Bose amp repair update

[David Head]

I've dropped of a front amp to a local place for repair. Had a great
discussion with their Bose guru. His personal car is a 90 Nissan Maxima
w/Bose.
The failure mode of Bose amps is due to 2 basic problems, according to
him. First, the capacitors are cheap - its only a matter of time until
they fail, causing failure of the mosfets and/or the IC drivers.
Secondly, the glue that is used on the board breaks down, forms an acid
that eats up the board and solder pads. This is coumpounded by the
failure of them to conformal coat the boards.
He removes all caps and replaces them, replaces boards where they are
too far gone, removes the glue, conformal coats and replaces the IC
drivers with ones he salvages from other boards. He provides a 3 year
warrentee - longest of all the website repair places I've found. So my
goal of finding a replacement driver is still stymied.
Bottom line at this point - if you have Bose amps and have electronic
repair expertise or know someone that does - get those caps replaced.
It'll save you big bucks. The glue removal I'll talk with him about next
time.
This is a small shop that does flat rate repairs on all car stereos/CDs.
The MK Elite place has a tech taught by him, who's main business is
selling women's underwear. Dave's cool stuff sells new front Caddillac
amps, which will fix your amp problems but through off the Bose designed
equalization curve. The amps are the same left to right, but have
different filter circuits front to back, along with different IC
drivers.
For the website info: http://carstereohelp.com/audi.htm
If you call, talk to Lewis.

IUD
Dave Head