Sounlab Colourscans - Fans mis-wired?

[jtcoops]

Hi Guys

 

I've got a couple of Soundlab Colourscans. They run exceptionally hot, and one of the lamps has failed after about 10 hours use (longest continued use was about 4 hours so not hammered at all).

 

I've noticed the fans suck in air rather than blow air out. I've got a couple of Geni Mojo scanners - the fans of which extract the hot air from the unit which seems logical.

 

Is it likely that the fans on the Colourscans are mis-wired and spinning the wrong way? In a hot environment, sucking in hot moist ambient air seems wrong.

 

Dont want to rewire the fans though if this is a design rather than mistake.

 

Any advice much appreciated.

 

Thanks

jeff

[Brian]

In a hot environment, sucking in hot moist ambient air seems wrong.

Even if you blow hot air out it's going to be replaced by your hot moist ambient air.

[Richard CSL]

Drill a big hole in the lamp support plate 32mm this will defo extend the lamp life . I have done this in all 52 that I have supplied over her in the heat.

[KevinE]

This is one of the perils of cheap lighting! Hot fixtures and short lamp life.

 

I doubt turning it around will help much, I'm sure the designers will have thought about this.

[DrV]

Dont want to rewire the fans though if this is a design rather than mistake.

 

Whatever way you decide to improve the airflow, swapping the wires around on a DC fan doesn't change the direction it blows - they are not ordinary DC motors, they have a little bit of electronics in them and this only works when connected the right way round (red +ve, black -ve). If you need a fan to blow in the opposite direction you need to unscrew it and re-install it facing the other way.

 

Dave

[DMXBandit]

I used to have a few colourscans, that's the normal fan direction for them. I remember you can put the lamp holder in either way round, I cant remember if there was anything else obstructing the air flow but turning the holder so the lamp is exposed to the fan may help...?

[lightsource]

Hi Guys

 

I've got a couple of Soundlab Colourscans.

 

Any advice much appreciated.

 

I bought 8 of these a few years ago for a specific job. The original lamps supplied with these units all failed within 5 hours.

 

Replaced them all with either Phillips or GE A1/259 lamps (can't remember which) and they never failed with lamp issues.

 

Did have various pan / tilt issues (motor/cables) cracked Dichroic optics, and focussing lenses that just fell out of the fixture.

 

Oh, and yes, they do run hot, and when you've got a few of them on a stage, sound like a 747 taking off at Heathrow......

 

A very poor product, that has no longevity.

[KevinE]

At the end of the day they are designed for the corner-of-pub DJ with a goalpost stand and a 'Now 99' album.

[Richard CSL]

I beg to differ, I have been selling and using the colourscan since it first came on the market (in blue).

 

Yes they are almost the cheapest scan on the market, but how many in the same bracket can boast 11 gobos. split colours, UV woods filter, built in programs (7) that can all be selected to run consecutively, reversable pan or tilt, or swopping. relatively smoothe pan and tilt for 8 bit. lamp save for end of night cooling.

 

I agree they run very hot, I have tried turning the fan around to little advantage, I have drilled large holes in the lamp base plate, this helps, and the tilt wires can crack after prolonged use, I have had many transformer ac connections fail, also some relay solder contacts have failed, but for the money they are quite exceptional. please view the following video. Note these have been modified to have a dimmer circuit internally.

 

[dmxtothemax]

I would think that a fan that is blowing air into a luminare would last longer,

because the air would be cooler than a fan pulling hot air out of a luminare?

Perhaps finding other ways to improve the cooling process would be helpfull,

Perhaps a fan that moves more air?

 

Hi Guys

 

I've got a couple of Soundlab Colourscans. They run exceptionally hot, and one of the lamps has failed after about 10 hours use (longest continued use was about 4 hours so not hammered at all).

 

I've noticed the fans suck in air rather than blow air out. I've got a couple of Geni Mojo scanners - the fans of which extract the hot air from the unit which seems logical.

 

Is it likely that the fans on the Colourscans are mis-wired and spinning the wrong way? In a hot environment, sucking in hot moist ambient air seems wrong.

 

Dont want to rewire the fans though if this is a design rather than mistake.

 

Any advice much appreciated.

 

Thanks

jeff

[dbuckley]

Note these have been modified to have a dimmer circuit internally.

You cant just drop a statement like that and say no more!

 

Details B-)

[david.elsbury]

I second David's comments. Details please! I was at one point trying to find AC 220v -> 24v 250w transformers to do a similar thing, but your way might be easier... those trafos are near impossible to source over here!

[Bobbsy]

I would think that a fan that is blowing air into a luminare would last longer,

because the air would be cooler than a fan pulling hot air out of a luminare?

 

Well, I can't speak specifically about this piece of kit but you're almost always better off extracting heat away from electronic gear than blowing outside air into it.

 

Once you've sucked the hot air out, it's still replaced by outside air at ambient temperature but the process is more effective because you're not trying to push more air into an already-full container.

 

Bigger than a scanner I know, but I once earned a nice paycheque consulting for a certain TV company who had a major problem with the racks for their graphics department overheating. They'd spent an almost 6-figure sum on air conditioning to blow cold air INTO the room but this hadn't solved the problem. My solution was extract fans sucking hot air out of the racks and a bigger one sucking air out of the room. Problem solved.

 

Bob

[Richard CSL]

Note these have been modified to have a dimmer circuit internally.

You cant just drop a statement like that and say no more!

 

Details B-)

 

 

 

Sorry to dissapoint you guys but all I did was add a triac and an opto isolator into the lamp circuit then feed pwm signal from an old dimmer pack. result below.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnO9NdMeuws

[david.elsbury]

So with, say, Figure 11 on this page, http://sound.westhost.com/project62c.htm is there any reason that the dimmer side of the circuit, couldn't be interspersed between the lamp and the 24v supply in a cheapo scanner?

 

Or have I got it totally wrong and there's a lot more to it than that?