Equipment fails!

mjbphotos

mjbphotos

Moderator
Everything has a shelf life... why does everything start failing at once?

1) Shure SM58 - the 'workhorse' of live mics, had mine for 11 years, got free from someone here It's taken a few drops, but never hiccupped. Brought it to a backyard open mic, plug it in, no sound. Go to remove the cable, and the whole connector piece comes out - with one wire missing. Shoved it back in, but can't get it out now!

2) AKG Perception 220 mic - had this for 10 years. It has taken a couple of falls when the boom stand went over. The capsule piece that holds the diaphragm broke (ceramic!) I took it apart a couple of months ago, glued the broken part. The glue let go the other day. Will try epoxy next.

3) Mackie mixer - had this for 11 years, its my workhorse mixer for live use, running open mics and gigs, so lots of transporting, etc. At my open mic 2 weeks ago, 2nd-to-last performer, all of a sudden, loud distortion from one speaker. Tested everything at home, cables, mics, turns out its one of the (2) main outputs. I can daisy-chain from the other speaker, and in a pinch, if the good output goes bad, I can adapt from the monitor output.

4) No-name Chinese bluetooth page turner pedal I have for my tablet - every once in a while the 'page down' button wouldn't work, usually it would free up if I moved the page by fingertouch. Yesterday, that side of the pedal completely failed - luckily at home, not at a gig!
 
I almost NEVER take my old '76 LP Custom out of the house anymore. I keep it home for recording. 45 years and nothing has ever failed on it. So....of course....I decided to take it over to a friends house to fill in for a band practice....since I hadn't played it in a band in quite some time and wanted to "remember". So....about one minute into playing....the jack gave out. Stuttering input. It's as if the old LP was telling me......hey.....let me rest. Easy fix.....but spooky.

Mick
 
No, he pissed off the voodoo dolls ! 👹 👺 He told them to chuck their standalone DAWS because they're old tech and rubbish. 😹 😂
 
I have experienced this too. A lot of my 90's gear started failing by the mid 2000's. By then, lot's of things were moving to the DAW so some gear I didn't repair. Some things I was able to repair myself or pay a small cost for repair.

Items that have failed.
- Quad Channel Noise Gate
- 2 Channel Compressor
- 2 x SM57's - easily repaired myself
- Mixing Board power supply - $150 to repair
- 8 Track Reel to Reel - Fixed myself enough to be able to sell it
- One of my ADAT machines - who cares!
- older VDrum Module - Roland attempted to repair twice. Problem kept coming back.
- a gigillion failed cables of course. Thank god for soldering irons!!
 
I hate unreliable gear but the things you listed are quite reliable. I've had the same 3 SM57s, 2 SM58s, and a Mackie 16 channel mixer for over 25 years now. All of them still work beautifully.

OTOH I had an ADAT which was an absolute piece of garbage. In and out of the shop 3 times, never worked right.

My Orange Rockerverb sounds nice but the darn thing isn't working yet again. 2nd breakdown in 6 years of light use. Very annoying.

I've got a '64 fender showman, that thing is a beast. Indestructable. Same goes for my Mesa Boogie DC-5. Heavy use, going on 25 years-old, zero problems ever. Pilot light had to be replaced twice actually lol.
 
I've been very lucky with real failures. I've had the odd sticky fader, but up till last week, my recording kit failures are the video card in the music computer which cuts out the monitor two output randomly, and a power supply failure on my old Tascam interface. Last week, however, my new PA,bought just before Covid, and warranty expired before I used it was being used for a tribute show in a 1400 seater venue. The touring crew seemed nice and I trusted them. The lighting guy told me they really pushed the subs and kick and bass guitar were really heavy until halfway through the second half when it got thinner. He didn't mention it until the next show came in and they said the subs were making funny noises. Testing things revealed one sub making nasty banging noises. I suspect it's cone over excursion and the former popped out and damaged the edge so turning it up sounds nasty. The other 3 are fine and I do have two spares that I've added. It's fine now and looking at the price of new drivers - thank goodness it is just one 18". Amp power wise, there is plenty and there were two amps for the 4 subs - but each capable of more than the RMS rating of the speakers. I'm annoyed they didn't tell me. They actually said something on the lines of - we noticed you didn't have a limiter on the system so we changed the desk to use the matrix outputs and popped a limiter on them. I bet they did that when they heard the problem! Even more annoying the damaged one is the top unit in a flown drop of speakers.
 
