Geoff49

Sorry - best image I have for now. I can't find "Lighting Partners" on the interweb, but I see where you're coming from, Dave. I hope someone out there actually knows the company and goes "oh yes,that's ..."!

I have found a better picture of "what looks like the mains supply unit for the dimmers". Can anyone make out or recognise the name? It seems it's not homemade, just not Pulsar... Thank you for your contributions - access is not that easy, even on the tallest of ladders I can't get to the back of the rack! But from below I can see that this "mains unit" has three-phase in from a 63A Ceeform.

Hmm, good point! Thank you, James. Yes, looking at them, the MCBs don't line up either. I must admit I assumed they were all Pulsar, but maybe not. Maybe they were 'Am-Dram' built to distribute a phase each to the three dimmer packs. Do you know if the three dimmer packs pictured are single phase or three-phase? Because they had three neon's labelled V1, V2 and V3, I thought they would be, but one phase each may make more sense. Does anyone have any schematics they coudl post that shows how these are connected together? I'm a sound-man really, but trying to learn about the old and the new lighting so I can be more useful to our Amateur theatre.

Hi all, I just had a 'hopefully simple' query about the Pulsar dimmer packs in the photos. Sorry they are poor, but they are a long way up... The query is "which phase of the three-phase input is the single breaker connected to?" It's the one which isolates the pair of 15A and 13A sockets. Top left unit in photo 1 and top right in photo 2. I'm sorry I have no idea what these unit model numbers are, haven't found much on the internet through picture searches, TBH, and it looks like Pulsar no longer have a web prescence! The reason for asking is that although we've stopped using the dimmer packs, as we have gone all LED lighting now, the LEDs are all powered from the 15A and 13A sockets, and before we re-engineer it, it would be good to know which of the three I/c phases that particular breaker is on! Thanks, Geoff

When we used to have to solder the ultra-flexible headphone cables at the BBC - the ones covered in cloth or made with litz-type wire, we were taught to take a single strand of copper wire and tightly coil it around the stripped end of the cable in question, and then solder that.

We have four of these mics over the stage as ‘Stage Listen’ feeds in our Am Dram theatre. They have sounded pretty ropey and it was only yesterday I actually found out what they were - I was going to undo the xlr to see if they were balanced or not, but I could not unscrew any one of the four XLRs! we start a new show tonight for 2 weeks so I was not going to investigate any further until it’s finished, but it was a coincidence that this got posted yesterday and I saw it once home! We are using two GZ500 boundaries as a stage listen for now. Are the original XLRs really tight on these, I could not see a grub screw I the half-light? As they are AT I presume they are fully repairable if found to be faulty? …and the spec sheet suggests these should each be about 3m apart on our tiny stage - as we have four that’s impossible! Would they be better off as a pair and two boundaries, rather than all four? Or moving two of the ATs further back (they are above the front curtain at the moment). I had planned to reposition them all once they were all working so would be interested to hear others opinions - PS sorry if it’s hijacked the thread! when I’ve opened them I’ll be happy to give the OP the answer, if still needed in a couple of weeks!

You might want to look at Canford Audio and/or the clocks from Glensound, Wharton, Sonifex, Evertz. Yes, they are broadcast-based, but that does mean they can usually be racked. I don’t know if they do what you want, or if within the budget, but there’s plenty of choice! Although most will be NTP, I would expect them to be able to free-run too.

I would suggest checking the hdmi resolution of the camera and what the monitors will work with. I had to connect the camera to a ‘tv’ monitor first and set the resolution to suit the pc monitors. The camera was factory set to 1080p30 and the monitors would not see it; they wanted 1080p50 or 60, IIRC. Once I changed the camera output they have been ok for the shorter runs on cat5, the longer runs needed cat6 as previously mentioned.

…or if it must be magnetic, you can get flexible magnet on a reel, which you could use double-sided tape to stick it to the inflatable. It may need a long length or several contact points. https://cpc.farnell.com/velleman-sa/magnet9/flexible-magnetic-strip-300-x/dp/SN36817?ost=flexible+magnet or this stuff, an inch wide, already has sticky tape attached.

Double-sided/sticky Velcro?

Thomann sell sm58 grilles and they list them as being suitable for beta58 too. https://www.thomann.de/gb/thomann_sm58_korb.htm

I’ve just installed an AIDA HD100A; hdmi output includes replaceable lens for £300 from CVP.com (although its now £355, prices are flying up!) the 4k version is about double. cant comment on the latency yet.

We used to call them Molex. Pitch was 0.1”, but other spacings exist… CPC/RS/ Amazon

You could try Pegasus in Ashford, Kent. Don’t know if they can do this. My son is Operations Manager, - you can but ask…. https://pegasusprecision.co.uk/

I’m not familiar with the unit under discussion here, but you have drawn a diode in parallel with the LED but in the same direction. From what I recall of my electronics, I would suggest it’s probably in the reverse direction, and would protect the LED in the case of a reverse DC voltage being applied, or a back EMF coming from somewhere (like a relay coil). The diode in series with the LED would only drop 0.7v and so a volt dropper is unlikely. The supply voltage could be AC, DC or reversed-polarity DC, which may explain the diodes being there. Do you know what the supply voltages are?

Ian_P: you're welcome. For that unit (and probably others) just make sure you install cat6 (minimum) and not cat5 or cat5e... and yes the remote RX take power from the cat cable - but they do have the dc-input socket is you find you need power at the end of a long run. Check it works, before you buy, if your runs are more than 40m, as the spec is 40m max. This is my first job to sort out - some displays are unreliable on this system, and I think its because the cabling is 'only' cat5e and run in close proximity to mains and everything else! Running some temporary cat6 tielines in free space and they have been rock-solid so far.

Do you have structured cabling (Cat5e/6)? We are using a cctv camera producing hdmi which feeds an Antiference hdmi0108scat unit which converts the source hdmi into a proprietary format and sends this down the cat6 (recommended) cables and then local RX units convert back to hdmi. If you can get the audio into it by using an hdmi combiner then you can use the tv speakers as well, although our feeds are on separate LS.

I’m sure Knotty Ash have heard all the jokes about diddy-men, but just to say they also built us a load of height adjustable desks!

Try Knotty Ash. BBC have used them, so have I privately. https://www.knottyashwoodworking.com