Horizon 24 lighting desk

[AdrianW]

Morin' All,

 

Just had an Horizon24 lighting desk land on my bench from a local school.

 

I have no info on this beastie, other than its a 24 ch two present desk with not alot else. Only appears to be one DIN connector on the back and nothing else - they don't even seem to have given me a PSU.

 

I'm assuming its DMX(?) but doesnt seem to have the standard output ......

 

Anybody got any more info on this creature?

 

Thanks

 

Adrian

[Brian]

I'm assuming its DMX(?) but doesnt seem to have the standard output ......

They get the power down the line from the dimmers. DMX is, IIRC, on pins 2 and 3 with screen on 1. Power is on 4 and 5 but my scribbled note from the last one I sorted doesn't say which way round. Two minutes with a multimeter should sort that out tho'.

[richard]

Worth bearing in mind with these that I believe that the desks and dimmers were made to order by local councils for their schools (at least in Cambridge) with the desk made specially for the dimmers. This seemed to mean that the guy who made it didn't sync the timing on the desk or dimmers to the standard DMX protocol, but instead to each other meaning that there are often problems with getting other DMX equipment to work with the dimmers (even when the right power cable is made)

 

You also must make sure that you get the pin configuartion correct when making an adaptor as people have been known to blow desks up by shoving the power into the signal pins.

 

If you need more info the guys at Stage Electrics (Formerly Theatre Direct) in Cambridge used to have to do a lot of work with these systems (usually sorting out the council's ####-ups) and have been helpful to me in the past with this stuff.

[AdrianW]

Thanks for the replies guys....

 

What you have said seems to make some sense. The desk is from a School & has been donated to the local AmDram when the school closed down. I know that the school did have Zero88 chilli dimmers installed & understand that this desk was used with these, no one seems to know how the connection was made.

 

I've opened up the desk & found that all the boards are marked "Custom Theatrical Services". I seem to think that this is a local based outfit that grew out of the Custom Curtain Company in Ilkeston, so it would all kinda make sense.

 

Any idea what the power supply rail would be? 17-20V as common on analogue packs perhaps?

 

Thanks for the help so far.

 

Adrian

[cruciblebrum]

I have also come across the Horizon desk and dimmers, (which has the 5 pin din which also powers the desk.) I have the same problem, I want to run the dimmers from my DMX desk which has a the standard 5 pin XLR

 

I have read the article from 2007 So did you make up the lead din to 5 pin to 5 XLR and did it work?

 

Is the horizon desk compatible with the standard 512 DMX on the 5 pin din plug have I got the pin out correct pin 1 screen 2 - 3 + DMX pin 4& 5 not connected.

 

john

[Brian]

...did you make up the lead din to 5 pin to 5 XLR and did it work?

I actually modifed the wall box, removing the 5-pin DIN and putting a 5-pin XLR in it's place

 

Is the horizon desk compatible with the standard 512 DMX

Yes, in theory. The last swap I did replaced the Horizon desk with a Frog.

 

... on the 5 pin din plug have I got the pin out correct pin 1 screen 2 - 3 + DMX pin 4& 5 not connected.

Yes.

 

I'd suggest that before you buy a desk (if you are going to) you do a test. The demux in the dimmer racks is a work of art - the whole DMX receive circuitry is done with discrete logic with a few adjustable timing tweaks! The couple I've seen have worked with standard desks but there is no real guarantee.

[PyROm]

Hi, Ive just come to try and replace the desk on one of these. I have gone for making up a male-male din-XLR lead and from pinouts I saw above connected pins 1 to 3 straight through, leaving 4 and 5 disconnected, was this right?

 

When plugging it in all lights come on and stay on regardless of what I do, except for one light on channel 13 which I can control between about 1/8 and 1/3 brightness. The DMX light on the dimmer unit is lit up. Ive checked the lead with a multimeter and all wires ive connected are connected, with none of them shorting to each other or the connector sheild.

 

Do I need to do anything else? I havent taken the front off the dimmer box, do I need to fiddle with the mentioned timeings?

 

Thanks

Robin

 

 

 

A concurrent post has been automatically merged from this point on.

 

Hi, sorry, I think ive found my mistake, I made the mistake of assuming the pinout on an XLR connector went 1,2,3,4,5 not 1,4,3,5,2. Will have another go at it on Monday.

[MarkPAman]

XLRs do go 1 2 3 4 5 - See the pdf here XLR 5

 

DINs go 1 4 2 5 3 DIN numbering

 

E2A or the other way around - depends on which end you start :)

[PyROm]

:( thanks... its always the smaller connector that needs resoldering :) .