I read PS Audio is going direct sales
- Thread starter Mike B.
- Start date
Puma Cat
Well-known member
It's true.
They have already indicated - no price decreases. They are dealing with a new storm around acid and corrosion on the BHK300’s I understand. Not good. Neither is passing DC from the amp to the speakers. Good luck.
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- Thread Author
- #5
This is a company that has been around for a long time. I would imagine their dealer network is fairly large? Typical dealer discount is around 40%. I wonder if this is directly related to profits or poor support by dealers? I have heard about a couple guys buying the $5000 plus DAC for mid $3K. Don't know if that was widespread.
It was all about heavy discounting/resale by internet dealers. A problem they created themselves IMO. This is a dumb decision. What they should have done was cleaned up the dealer network, stuck with B&M dealers only and implemented a policy around discounting. But the genie was already out of the bottle and blowing up the house was their idea to fix it.
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Audiophilehi
Member
Hi Mike,
This is the first I am hearing of this. I see no mention of this in the PS Audio forums. My BHK 300’s work just fine.
Hi Mike,
This is the first I am hearing of this. I see no mention of this in the PS Audio forums. My BHK 300’s work just fine.
They deleted it. Thankfully one of our members has screen shots.
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Audiophilehi
Member
Thanks Mike..... I sure would like to see those screen shots.
Audio 1
Active member
My understanding is that PS Audio would offer volume incentives to dealers at times. So of course this fueled the heavy discounts by certain sellers and created a disadvantage for many dealers. If dealer A offers a generous discount, but dealer B offers a deeper discount and is still making money and can ship anywhere they desire then at some point the resale network program will fail, and it did.
Resurrecting a brand that by its own design devalued the products it makes will not be easy.
The only way I see selling direct at full list prices would be successful is to introduce entirely new models. One would have to be quite naive to pay full retail price for something well known to be worth far less. There are far more brands than there are consumers to buy them, so a do over will be a battle. Time will tell and they may pull it off.
Audiophilehi
Member
Thanks Mike!!!
Audiophilehi
Member
Update on the PS Audio BHK 250/300 rust/corrosion issue
“The problem is simple rust from water trapped between two steel plates.Way back in 2015, when we first launched BHK, the bottom plate for the amplifier was built in two pieces. There was the main steel bottom piece and attached to it, in the middle, another steel piece used as a stiffener so the big toroidal transformer didn’t deform the bottom plate during shipping.
To build this assembly, each piece was separately fabricated using laser cutters, then attached to each other with a spot welder. That assembly was then sent out to the platers where it was zinc plated. As part of that plating process the assemblies are washed and dried, then baked to remove any moisture that might eventually cause some rust.
For the first two months of production, the platers neglected to bake the assemblies. Our quality control people caught the issue and returned all the inventory to be rebuilt. Unfortunately, two months of production got out the door and Dirk’s BHKs were among those. He first noticed a discoloration around the outside edges and, when he drilled out the spot welds and separated the two plates he saw the rust inside.
We are still investigating how many amps were affected and then trying to figure out what to do about it. Of course, anyone with an affected amp can get a new bottom plate. It doesn’t look like there’s actually anything other than ugliness to be concerned with as the stiffeners we’ve looked at were more ugly than non functional. There’s likely not enough water inside to cause more ugliness than what we saw but I cannot be sure of that. They certainly aren’t right.
If you want to check your serial numbers, look at the last block. Dirk’s ended in 5G0032 so they were right in the first month. The way to read the serial number, BTW, is simple. The first is the year, so 2015. The G corresponds with the month in alphabetical order. G is the 7th month (counting up from A), and then the last two are the unit ID. So, Dirk’s was number 32, built in July of 2015.
Anything built starting in August of 2015 is fine.”
“The problem is simple rust from water trapped between two steel plates.Way back in 2015, when we first launched BHK, the bottom plate for the amplifier was built in two pieces. There was the main steel bottom piece and attached to it, in the middle, another steel piece used as a stiffener so the big toroidal transformer didn’t deform the bottom plate during shipping.
To build this assembly, each piece was separately fabricated using laser cutters, then attached to each other with a spot welder. That assembly was then sent out to the platers where it was zinc plated. As part of that plating process the assemblies are washed and dried, then baked to remove any moisture that might eventually cause some rust.
For the first two months of production, the platers neglected to bake the assemblies. Our quality control people caught the issue and returned all the inventory to be rebuilt. Unfortunately, two months of production got out the door and Dirk’s BHKs were among those. He first noticed a discoloration around the outside edges and, when he drilled out the spot welds and separated the two plates he saw the rust inside.
We are still investigating how many amps were affected and then trying to figure out what to do about it. Of course, anyone with an affected amp can get a new bottom plate. It doesn’t look like there’s actually anything other than ugliness to be concerned with as the stiffeners we’ve looked at were more ugly than non functional. There’s likely not enough water inside to cause more ugliness than what we saw but I cannot be sure of that. They certainly aren’t right.
If you want to check your serial numbers, look at the last block. Dirk’s ended in 5G0032 so they were right in the first month. The way to read the serial number, BTW, is simple. The first is the year, so 2015. The G corresponds with the month in alphabetical order. G is the 7th month (counting up from A), and then the last two are the unit ID. So, Dirk’s was number 32, built in July of 2015.
Anything built starting in August of 2015 is fine.”
The explanation is mighty confusing. If I understood this right, these BHK amps with the at-risk bottom plates were built for 2 months and shipped to customers. The one that was first discovered corroded was built in 7/2015 being "right in the first month". Yet they say, those that were built in 8/2015 are fine (being the 2nd month). It just doesn't add up. If 7/2015 was the first month, then 8/2015 would be the second month, so the builds that should be OK would be from 9/2015, surely?
And for those who didn't see the photos on the PS Audio Community forums, it wasn't just corrosion between the plates, it seemed that sections of metal were simply missing, all corroded away in to nothing. The explanation has come a long way since originally saying it was only minor zinc plating bleed-through, to then accusing the owner of sabotaging his own amps with acid to make them look bad, to admitting they'd known for four years that a batch of bottom plates weren't made right by the sub-contractor and two months worth of production with bad plates shipped out the door. And all of those built with bad plates are still out there in the wild.
And for those who didn't see the photos on the PS Audio Community forums, it wasn't just corrosion between the plates, it seemed that sections of metal were simply missing, all corroded away in to nothing. The explanation has come a long way since originally saying it was only minor zinc plating bleed-through, to then accusing the owner of sabotaging his own amps with acid to make them look bad, to admitting they'd known for four years that a batch of bottom plates weren't made right by the sub-contractor and two months worth of production with bad plates shipped out the door. And all of those built with bad plates are still out there in the wild.
Audiophilehi
Member
Hi Brodric...in answer to your 1st paragraph I think Paul McGowan might have miss printed August 2015 and should be starting September of 2015.
As for the 2nd paragraph I would hope that PSA would do the right thing and recall the units built in the 1st 2 months of production. I have to say that PSA is tops when it comes to customer service so I’m sure they will make good.
Jack
Active member
Paul
He's just going back and forth between the two forums trying to keep the pot stirred. He actually doesn't care as he's never owned a BHK product.
He's just going back and forth between the two forums trying to keep the pot stirred. He actually doesn't care as he's never owned a BHK product.
BlueFox
New member
Well, 2015 was four years ago, so if they haven’t made good yet then it isn’t going to happen.