Fender G-DEC not working, Help!!!

[ozzu2000]

I never really liked these kind of amp with too much electronics inside, normally SS amps are bulletproof, but these one seem very fragile
I got my hand in one of these G-DEC amps, but it's non operational... sometimes, if I kick it, it will come back to live tough!

Do you have any ideia of what this could be?

Video here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBSHPsBcTtY

[ozzu2000]

Fixed!
It turned out to be a problem on the power supply, 1 bad solder joint on one of the diodes!  xP

It was a matter of melting the old solder and apply a bit of fresh one. Done. 

[bobhill]

Sometimes you just gotta know where to hit them.

[spud]

There was a web site somewhere (I'll try to find the link) where someone got a G-DEC (I think the lower end one) and found a fried diode in it, replaced it and bang it worked fine.  He found them in a dumpster at some repair place (could have been Fender, I'm not sure).  They had been "damaged" on purpose to make them of no commercial value, then they were dumped out back.  This guy found a few of them and started repairing them.  I'll try to find the link as the problem may be common to that model - it was a very tiny diode, not sure exactly where but once it was replaced it worked.  The guy repaired the other damage and presto working G-DEC.  I'll update with the link once I find it.

Found it: 

http://www.lojeck.com/brian/GdecRepair.html

And they were 2 G-DEC Jrs. 

And re-reading it, it was a pico-fuse that fried.  Also, he got them off ebay but they were damaged to "prevent" (more like discourage) someone from scavenging them and trying to repair them (which was done). 

Jim

[J M Fahey]

I don't think they were damaged *on purpose*, what would they gain by that?
And if they wanted to, a hammer to the PCB or plugging it into 240V with a nail as a fuse would be much more "definitive".
Fact is, Fender has a long list of "do not repair" products, where they prefer to send you a new one and order you to dump the bad one; obviously unrepaired.
*Some* Techs with a *big* heart, such as our friend Enzo, often repair a few and give them for free to some charity, but that's on their own.
But they are forbidden to resell them.
The Tech is only allowed to pull a couple parts, such as knobs or, say, the speaker, if it may be useful for him in a future repair.
Yes, I would also go dumpster hunting at any Tech shop, that's for sure