Can I use a lamp limiter to discharge capacitors ? I was thinking that if the L/L was connected to the amps power cable and then completed the circuit that the all capacitors could be discharged.

If not what is the correct / best practice way to go about surviving around them ?

I've had this 1980's SS Peavey PA 100 for longer than I can remember.

It started to develop a lot of loud static ie pops & crackles even with all pots at zero. This static makes the PA useless for say a low volume level vocal / guitar etc. Increase in PA volume doesn't affect the static volume so it's ok for high volume performance. Not every wants the musicians blowing them away

Took it to a tech who says that he'd have to start at replacing all the transistors, which would add up to many hrs and cost $400 or so.
His advice was to junk it and buy another PA.

Thought I could do the transistors myself. The problem I have is as a newbie to involved electronics [ I can do guitar electrics etc ] when I started to check out
how and which transistors to replace I realised I don't know enough. I found that Peavey has a list of replacement transistors but I found that the original and the suggested replacement have different Base wires eg existing transistor has Base as middle but replacement has Base as left side wire. See attached diagram.

A number of replacement transistors have different base wires to the original so that's got me really confused.

Any help would be great as I don't want to junk this PA. Also haven't got the money for another better one.