Mackie DL32 Disaster!

[@anthonythegamingboi7061]

Just to shed some light on what might have happened. Had the same exact situation with my DL32R a few weeks ago. A friend had the situation happen a month prior. It might have to do with insufficient power at the location. I have a furman with a readout and usually get 121 good voltage. At this location, i was getting 112. The mackie has a amber light on front that will blink when you arent getting good power. I powered the unit on and off and switched the outlet and everything was fine. As far as anyone having issues with channels and Aux that stop working. The mackie is notorious for the ribbon cables coming loose inside. this will cause a channel or aux to stop working. Once a month i open it up and clean and reset all of the ribbon cables. There is a video on here that shows you how to do that. I still always carry my 1608 with me to every gig.

[@TheGiggingGuitarPlayer]

We did check the power, and later reset all the ribbon cables. It didn't help. I suspect it had more to do with the bottle of beer that was spilled directly into the unit. We cleaned it up as best we could, but still no Aux sends. Thanks

[@BiggyRatShanksRkive]

WOW! DISASTROUS! BUT NICE SAVE👍 SPARE PARTS ALWAYS GOOD!👍

[@oneminuteguitarlessons6060]

I had virtually the same thing happen with my Mackie DL32S. I took to have it serviced and they never could find the problem. I bought and keep the 16 channel version with us at all times but luckily haven’t needed it!

[@TheGiggingGuitarPlayer]

We never did figure it out. Sold the unit and bought a new one.

[@Gratefulman1965]

Any news on what went wrong on the DL32 as of yet? You folks got lucky with the 1608 along with Jeff’s input. Cold fries is the price some pay. Sounded like a pretty good mix after all was said and done though.👍

[@TheGiggingGuitarPlayer]

Jeff took the unit apart, cleaned and reset all the cables, but could not fix the issue. A year previous, the unit took a "beer bath" when someone spilled a beer directly into it. At that point, it was completely nonfunctional. He took it apart and cleaned and reset all the connectors, and it worked just fine for the rest of the year. Possibly sitting idle in the truck over winter, and some residual effects of the beer bath were to blame. It has been replaced with a new unit, and is being treated with more care. It won't be spending any winters sitting out in the band truck.

[@georgelevin6134]

I guess I’ve been lucky. Have been using a DL32R for probably 5 years or more doing bluegrass festivals and your average weekend music venue. Have never had so much as a hiccup out of the unit.

[@TheGiggingGuitarPlayer]

Glad to hear that. Hope it continues.

[@AudioMuze]

Hey, if it happens again you may want to repatch the offending outputs. I’ve had a few times now when my dl32r has stopped passing audio. The only way I can fix it is to go to the patching screen, deselect the patch for that output, then re-select it. Hope that helps.

[@TheGiggingGuitarPlayer]

I can't remember if we did this. I'll certainly keep it in mind if it happens again. The band bought a new one. If I can get my hands on the old one I'll try it. Thanks!

[@MrAdamJoel]

We call those experiences “Firedrills” ! Good job

[@TheGiggingGuitarPlayer]

Ha! Good name!

[@JakeAikens]

I think the lesson is don't leave your gear outside in the truck in the middle of winter. Just sayin'.

[@TheGiggingGuitarPlayer]

True. Get a garage. And don't spill beer into your mixer.

[@yordicui]

Did you open the dl32 up and check ribbon for moisture ?

[@TheGiggingGuitarPlayer]

We did. Cleaned, re-seated cables, etc. It was sold to someone, sure that it could be easily fixed. I haven't heard.

[@jfeick]

Yeah, my burger was kinda cold, too! Glad I had my mixer in the van. I had a bunch of snapshots from the band saved on the old iPad from when we were using MasterFader 4, but since upgrading to the DL32s and moving up to MasterFader 5 the DL1608 would no longer sync with the old 30 pin iPad and MF4 and could no longer pull up those shows. At least there was a basic channel template and I had photos on my phone with the starting gain levels - but no EQs, effects, etc saved. Got us through the night anyway. Yeah Bob, the cold fries just didn't cut it.

[@TheGiggingGuitarPlayer]

You saved the day, Joe. Someday we are going to get to eat our fries.

[@Iam_Dunn]

You guys rocked! ❤ from 🇨🇦 :)

[@Iam_Dunn]

Yeah, I’ve had an 8yr or so love/hate relationship with my DL-32R. Had channels die for no reason, outputs just quit and many other gremlins. I know you said you “rebooted” it, but I’m not sure if you meant power cycle it, or did you actually factory reset it? If you did just power cycle it, I have found factory resetting it usually helps. There is a tiny hole to the right of the Network light, and right above output 2 that you can stick a paper clip into and hold down the little button inside to reset the unit. :) ❤ from 🇨🇦 :) ps… the band was smokin’! I immediately starting singing along!

[@TheGiggingGuitarPlayer]

The mixer does not belong to me. It went home with the guitar player. He was unable to make it work again. I assume he would try all of the above. They have a 2nd one they use now. I'm going to take a look at the old one....one of these days.

[@user-jx3jp3gb4x]

My guess is that all the auxes were assigned to a common DCA, and if that DCA was either muted or turned all the way down that would explain why you had level on all the aux mix masters, but no audio coming out of the XLR outputs.

[@TheGiggingGuitarPlayer]

That would do it, but I don't think that was the case. There were certainly no aux masters assigned to DCAs in the show I called up. We had another tech look at it as well. I think most likely it was the beer bath it took on the previous gig.

[@user-jx3jp3gb4x]

@@TheGiggingGuitarPlayer do the aux outputs work now?

[@TheGiggingGuitarPlayer]

@@user-jx3jp3gb4x Neither we, nor the repair tech we went to could get them to work. We sold it it and bought a new one. This one lives in a road case, and is kept away from wayward beer bottles. I don't know if it ever worked again. It was an "as is" sale with full disclosure.

[@user-jx3jp3gb4x]

@@TheGiggingGuitarPlayer thanks for getting back :)