Pretty dissapointing results with this amp repair :(

[deez283 10+ year member]

I have a Oldschool Zapco Z300 competition amp (black one) which I sent to a board member here to be fixed... In the end it didn't get fixed or even shipped back put together....

When I contacted this person I explained what happended to the amp, He said "Sounds like it blew up the audio section..not a problem repair will be 70.00 or less and should take 7 - 10 days"

That sounded great to me so I sent it off to him and he recieved it Late Febuary...

Some time went by and he contacted me saying it needs 16 new outputs 8 per channel and this will be 75.00 for parts .. he will have them in 5-7 days and another day or 2 to put it back together...so I sent him the money that day via paypal...

So a couple more weeks go by and he emails me again. This time he says the amp has bad drivers and this is very bad news cause they are no longer available as they are the same ones used in the original Orion HCCA amps and my amp is basically a copy of the original HCCA line with a few changes... But they have not been available for quite sometime so He'll have to see if he can locote some used parts or something...

Well in the meantime I email zapco and ask if thie parts are available and they tell me yes, So I let him know and he emails me right away saying..

"I got the parts in today..I just got them a little while ago..I'll work on your amp tomorrow morning..Zapco stocks all the parts except the drivers..they offer a alternate part number and It will not work under a one ohm load...Same problem with older orions as they use the same part in the HCCA's for the driver"

I figure ok cool well maybe this will get done after all..

well when I hear back finally he says My amp can't be fixed there's another problem with it he can't track down and he's shipping it back and tells me sorry I had to spend 105.00 for nothing (shipping and parts)..

Well today I finally got it back after waiting since Febuary...

I opened the Box to find my amp not even put together... The end plates are in a bag with all the screws.. The bottom plate is just sitting there.. The speaker terminal screws were just thrown in the amp sitting on the board rolling around I only found 2... the three 30 amp fuses are gone etc...

Now tell me this.. Are all amp repairs handled this way?? This is the first amp I've ever sent off to be fixed and after this not sure I ever want to again..

Sorry for the long read but I'm pretty bummed over this..

So

Click to read more...

 

[Slo_Ride 5,000+ posts]

Who was it? Because thats some serious ********.

 

[deez283 10+ year member]

I'll share the name in a few after a little feedback.. really didn't want to call anybody out, But man I can't help but to feel I took it in the ass on this one..

while were at it.. I still want the amp fixed any good places or should I just go through Zapco and see if they will fix it?? It's a pretty tough amp to find when they pop up for sale people want 499.99 - 599.99 or so..

 

[sulin's baby 10+ year member]

I repair amps on the side myself from time to time...and normaly no this isnt the way amp repairs are handled. I usualy test ALL the components I can before even ordering parts. I go through and run test on special made boards to try and replicate nominal use under normal conditions. Then...and only then do I order parts and ask for money. For the simple fact that with any electronics repair you NEVER know what can happen. Some components can seem fine when tested and when fired back up after repair go bad in just a few days. Sounds like this guy was a **** up!

 

[misfit138 5,000+ posts]

What a shame.

 

[Slo_Ride 5,000+ posts]

I'll share the name in a few after a little feedback.. really didn't want to call anybody out, But man I can't help but to feel I took it in the ass on this one..
while were at it.. I still want the amp fixed any good places or should I just go through Zapco and see if they will fix it?? It's a pretty tough amp to find when they pop up for sale people want 499.99 - 599.99 or so..

No doubt about it, rawdogged it at that.

 

[O.G. D-Wet 10+ year member]

**** thats fukd up!!! holy ****! I'd cry! I'm already almost crying and its not my ****!

 

[Tone415 10+ year member]

**** thats fukd up!!! holy ****! I'd cry! I'm already almost crying and its not my ****!

lmao

 

[hispls 5,000+ posts]

Zed Audio repairs any make/model of amp. If you've never dealt with him, let me just say his customer service is top notch and he is definitely an amp genius.

Also Cali probably won't be too rough for you to ship back and forth to.

 

[deez283 10+ year member]

Right on I'll drop Robert at Zapco and zed audio an email...

As far as the repair guy from these boards.. His screen Name was amprepairman anybody else have any dealings with him good or bad?

 

[chardy85 10+ year member]

Son of a b****. I had a feeling you were going to say it was him.

I met him in person and actually sent him to this site. He had posts on Craigslist. He actually had a ton of experience fixing amps...even high end equipment from churches and home theater stuff....

He repaired quite a few amps on this board including one I had. It worked fine when he was done....

He is now in the Hospital which may be why it came back so shitty. I know he had his daughter taking care of his paperwork and other stuff. I had one user from here.. jh****....I can't remember the numbers in his screenname. But he had a problem with the dude fixing and upgrading his 800hc Visonik. I guess he sort of just lost contact with him. Since he knew I had met him in person he asked me to find out what was going on. Nobody would answer his cell phone so I sent it a nice text. His daughter "Christina" told me they were not answering calls that he was in the hospital. She said to send any inquiries to his yahoo email address. jh*** said that he got ahold of her and she said she was shipping the amp back to him but it wasn't done.

I know the guy knew his stuff....he actually let me see the amp working after he fixed mine....

Sorry you had to go through all of that ****.

 

[DonH 5,000+ posts]

why i go with Steve at ampmedics.net

 

[deez283 10+ year member]

Yeah I heard he was in the hospital.. But does anybody know for a fact this is true?? he had been loggin into this site the whole time and contacting me via email too.. Also he goes by 2 names??? in all of our emails he went by Carl but in his profile he goes by louis

He sent me an email on 3/22/2010

saying he had the parts needed to fix my amp...

Then never heard anything until 4/14/2010

he sent a email saying sorry for the delay I just got out of the hospital I'll have your amp shipped in a couple days.

Then 4/20/2010

I got email saying "We are sorry that this is the end result but we cant do anything else with your amp..We will be putting it back together and shipping it out sometime this week..We will pay for return shipping back to you"

Well they didn't even bother putting it back together I got it all torn apart..

He then emailed me the next day 4/21/2010 saying how much time he put into the amp and can't continue putting hours into it...

In the emails it said "WE" so is this a one man operation or a company?

and if he had fixed hundreds of amps for people on this site where are they to vouch for him? I've seen one or 2 people but I know of a handfull who's had there amps with him for multiple months and could not contact him while I was talking to him daily...

 

[chardy85 10+ year member]

I believe his name is Carl Louis Gastreich.....Louis being his middle name.

When he said "we" I think he just meant his Company..He does have a business license but he logs everything as Labor because in Missouri you don't have to pay taxes on Labor only...but as far as I know he was the only one doing the work. He told me he had his daughter do the paperwork and other stuff. She may have been the one sending most of the emails.

I didn't realize he was out of the hospital and I haven't talked to him in a while. I don't know for a fact that it is true I just know what the text message said from his "daughter" on his phone. I am in no way taking up for him I was just letting you know everything I know. Hit me up with a PM if you want his Cell phone #.

Also, I said he fixed quite a few of amps not hundreds....

If you want feedback from others that have got amps fixed I would check out his original thread. I remember seeing some people saying they got amps back in working order.....

 

[revrider1 5,000+ posts]

***** man, id be pissed...