[Chris Baucom]

I have a Yamaha HTR-5250 with 5.1 and DTS, along with varied DSP's. Last night it starting shutting off automatically while watching a DTS disk at moderate volume. Turning the unit back on revealed the message "Check SP wires" on the front panel, indicating to me that there is probably some safety circuit being tripped. I have checked all the speaker wires and connections seem good and tight and there are no positive/negative crossovers. All my speakers are 8 ohm and the selector switch on the back of the unit is set accordingly. Frankly I haven't touched my speaker wires in two years and they are routed out of sight and reach (away from the kiddies) so I feel pretty good about the connections. The unit shuts off much less often at low volumes.

Has anyone ever heard of this or had this happen. Could it be a short or something internal to the receiver, or do speaker wires degrade?

thanks for any help.

[Bob McElfresh]

This is almost always caused by a short in the speaker wires or internal to the speaker.

Did you check the speaker wires at the SPEAKER ends, not just behind the receiver?

You might even need to trace your wires. One guy had his pet rabbit 'snack' on the speaker wires causing a short.

If that does not solve the problem, try this:

Disconnect the back speakers from behind the receiver.

Play some movie at loud volumes. Does the unit shut off? If not, the problem is somewhere in the rear-speaker or wires.

Continue by disconnecting the L/R speakers and playing something loud. If the unit stays stable, check the L/R speakers and wires. If the unit still turns off, it's the Center speaker & wires.

PS: If you have not touched things in 2 years, you are due for a HT Spring Cleaning:

- Disconnect speaker wires at both ends. Cut off the exposed ends and strip to expose fresh-copper and re-connect. I really like the dual-banana plugs (2xx-308) from Radio Shack. They make it easy to do a neat & safe wire job even with 12 ga. For behind the receiver, check out the single-bananas (2xx-306).

- Disconnect/re-connect every connection on the back of the equipment. Now would be a good time to dust. An old tooth-brush works great for scrubbing the RCA jacks and a new-but-cheap paintbrush can also reach and dust small places.

- Use a laser-pen to check the angle of the speakers and see where they are pointing.

- Finally, use the SPL meter and test-tones to level-adjust everything.

Good Luck.

[Chris Baucom]

Bob,

Thanks for the great tips! I'll give them a try this evening. I also agree it is time to a little cleaning.

[John Gido]

Chris,

I had a similar problem with my Yamaha RX-V595. It got to the point that every time I would try and turn it on, it would immediately shut off.

The problem turned out to be a relay switch inside the unit connected to a switched outlet in the back of the unit. Seems that the relay was "welded" in the open position and had to be replaced. Have not had a problem since.

[Chris Baucom]

Thanks to you both for your feedback. Friday night I followed Bob's suggested cleaning and test sequence and the unit is not shutting off anymore. Turns out one of the main speaker wires must have had a poor connection or a short. After cleaning all the speaker connections and restripping the wires, the problem is gone.

Thanks to you both for your help!