 1 and 9 and pins 2 and 5 as well,surely this is a mistake right?
The amp has to be grounded somewhere doesnt it?

As far as using a different chip ,I already bought these and would like to make this work.
If you look at the picture of Munkeys amp you will see the EXACT same heat sink I am using.
He stated that he added that after the fact,My chip would have already melted had I not had it.
I think it takes less than a minute for it to heat up so much its almost to hot to touch.
(the sink not the chip)
I have checked pin 3 and have exactly half V+ there so I assume thats correct in BTL it shows it not connected to anything.
As it is I get sound but the HEAT makes me shut it down.
Shouldnt this chip shut down by itself if it were to overheat?
Isnt that what they mean by thermal shutdown and overload protection?

I really appreciate any help with this as I am well  :loco after trying all day and night yesterday to no avail.

UPDATE the problems were solved and soon I will update with schematics and finished build pics,I hope this thread helps someone else.

UPDATE here is the latest schematic working great so far.
http://i419.photobucket.com/albums/pp276/Bry928/SolidState%20Amps/12Watt-TDA1519B%20build/12WattTDA1519B_schematic.jpg
NEW SCHEMATIC COMING MUCH BETTER
CAB COMING SOON!

Here are some sound clips they sound like they were compressed for the server,if anyone wants the original MP3s PM me
http://vibecat.com/brymus

Hi all,I need some help I recently got some tda1519b chips and decided to make a guitar amp with one.
I followed the schematic in the application notes for the BTL at 12watts and simply replaced the LM386 in my Ruby type amp with the tda1519b using the right pins and a small heat sink.
I am using a 12V supply with a switch between pins 7 and 8.
The pre amp is a TubeScreamer topology using a NE5532 and a few FETS it sounds great going into the lm386 but the tda1519b not so much.
Also this thing is getting HOT I mean REALLY HOT!
I have a 8 ohm load and after a minute or so I am shutting it off cause of the excessive heat.I am using a fairly good size heat sink but maybe not enough.

I am powering the amp with 8 AA nihm cells putting out just under 12V
And for testing I am using two 16ohm 5watt spkrs in parallel from an old TV.

After almost 5hrs of googling this http://munkey.hopto.org/projectsdir/audiodir/simpleamp.php  and 2 TV schematics are the only schematics I can find.
I have it like this but its not right can someone show me what I am doing wrong?
I have been trying all day to make this work without any luck.
Is my input V or my input Z wrong? If it works great with the 386 chip?