I have an circa 1983 Acoustic G60T combo that I bought brand new in Seattle, dragged down to Texas in ~1985, moved to several different places over the next 23 years and then in 2008 I built a house and it took about two years for me to get the studio set up and running again. Lo and behold, my amp did not work anymore. Took me another year to getting around to fixing it(had other amps to use anyway). Now I am super gentle with it whereas I used to be pretty hard on it.

Right now I am building a repair/restring area in my studio and one of the first things in line is my old Mac g4 which suddenly stopped powering up about two months ago.
 
Absolute rubbish! It last the same time as other products made at different price levels. There is a kind of paranoia about country of origin. One of my nicest sounding microphones was made in Soviet controlled East Germany years back. My favourite stereo microphone was built for me in China nearly 20 years ago. Behringer are now widely accepted on riders in the same way they were not years ago, but I still have Behringer kit from the so called terrible years and it's been great. Same with other processors dating from the 90s - Of course there is total rubbish too, that's really unreliable, but much British classic gear was appalling unreliable, with terrible quality control. We also have a few American build guitar amps that have always needed a kick to stop them hissing like devils.

Most electronics from EVERY country will be a good reliable design, or sadly a bad one. The source country is NOT the reason for poor performance - it's poor design and poor components and they pop up everywhere. How many so called British and American brand kit is actually made quietly in China, imported and assembled and we rate it highly!

Apart from music gear, I have lots of communications equipment. Big American brands made from kits of assembled parts. I've been smiling how people get so angry the Chinese are producing counterfeits when they're really over-runs of equipment sold by the big-boys. When a model gets discontinued, at around 5 years from the new date, they suddenly appear. People cite them as counterfeits, but that's the expiry date of the contract and they quietly sell them into the Chinese or other markets, and a few find their way my way. Country of origin does actually matter when the products are sourced from a few countries. India and Pakistan are producing some kit now and they struggle with quality of materials and finish. Much is hand made but quite poorly. I had some unbranded monitor loudspeakers in wooden cabinets and the timber was very variable in quality. The plywood very light with lots of filler in the voids and very crumbly MDF. A plywood 12" wedge is a known weight that varies little between makes but the 4 Indian ones I bought were so light something was adrift. They actually sounded OK but have worn very badly. The textured paint appears to be black emulsion paint with sand in it! It flakes off badly. They were, however very cheap - but I won't buy more.
 
rob aylestone said:
Absolute rubbish! It last the same time as other products made at different price levels.
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There is no CCP equivalent to a Snap-on or a Mac wrench when you must go into tight places on heavy equipment. It's the steel-quality and the precision forgings that maximize your room to maneuver, and fit up so perfectly to the hardware. On the other-hand My China wrenches are rough-shod, and loose fitting. They'll strip a bolt head in a heartbeat. They're unusable in a tight spot.
Likewise, my father bought his dental tools from Germany. It's the steel. They lasted him a lifetime.



rob aylestone said:
There is a kind of paranoia about country of origin.
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There's kind of a paranoia when a building fails, and the construction company is liable. Bolts from Asia are mismarked quite often on their proof strength . As an engineer I'd never put those in a construction project, and risk people's lives, just to save a few bucks.

rob aylestone said:
One of my nicest sounding microphones was made in Soviet controlled East Germany years back.
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My Tung Sol tubes are made in Russia. I love them.


rob aylestone said:
My favourite stereo microphone was built for me in China nearly 20 years ago.
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My favorite needle nose pliers say St. Louis on one side, and China on the other. I bought them at a flea market -- at least 40 years ago. Guess which side was facing out. 😉

rob aylestone said:
How many so called British and American brand kit is actually made quietly in China, imported and assembled and we rate it highly!
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yup, that's what it goes back to. I have an SG guitar knock-off with a broken pick-up and a twist in the neck. Looking closely, I see it is made in dragon-land. You are welcome to come by and take it off my hands. I don't want it, and I hate to put it in a land fill. It retailed for maybe $200.
 
