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I went and reclaimed my Kenwood 600 from my brother in law on Sunday. I gave it to him about 25 years ago along with the tuner, after trading up to Adcoms. He just had them sitting gathering dust for the last 20 years, and every time I go to visit it breaks my heart to see them.
I bought it in Jamacia in the late seventies from a good friend, and migrated to the USA with it.
The ugly damage on the faceplate was the result of it sliding off the hood of the car, the night I gave it to him and he placed it on there to open the car door. :(
I even have a new spare set of output transistors, the manual and service manual.
Anyway, it is so dirty I do not know where to start. Just vacuuming will not do this, its like looking into a dirty car engine, I just feel like spraying it with degreaser and hosing it down.
So whats the best electronic wash to use, Craigclean? should I do it in sections, or just blast away?
Also, if you have any ideas how to fix the faceplate, with out making it look worse, please tell.
I do not even know if it works, I plugged it in briefly, pressed the power button, the relay clicked in but the power light did not come on. then I began to smell things heating up, so I unplugged it.
Hopefully it was just the dirt frying :)
AB.
Follow Ups:
My humble advice. Never use windex on the lettering and numbers on a dial glass. I tried once and it ate the numbers off. The front of the glass is probably okay but if the glass comes out for cleaning the numbers are (silk screened?) put on the back side and windex cleaning will eat them. Soap and water, if cleaning is necessary.
I'm not necessarily advocating this, but I heard of a novel (though not new) cleaning method last Summer when I was visiting the VintageTek museum in Portland, OR.
My Dad was explaining how they cleaned oscilloscopes when they came in for service back in the day. They were all built point-to-point, discrete components, tubes and all. He asked me how I thought they cleaned them. I suggested the usual - brushes, cloths dampened with water or solvents, etc.
He said no; that was way too slow to keep up with the volume. The eventual solution was to open the scopes up, and remove the tubes. Any paper caps were covered with condoms, and the insides of the scope were hosed off with soapy and then clear water. They were then dried in a pizza oven.
The only change I would make would be to rinse liberally with distilled water, to avoid leaving deposits that might be conductive. After dumping a cup of coffer in my running laptop, I looked up what to do on the internet. I followed the directions, which were to:
1. Turn it off immediately. I'd already done that.
2. Remove battery.
3. Rinse in distilled water. Really? Yup.
4. Repeat using fresh distilled water until you're pretty sure you got it all. I repeated until I couldn't smell coffee two times.
5. Drain as well as possible.
6. Allow to dry THOROUGHLY. I left it on an air conditioning vent in several orientations for two days. Worked fine afterwords.
I think I will take the slow way. Besides, my oven is not quite big enough. :)
AB.
should I try straightening it, and how? take it off and beat it with a hammer? :)
AB
I've had faceplates & chassis arrive with dings and bent corners, in steel and aluminum, and unless you have access to a full machine shop and screenprinting facilities, it's very rare that you can improve it, let alone restore it to original condition. Best you can do with typical resources is to conserve and clean it up - which has its own charm, I've come to accept.
I've found from years of fooling around with brushed aluminum plates - less IS more.
The more you try to correct that dent - the more scuffs you'll put in that plate.
Sorry
charles
Get yourself a soft paint brush from the dollar store and they come in a 2 or 3 pack of different sizes..Take a brush along with a small shop vac or regular vacuum with small attachments and brush and suck up the dust and dirt.You will get 85 to 90% of the dirt that way and then you go over things with a Windex dampened cloth.
Honest amplification is better than excessive 2nd order distortion anytime.
Or now that the weather is getting warmer, my preferred method is to take the job into my backyard. Using the same brushes, and some canned air, I set the dust free. Maybe it will find a new home in one of my neighbors computers or amps.
By using Mikey's method of getting rid of most of the dirt, you avoid creating the "mud" you might if you start off with a wet cleaning.
Just hope and pray that the amp wasn't used in the frying area of a restaurant kitchen. Greasy dust ain't no fun!
Vacuum and fine hair brushes. BTW I owned a KA-7300 that I gave to a friend 35 years ago. I bought for the low noise preamp, dual power supplies and the great feel of that large volume knob! Looked him up on fb last fall - He still has the amp and works great! My Phillips TT (model 212) he also purchased hadn't survived the years (or a half dozen moves) though
Three most important things in Audio reproduction: Keep the noise levels low, the power high and the room diffuse.
Good idea! There is a lot of harmful junk in that stuff. I was shocked when I read the label. Better safe that sorry!
Dave
for PCBs I use 99% isopropanol and a paint brush. Brush on alcohol liberally and use the bristles to apply a gentle scrubbing action I tuck a few paper towels along the bottom edge of the boards (tilting the chassis a bit) and soak up the excess. allow some time to dry, of course before turning on.
Don't use the 70% rubbing alcohol as it often contains a perfume. The 90%
alcohol found at many drug stores is ok but the additional water takes longer to dry.
and I accidentally got some on the plexiglas or plastic gauges. The gauge faces are now slightly opaque.
a friend made up a cleaning fluid which works marvelously well, particularly if you have leaky electrolytic and oil filled caps. He mixee 409 with ammonia. Kinda strong smelling but it sure cuts through the gunk unbelievably well. I follow with the alcohol wash though.
Mix ratio? Ammonia is strong stuff.
You may need to wirebrush the grounds of those pesky RCA connectors. They look corroded.
I ruined a few old pieces of gear before I realized that the ammonia in Windex was destroying the original light coat of varnish on the front plate. In a way that was irreperable.
If you EVER see anyone headed for a hi-fi panel with Windex, Stop them. Use a weak solution of dish detergent and water with a nice soft paintbrush.
Windex is, however, pretty good for hosing down a chassis before you stick it under the shower. Not as good as the power washers at the coin-operated car wash but better than nothing.
On occasion, I've had problems with Windex & silkscreen. Not common, but it pays to 'test on an inconspicuous surface' first, or at least proceed with caution around lablels. I wouldn't kid ya...
Another tip, FWIW -- I think that the best (safest) way to use Windex is to spray it on a paper towel or cleaning cloth and use the Windex-dampened cloth to clean, rather than to spray it directly on the surface being cleaned.
Emery cloth is good for cleaning up mild oxidation on RCA jacks &c. Also worth a try in many such cases is a little CAIG DeOxit D5 shpritzed on a Q-tip.
all the best,
mrh
...the Windex (and some other cleaners) available in my location contain water miscible solvents...smell like glycol-ethers. The solvent attacks many paints and lacquers...from personal experience.
On the Deluxe Reverb I just recapped, I remove most of the heavy stuff (irons, some circuit boards), used a wet rag with a little Liquid Wrench on it. A brass brush. Then, finally some Simichrome on the chassis.
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