No Sound Pro-97

[WisconsinRailfan]

Good Day All!

Well I was listening to my scanner last evening, then all of the sudden, no sound. I replaced the batteries, adjust the SQ, still no sound. , I pugged in the headphones, same thing, unplugged the headphones still no sound. However, I can hear the beeps when I press the buttons. At the time, I was listening to the local HAM repeaters. Any ideas? Thanks in advance for any advice, this scanner is less than a week old, so I guess my only option is to return it, I just hope, they can clone it to the new one, I spent several hours setting it up "just right" as I don't have the cable to connect to my PC. But has a computer geek, I would like to know what happened, even if I am not going to fix it myself.

 

[shaft]

Im wondering if it was an issue with certain production models of the 97. When I bought mine a few weeks ago, well the first one I bought did the same thing right out of the box. It was an obvious returned unit when I opened the box. Nothing I did would get the sound working so I just went and returned it.

If you have only had it a week, go buy the programming cable, download Win97 and save yourself the trouble of re-programming it, then return it for a new one.

 

[gmclam]

Silent PRO-97

Well if you are getting beeps when you press keys, that tells me the audio amplifier and speaker are functional. Since you do not get "rushing" with the squelch wide open, that would lead me to believe the discriminator IC failed. Are you receiving (via the display) CT/DC tones? Or does it stop correctly on trunked channels? If those functions work, I'll have to check the schematic; there is not much between that and the squelch and audio amp.

 

[ftwskies]

There's a known issue with the volume pots on these things going bad. Mine did the same thing right at the one month mark. Question: if you put the speaker right up to your ear can you hear squelch rushing very very faintly as you turn the knob?

 

[gmclam]

There's a known issue with the volume pots on these things going bad. Mine did the same thing right at the one month mark. Question: if you put the speaker right up to your ear can you hear squelch rushing very very faintly as you turn the knob?

Looking at the schematic, there are a few components between the discriminator output and the audio amp. The beep signal is inserted AFTER the volume pot. I agree and think the volume pot is VERY LIKELY the problem.

 

[WisconsinRailfan]

I tend to agree that it must be the volume pot..

"if you put the speaker right up to your ear can you hear squelch rushing very very faintly as you turn the knob?" It's hard to tell it is very faint

I took it back, I had the guy at the store break out a cable, so I could clone it.

However, seeing that others have had this issue, would anyone recommend taking it back and buying the BC246T? it's about $80 more than the Pro97's sale price?

 

[WisconsinRailfan]

How easy is it to replace the volume pot?

 

[gmclam]

How easy is it to replace the volume pot?

It all depends on your experience. I'd say it is like replacing the water pump on most autos. For those who do it all the time, it is neither easy nor difficult. But you do have to dismantle quite a bit to get to it (and put all those parts back together again.

What makes the volume pot in the '97 a little more difficult than it needs to be is the fact you'll also have to replace the squelch pot, since they are one component. Thank you GRE.