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We will have to differ, but I can assure you that the quality you get from China depends entirely on how much you are prepared to pay. They can make, and have the skills to make, almost anything - but we insist on buying rubbish - for silly money then complaining it is poor! You are totally biased and clearly pushing your point. No point saying any more - you'll just take snippets out of context again. Some of what you have said is complete squit!

I don't know how it works in America, but here I can buy a welder on ebay and make some brackets. I have a friend who is a coded welder - certified to work on off-shore platforms, nuclear power stations and really critical applications. His work and my work are not comparable. Where we physically are in the world is irrelevant. He's good and I'll be bad. I can't compete with the fact you hate China. I happen not to, and have found suppliers I like and can trust. I'll do business with anyone if they offer something I want. Asia is no different from other continents - you can buy decent or you can buy cheap - the buyer chooses one choice. If you are an engineer - you know all this. First module at university.
 
TBH nothing I've bought from China in many years has failed. People used to say that about Japan's products. My parents would never consider a car from Japan.....but never knew that the TV and stereo and many other things they bought were made in Japan.

Mick
 
rob aylestone said:
We will have to differ, but I can assure you that the quality you get from China depends entirely on how much you are prepared to pay. They can make, and have the skills to make, almost anything - but we insist on buying rubbish - for silly money then complaining it is poor! You are totally biased and clearly pushing your point. No point saying any more - you'll just take snippets out of context again. Some of what you have said is complete squit!

I don't know how it works in America, but here I can buy a welder on ebay and make some brackets. I have a friend who is a coded welder - certified to work on off-shore platforms, nuclear power stations and really critical applications. His work and my work are not comparable. Where we physically are in the world is irrelevant. He's good and I'll be bad. I can't compete with the fact you hate China. I happen not to, and have found suppliers I like and can trust. I'll do business with anyone if they offer something I want. Asia is no different from other continents - you can buy decent or you can buy cheap - the buyer chooses one choice. If you are an engineer - you know all this. First module at university.
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What does "squit" mean?
 
rob aylestone said:
You are totally biased and clearly pushing your point.
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Okay, well come on by and pick up the free guitar. I'd be playing it -- if it actually worked. The strings buzz and one pickup is 100% dead. made in China.

Personally I don't think a luthier can fix it for $200. A new one costs $200. I don't want it. Can you please come and get it? It has your name on it.
 
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Mickster said:
TBH nothing I've bought from China in many years has failed. People used to say that about Japan's products. My parents would never consider a car from Japan.....but never knew that the TV and stereo and many other things they bought were made in Japan.

Mick
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I thought I'd never buy another American-made car. I ended up buying a Ford van this year. The motor and transmission were assembled in the USA. The rest of the vehicle was assembled in Spain. It is strong and durable. The technology is up to date. Ford has been making vans for a long time. I was impressed with it.

I used to buy NOTHING BUT Nissan. They have fallen. The variable speed transmission on a Nissan van was a no-go for me. It shows up in the miserly Horse Power rating too. It saves on gas mileage, but the towing capacity is really weak. The puny looking tires tell it all.
 
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rob aylestone said:
I don't know how it works in America, but here I can buy a welder on ebay and make some brackets. I have a friend who is a coded welder - certified to work on off-shore platforms, nuclear power stations and really critical applications. His work and my work are not comparable..... you can buy decent or you can buy cheap - the buyer chooses one choice. If you are an engineer - you know all this.
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Accounting picks the cheapest one because the only thing they know is price. They don't know the technical side.

When we select vendors for an engineering project -- we almost never go with the cheapest one. They have NOT counted all the costs, and they end up short-cutting the job. In the end you get what you pay for. That has been our experience with it.
 
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